Behavioral Archaeology and the "Pompeii Premise"

It is argued that "behavioral archaeology," as it has been advocated by M. B. Schiffer, represents a series of partially misguided postures relative to some important points of debate common in the 1960s. Due to failures to understand some points at issue, behavioral archaeologists appear to embrace many of the methods and goals of traditional archaeology, and thereby present a "reactionary" position rather than a "revisionist" position, as it has claimed. The issues upon which behavioral archaeology appears most reactionary are points most urgently in need of change, if archaeology is to progress as a discipline contributing both to our knowledge of the past and to our understanding of historical trends.

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