Mary Carolyn Beaudry

This book provides an excellent introduction to the field of historical archaeology. Using a single case study to demonstrate the power of their interdisciplinary approach, the authors create a fresh portrait of nineteenth-century domestic life in the company-owned boardinghouses of the Boott Cotton Mills of Lowell, Massachusetts. From a compendious three-volume site report the authors have distilled the essence of their findings. They discuss the methods and theory of historical archaeology and demonstrate its strengths and limitations in the examination of Lowell. Combining documentary evidence, oral and architectural history, and environmental and material culture studies, they trace the deterioration of living conditions for mill workers and their families as owners began substituting native-born employees with immigrant laborers. The detection of environmental decay and its implications for the health and well-being of the boardinghouse populations offer a compelling illustration of how information deduced from historical archaeology can augment and modify findings based on conventional historical documents.

The Oxford Handbook of Material Culture Studies introduces and reviews current thinking in the interdisciplinary field of material culture studies. Drawing together approaches from archaeology, anthropology, geography, and Science and Technology Studies, through twenty-eight specially commissioned essays by leading international researchers, the volume explores contemporary issues and debates in a series of themed sections - Disciplinary Perspectives, Material Practices, Objects and Humans, Landscapes and the Built Environment, and Studying Particular Things. From Coca-Cola, chimpanzees, artworks, and ceramics, to museums, cities, human bodies, and magical objects, the Handbook is an essential resource for anyone with an interest in materiality and the place of material objects in human social life, both past and present. A comprehensive bibliography enhances its usefulness as a research tool.

The Cambridge Companion to Historical Archaeology provides an overview of the international field of historical archaeology (c. AD 1500 to the present) through seventeen specially-commissioned essays from leading researchers in the field. The volume explores key themes in historical archaeology including documentary archaeology, the writing of historical archaeology, colonialism, capitalism, industrial archaeology, maritime archaeology, cultural resource management and urban archaeology. Three special sections explore the distinctive contributions of material culture studies, landscape archaeology and the archaeology of buildings and the household. Drawing on case studies from North America, Europe, Australasia, Africa and around the world, the volume captures the breadth and diversity of contemporary historical archaeology, considers archaeology's relationship with history, cultural anthropology and other periods of archaeological study, and provides clear introductions to alternative conceptions of the field. This book is essential reading for anyone studying or researching the material remains of the recent past.