Watching discussion about Harman and Latour from the sidelines, I came
across this article:
Lucas Introna (2009): “Ethics and the Speaking of Things.” Theory Culture
Society 26(4): 25-46. <http://tcs.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/26/4/25>.
Haven't read it properly, but there are some interesting ideas in there
about the impossible yet necessary ethos of letting things be. What I find
striking is the impact of Latour and STS on philosophy - yet still no
mention of the significant anthropological and archaeological contributions
to this debate. Is this absence about a continuing mistrust outside of our
disciplines about our colonial and antiquarian echoes? Then again, not many
philosophers in this area work with chemists either...
So, just wondering how colleagues on the list are reading these recent
contributions to the debates. Many of you have talked about the important
work that archaeology does in terms of specificity. I'm probably out of the
loop on such things so this may already be happening, but seems to me that
it's a good time for a group of smart archaeologists to propose a special
volume for something like Theory, Culture & Society or CTheory.net? So many
of you have been involved in terrific-looking events in the UK recently, so
perhaps this is in process?
And I'd love to hear if anyone's done any contemporary archaeology of the
mid-20th-century ghost towns of coastal BC. Just returned from personal
trip to Ocean Falls, camping with my dad who washed up there off the boat
from Italy in 1956. Ocean Falls began with mill owners ousting the Heiltsuk
people from a traditional village site in 1903/04. The falls were dammed
and the village was flooded out. Town and mill site now being demolished at
a rate of knots due to asbestos danger and a multinational Atlantic salmon
fish farm set up a few years ago threatens wild salmon populations. A few
people remain in the area, relying on summer tourists, fishing trips and a
range of semi-legal activities to get by. What now appears as a very
remote, middle-of-nowhere place was a bustling centre for central coast
First Nations before it became a 5,000-strong hub for new immigrants to
Canada, with people coming from the UK, Germany, Eastern Europe, Japan,
China, Italy, India. Crown Zellerbach used to greet men stepping off the
train from Eastern Canada, enticing them to Ocean Falls with the promise of
easy money. Lack of single women, high-stakes gambling, the perpetual rain
and the chemical cocktails of the pulp and paper industry led to extremely
high staff turnover. There's a rich archive of documents and photographs
and a growing oral history, but no one had seen any archaeologists...
Nearly Normal Norm's collection of things *rescued* from abandoned houses
reminded me of Caitlin DeSilvey's 2006 article in the Jrl of Mat Cult 11
'Observed Decay: Telling Stories with Mutable Things'.
All best
Angela
----------------------
A A Piccini
Lecturer in Screen Studies
Drama: Theatre, Film, Television
School of Arts
University of Bristol
Cantocks Close, Woodland Road
Bristol BS8 1UP
E: [log in to unmask]
Skype: aapiccini
W: www.bris.ac.uk/drama/staff_research/angela_piccini/
************************************************************************
From Jan-Aug 2009 I am a Visiting Scholar in the Centre for Cinema Studies
and the Department of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia.
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