The Languages of Archaeology: Dialogue, Narrative, and Writing: Social Archaeology

She examines rhetoric, narrative, and dialogue as crucial topics for archaeological reflection, discusses the recent explosion of experimentation with new forms of writing within archaeology - fuelled by sources including feminism, post-structuralism, and critiques of representation from descendant groups who see archaeological sites as their cultural heritage - and demonstrates how this experimentation with writing might lead to a sustained critical examination of writing.

The author draws on the work of Mikhail Bakhtin and Roland Barthes to explore the nature and significance of dialogue within archaeological writing. By examining a selection of different kinds of archaeological texts, she shows how the creation of narratives is a practice that literally binds the discipline of archaeology together from the field through to formal and informal presentation of interpretations.