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Scaffolding and Concept-Metaphors: Building Archaeological Knowledge in Practice

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Explorations in Archaeology and Philosophy

Part of the book series: Synthese Library ((SYLI,volume 433))

Abstract

Scaffolding and concept-metaphors have emerged as key terms within alternative approaches to the epistemological analysis of archaeological practice. Each term contains definitional ambiguities, including distinctly broad and narrow definitions in the case of scaffolding. I argue that the broad application of the scaffolding metaphor, most closely associated with the work of Alison Wylie, allows one to understand concept-metaphors as a specific category of scaffolding. At the same time, the broad application of the scaffolding metaphor provides a dynamic and flexible way of organizing the epistemological analysis of archaeological practice because it is acting as a concept-metaphor.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Walsh (2019) provides an elegant analysis of this process in relation to Newton’s experiments on the periodicity of light, while Janssen (2019) describes the history of the development of relativity and quantum theory through the metaphor of arches built on scaffolds of earlier theories that were then wholly or partially discarded.

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Acknowledgements

I would like to thank participants in the University of Exeter’s Zoom workshop “Archaeology Works” for their helpful comments on this paper, especially Adrian Currie, Alison Wylie, and Assaf Nativ.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK

    Bruce Routledge

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  1. Bruce Routledge
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Correspondence to Bruce Routledge .

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  1. Department of Philosophy, Mount Allison University, Sackville NB, Canada, School of Philosophy and Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language, Australian National University, Acton ACT, Australia, Acton, ACT, Australia

    Anton Killin

  2. Department of Philosophy, Florida International University, Miami, FL, USA

    Sean Allen-Hermanson

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Routledge, B. (2021). Scaffolding and Concept-Metaphors: Building Archaeological Knowledge in Practice. In: Killin, A., Allen-Hermanson, S. (eds) Explorations in Archaeology and Philosophy. Synthese Library, vol 433. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-61052-4_4

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