Go to the SMU Theory webpage to view the tabulated, objective results for three separate years (as well as the text found below).
Coming out of the most intense decade of the New Archaeology paradigm, archaeologists in 1983 used regional data to develop long-term, broad images of their fieldwork areas. Architectural analysis was used most often, going hand-in-hand with regional survey data. Middle-range theories and experimental archaeology were also utilized, in the tradition of Binford, who received many citations by archaeologists in this year. Ceramics analysis was used across theoretical approaches and geography, as was lithics analysis. Archaeometric methods included radiocarbon, dendrochronology, SEM, and petrography. The high frequency of textual analysis usage is mainly a result of the issue of World Archaeology on industrial archaeology, where scholars consulted historical documents to understand the context of technological materials of the recent past. Paleoethnobotany and geoarchaeology occurred in cases of regional analysis in prehistoric archaeology and ecology was most often present in studies such as those in the World Archaeology issue on transhumance and pastoralism, or within studies pertaining to subsistence systems.
Distributed across journals and throughout the globe, nearly half the articles focused on prehistoric archaeology. Half as many dealt with historical archaeology, which is mainly a reflection of the Industrial issue of World Archaeology. Social organization was another major focus, including sociopolitical integration and development, and was influenced by Marxism and cultural evolution. Many of these articles looked at the sociopolitical organization within cities or villages and were found within most sub-disciplines. Culture historians, processualists, and post-processualists all considered social organization, with varying methodologies from ethnoarchaeology to architectural analysis to bioarchaeology. Articles on subsistence strategy are a product of the same phenomenon across sub-disciplines. All those dealing with industrial archaeology and technology as major themes come from nine out of ten articles in that issue of World Archaeology, just as all those dealing with pastoralism come from the issue on transhumance and pastoralism.
An overwhelming majority of research published in these journals in 1983 took on the processual approach, at times in combination with culture history. Many articles employed the scientific method and followed Binfordian concepts. Cultural evolution and cultural ecology were common approaches taken here. Many culture historical articles were found in the Islamic issue of World Archaeology and were written by scholars based in the Near East. Those that were characterized by historical reflection were often from industrial archaeology, literature reviews or treatises on how a particular subdiscipline has been treated in the past. An example is Colin Renfrew's address to the SAA on the state of American archaeology and a suggestion to proceed with cognitive archaeology in mind as a new paradigm. Other post-processualists looked especially at style and ideology.
Other areas included parts of the United States, Canada, Europe, and Asia, as well as Oaxaca and the Andes. The prevalence of Near Eastern topics is due to the WA Islamic issue. Six articles had no region specified and served as literature reviews of a certain issue (i.e. hunter-gatherer subsistence) or reflections and calls for new theoretical approaches (i.e. Schiffer's paper on behavioral archaeology). The Maya region research was with both precolumbian and contemporary Maya societies and is the result of a random sampling (all different authors, topics, and approaches). The same is true of work done in the American Southwest (though all prehistoric). All work from the British Isles was within industrial archaeology.
Only four papers presented regionally compared data. They focused on: paleodemography in Eurasia. the European Mesolithic, secondary exploitation of animals in Europe and the Near East, and the state of industrial archaeology in northern Europe. In the first three cases, research was completed by others and merely cited as the main body of data within the text.
Males dominated 1983 in archaeological publications. Most articles (42) had one author, who was male. In cases in which there were two or more authors, the male was always the lead author (if both genders represented) except in two cases. Forty-two articles had one author, nine had two, one had three, and three articles had four authors. In five cases or two or more authors, all came from the same institution. The other eight articles were written by scholars representing different institutions. Michael (Brian) Schiffer was the only scholar with two articles (one as single author and one as second author).
Most authors were from American universities, with a few from the United Kingdom and Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, and Canada. There were more Asian and Eastern European universities than would be expected due to the Islamic archaeology theme issue of World Archaeology. Other than universities, about one-third of the institutions represented by authors in 1983 were museums, cultural centers, and corporations. American and British museums often author archaeological papers, but the European, American, and Asian cultural centers and corporations again were the result of inclusion of two theme issues from World Archaeology: Islamic Archaeology and Industrial Archaeology.
