Det andra påseendet. D. 2, Den omvända diskursen

Sammanfattning: This thesis consists of two parts. The subject of the first part of the thesis is the transition in the early 19th century Scandinavian view of the past, from a "poetic" or mythological past to the empirical and reified past. In early 19th century, the first antiquarian journals primarly contained poems and the world of imagination and empirical reality were considered of equal merit. Scientifically-oriented archaeology, on the other hand, aims from the very beginning to divide the speculative from the scientific. The historical relationship between romanticism/the power of imagination and science/reason is discussed. The formation of archaeology as a discipline is also discussed and formulated as a "second glance" within a critical confrontation with the romantic abandonment. Different diagnostic classifications and concepts (such as the three-age system and typology) are analysed as created in order to master the past. The honoured empiristic ideals, however, am also backed up by values in which the secrets of authority is enclosed. The commitment to a system of liabilities and responsibilities is discussed as a morality, vital for the development of the discipline. The consequences of this unity between morals and science are then discussed as a historical relation. It is argued that the scientific character itself is a historical burden, where the subjective desire and the institutional demands constitute each other on a negative level. This negative character of archaeology is discussed in relation to the human dimension, archaeology's possibilities to embrace a cultural concept, and in terms of irregularities which in itself could be irrational. since it counteracts the insight in to the consequences of knowledge. In the second part of the thesis the background as well as the method used is elaborated and put in context. The thesis is the result of a reversed discourse that take its departure from the ambiguous character of archaeology. This ambiguity, it is stressed, is scientifically constructed and relates to different views of the role of archaeology as well as views of the past, culture and what it means to be human. The reified theory which has dominated the view of the past is critized as being a-historical and an obstacle preventing other views of the past to emerge. The historical persistency of certain questions, which is analyzed in the first part, is discussed as subordinated humanistic ideals that points at new directions of thought and practice in archaeology. These new ideals and values could and has already opened up new agendas and areas of research true to new concepts of what it means to be scientific and an archaeologist. These different views of archaeology, it is stressed, reflects a new insight into a postmodern non-uniformity in archaeological thinking and practice.