Post‐processual developments in Anglo‐American archaeology

Post‐processualism, which stresses the theory‐ladenness of observation, the underdetermination of theory by evidence, holism, and science as a social activity, is promoting a more comprehensive understanding of the past than did processual archaeology. Among its major contributions are emphasizing a contextual approach and more accurate knowledge of the nature and significance of material culture. Extreme relativism is, however, threatening these accomplishments by denying that archaeology can contribute anything to an objective understanding of human history or human behaviour. The history of archaeology reveals that the discipline is able to discover both what archaeologists want to believe and what they do not want to believe, and that over time archaeology has been able to produce contrary findings in ever larger numbers.