Racism in ‘Exodus’ Casting
The new Ridley Scott movie, Exodus, is attracting criticism because of the racial background of its stars. Christian Bale and Sigourney Weaver are white people playing ancient Egyptians…
Author: A. J. West
‘Remarkable Plants’ by Bynum & Bynum, ‘The History of Central Asia’ by Baumer
It was my birthday last week, so I've got some new books to read, including volume two of Christoph Baumer's The History of Central Asia (I B Tauris),…
Salon: "Why we’re obsessed with glamorizing archaeologists"
There's an interesting article on Salon right now on archaeologists and their profession, tied in with a new book, Lives in Ruins, by Marilyn Johnson, about the same…
Ethnological Method
Applying the comparative method in historical linguistics is relatively straightforward and academics habitually apply it to any language they come across at some point or other. But the…
Bruno Latour: Imperialist?
I recently saw a blogpost that took Bruno Latour and his disciples/fellow travellers to task for being colonialist ('An Indigenous Feminist’s take on the Ontological Turn: ‘ontology’…
The Nazca Culture
The south coast of Peru is home to one of the more famous ancient South American archaeological cultures, the Nazca/Nasca. The reason it's such a celebrated tradition…
Invest your emotion elsewhere
People tend to call me a rationalist, and that's not really something I have a problem with. I don't think philosophical ideas should be a matter of identity…
An Anthropology of X
One of the things most guaranteed to raise my considerable ire is the bizarre and frequently incomprehensible jargon of modern social/cultural/socio-cultural anthropology. I'm not a fan of the…
BBC: "Cave paintings change ideas about the origin of art"
Indonesian archaeology briefly made the news this week with a story about rock art from Sulawesi. The art, which includes the oldest known figurative drawing in the world…
What I’m writing these days
I haven't posted anything in a while, primarily because I've been busy. I've been planning and researching a book on ancient Indonesia, writing out detailed chapter plans and…
Britain is a ‘Christian Country’, apparently
David Cameron has recently claimed that the UK is a 'Christian country' and has said that he will act as a 'giant Dyno-Rod' for Christian organisations here (implicitly…
Why I’m also quite glad I studied social anthropology
I said earlier that I regret studying social anthropology, and this is still true. It wasn't the best choice. But it wasn't a total waste of time either,…
Albuquerque and Drake in Indo-Malaysia – Bows and Arrows
It probably isn't surprising that historical references to bows and arrows in Indo-Malaysia from the age of exploration are relatively few. The bow wasn't a particularly important weapon…
‘Gene driven change is much more the norm’
A tweet was directed my way by ziel (@yourlyingeyes). I had tweeted in response to some new HBD silliness that in most cases a genetic explanation is worth…
Where do we get our technologies from? (Answer: everybody else)
How much of your success comes from your ability to read? Would you be able to feed and clothe yourself without the help of others? Would you have…
‘HBD’
There is a small but rather vocal group of people variously associated with the human sciences who declare that almost everything humans do is related to and primarily…