Nach dem Post-

Abstract

The establishment of a Forum for Critical Archaeology is necessary and highly welcome. As in any science, interpretive statements in archaeology, in this case concerning prehistoric societies, are highly tinged with present-day ideologies. Archaeology is actively engaged in the mutual process of projec - tion and feedback between the present and the past. It is the task of a critical archaeology to reflect on this process and to deconstruct the system- stabilizing function of traditional archaeology. Archaeology has to take responsibility for its political role. Posthumanism offers an exemplary case in which this kind of debate is demanded. Humanism, which began as a way to emancipate the subject, developed aggressive and repressive consequences in the course of its history. In particular, the ontological differentiation of species and anthropocentrism are criticized by posthumanism. The person as a being has to be seen as a hybrid that is constituted in mutually symmetric actions (Handlungen) with objects and other creatures. According to actor-network theory, objects have agency, a claim that requires a new understanding of social sciences. Symmetrical archaeology has introduced this concept into archaeology. Ontological difference should not be an a priori prerequisite for scientific analysis. The advocates of symmetrical archaeology take the anti-ontological and egalitarian notion as an ethical principle as well, a point that needs to be debated. The posthumanist paradigm also has a technological side, which is seen especially in eugenics and the development of genetically modified organisms. These change power relations, with an emerging new – and repressive – social order, which should be taken into account in philosophical debates. A critical archaeology must take a position on these issues.