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A METHODOLOGICAL FOOTNOTE: SAMPLING AND REPLICABILITY IN
ARCHAEOLOGY
Colin Pardoe
Pcter Brown's critique of Sim and Thorne (1990) is
timely and insightful: the puberty of our discipline,
where increasing professionalism is accompanied by
growing pains, should be enjoyed. With that in mind, I
would like to take up a small point with which Brown
ends his criticism, namely 'that information of this
type is not data in the scientific sense and probably
should not be published'. And hexc I thought that no
one was reading AA (see Pardoe and Webb 1986;
Pardoe 1986)!
Brown is quite correct about evidence. It is central
to science and scientific method. We must be able to
replicate analyses and to assess evidence in principle.
However, we need to be clear about our investigative
goals in terms of our brand of science, differentiating
between pattern and process analysis (or, if you prefer
archaeological jargon, pmessual and historical,
respectively). Archaeology and skeletal biology in
their historical goals rely on unique events: the King
Island skeleton is the King Island skeleton and no other
will do. In this I agree with Brown.
In the analysis of pattern however, then just as any
old electron will do for physics experiments, so too
could a researcher find and excavate a putative 14,000
year old skeleton on King Island, in principle. The
exact individual and derived measurements are only
sampled from a population and these observations
form a sample that we can investigate. The actual
measurements cannot be corroborated, but different
samples may be. In this sense, there is nothing wrong
with using data from skeletal remains that have been
reburied. If physicists had to chase down the same
electron each time they wanted to do an experiment,
our knowledge of the universe would be scant.
Division of Anthropology, South Australian Museum,North Terrace, Adelaide, S A 5000,Australia.
Australian Archaeology, Number 38, 1994
A Methodological Footnote: Sampling and Replicability in Archaeology
The beauty of archaeological or palaeoanthropological study is the complexity of behaviour and fom
that is the product both of history, the unique combination of events producing the record of the past, and
of mechanisms that pattern what we see. As one
regional segment of the discipline that has had to take
on many important social values, we have been part of
perhaps the most important life stage of archaeology;
an awareness of our place in society as much as
the search for objectivity in a scientific framework
An agreement between Aboriginal people and archaeologist that remains are reburied after some degree of
study is a social contract that does not demean the
science. This is the current state of play, but if we
wish skeletal biology to fade away completely, then
we can ignore data.
Data can be successfully assessed as has been
shown by Brown. Mistakes can be caught, but if
we refuse to accept the results of our colleagues then
something is seriously wrong with the guild/ apprentice nature of the discipline and with our teaching
methods.
References
Pardoe, C. and S. Webb 1986 Prehistoric human skeletal
remains from Cowra and the Macquarie Marsh, NSW.
Australian Archaeology 227-26.
Pardoe, C. 1988 The Mallee Cliffs burial (central River
Murray) and population based archaeology. Australian
Archaeology. 27:45-62.
Sim, R. and A. Thorne 1990 Pleistocene human remains from
King Island, Southeastern Australia. Australian A rchaeology 3 1:44-51.
THE GRACILE MALE SKELETON FROM LATE PLEISTOCENE KING ISLAND,
AUSTRALIA
AIan Thorne and Robin Sim
In his response to our paper (Sim and Thome
1990) on the discovery of late Pleistocene human
remains from King Island, Peter Brown (1994) raises
an important and nxurring issue - the duty of prehistorians and palaeoanthropologists to report field data
accurately and as fully as circumstances permit, as the
basis for any interpretation or discussion.
Brown rightly sets high standards, based presumably on a personal approach that he would take
were he to undertake fieldwork in Australia himself.
He admits he opposed publication of our brief field
report, arguing that since the skeletal materials were
reburied they were not available for reassessment or
further study. As he says now, 'information of this
type is not data in the scientific sense and probably
should not be published' (Brown l994:6). He suggests
quite seriously that data obtained fmm important
archaeological cfiscoveries be withheld from the achaeological community. Such an attitude to replication
applied to ethnography and prehistory would severely
curtail publication in these areas. Field notes are
commcmly the only permanent data source we will ever
have. It is because data is frequently impossible to
check that anthropology generally maintains such high
professional standards.
Brown argues that our observations cannot be
'directly corroborated, or challenged, by others' (p.6,
our emphasis). But hang on. If our data are not
scientific then why did he write an article at all,
especially one that does challenge some of our data
and conclusions? To be consistent he should ignore
our work altogether. He does not, of course, and by
accepting some data, those that serve his wider purpose, he implicitly comborates them. He accepts our
statements about radiocarbon age, ethnicity, personal
age and all but one of our 30 skeletal measurements.
He challenges our deductions, not our data, a normal
course in scientific debate. Our deductions about the
King Island remains do not accord with Brown's vision
of Aboriginal origins, but rather than demonstrating
scientifically how data obtained from these remains
could support his ideas, Brown falls back on suggestions of incompetence or an error on our part to solve
his problem. Naturally, when the supposed 'error' is
'corrected' it supports his version of the past.
A crucial dimension corroborated
The nub of Brown's article rests on a single crucial
point. As he says, it 'matters if the femur head breadth
was 39 mm or 49 mm but short of re-excavation, the
Division of Archrreology and Natural Histoly, Restarch School of Pacific and Asian Studies,'lhe Australian National University, Cmberra, A m MOO,
Australia.
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Australian Archaeology, Number 38.1 994