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Simulation as Narrative: Contingency, Dialogics, and the Modeling Conundrum

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Abstract

In this paper, we will cast a critical eye on the practice of simulation modeling in archaeology, focusing on some of the unwritten assumptions underpinning currently popular agent-based approaches. We shall suggest the need for (1) a better integration with the basic tenets of complexity theory, (2) a stronger focus on epistemological issues, rather than on technological/methodological preoccupations, and (3) a distributed ecology of models functioning as an exploratory research laboratory. In essence, we argue for a more discursive, dialogic approach that places modeling in the arena of narrative construction, rather than the pursuit of some representation of “reality.”

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Acknowledgments

I would like to thank Bernardo Rondelli and Xavi Rubio for some stimulating discussions on a number of issues that subsequently formed the basis of the present paper.

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  1. Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain

    James McGlade

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  1. James McGlade
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McGlade, J. Simulation as Narrative: Contingency, Dialogics, and the Modeling Conundrum. J Archaeol Method Theory 21, 288–305 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10816-014-9201-3

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