Postmodernity: Archaeology in Late Capitalist Times

The term ‘postmodernism’ was evoked in the past to describe certain changes in archaeological practice and theory, in particular, certain ideas circulating in the postprocessual archaeology of the 1980s and 1990s. However, most of the ideas concerning postmodernism during this period focused primarily on knowledge claims and relied mainly on ideas from poststructuralism. These ideas discussed the validity of metanarratives, the past as a text to be read, and the inherent subjectivity of knowledge claims. Of course, postmodernism is much more than this; postmodernism is also postmodernity, a historical period marked by a logic inherent to late capitalism. According to this logic, postmodernity is a more recent phase of modernity, one where the economy has become decentralized, leading to changes in labour, society, and culture. Some archaeologists have referred to this expanded notion of postmodernity, but few have remarked on its effects on archaeological practice. When viewed at this larger scale, it quickly becomes apparent that archaeology has not moved beyond postmodernity, much on the contrary, it demonstrates that archaeology is more postmodern today than it has ever been.


POSTMODERNISM OR POSTMODERNITY?
In archaeology, postmodernism made an impact during the 1980s and 1990s, in association with postprocessual archaeology.It was a movement that took place in British archaeology, but also had strong influence in North America, and shortly after in Scandinavian countries.In short, postmodernism was a turn towards fragmentation, plurality, difference, and unpredictability in the production of knowledge (Fahlander 2012, p. 110).It was a rejection of metanarratives of all sorts, from the dialectics of the Spirit, the hermeneutics of meaning, and the emancipation of the rational agent or subject (Lyotard 1984, p. xxiii).Consequently, postmodernism disregarded any form of teleology, such as that presupposed in historical materialism, socialevolutionary theory, and the Enlightenment process (Johnson 1999, p. 163).Additionally, postmodernism critiqued the idea of an objective and 'real' world that exists independently from discourse.On occasion, there is also mention of postmodernism as a new ethos (e.g.Fahlander 2012), but this was never extensively discussed in archaeology.Finally, postmodernism is also commonly associated to a very ambiguous and impenetrable style of writing, often evoking poetic allusions and cryptic metaphors (Fahlander 2012, p. 118), however, ambiguity and impenetrability are not exclusive to postmodernist intellectual writing.Overall, postmodernism inaugurated a period of disillusionment in the projects of science, the idea of progress, and strict notions of truth (Hodder 1991, p. 65, Thomas andTilley 1992).As argued by some postmodernists, rather than objective truth that is sustained through governments or capital, what we actually have is a series of performances (Lyotard 1984, p. 60).In fact, for postmodernists, there is something inherently wrong in assuming a separation of a universal and real nature, from a culturally and historically particular society (Martin 2013, p. 16).
Among archaeologists, the tensions of postmodernism were most often reflected in terms of poststructuralism.Rather than focusing on postmodern cultural and economic change, many archaeologists leaned on the importance of text and discourse (e.g.Bapty andYates 1990, Hodder 1992).Relying on the work of French thinkers such as Foucault, Derrida, Barthes, and Ricoeur, poststructuralism in archaeology was a rejection of the rigidity imposed in structuralism, especially anthropological structuralism such as that of Claude Levi-Strauss.Poststructuralism argued that writing was a process involving relations of power and contexts, and a text could be read in multiple ways because a text only exists in virtue of a reader (Hodder 1991, p. 69).Extending this reasoning into archaeology, the archaeological record became something that could be read and interpreted in multiple ways, very much like texts (Hodder 1992).During this phase, archaeology also became a critical project (Leone 1982, Wylie 1985, Leone et al. 1987).This project aimed to deconstruct our perceptions of culture and society (Maley 1990), especially those built on power-relations that subjugated certain genders and ethnicities.
Some archaeologists adopted a different view of postmodernism, recognizing it as an opportunity to create a more diverse, multiperspectival, and interdisciplinary way of engaging with the past (Knapp 1996).For other archaeologists, however, this just ended up leading to a fragmented discipline, with multiple mutually exclusive lines of discourse (Kristiansen 2004, Gardner andCochrane 2011).And for others, postmodernism, as a movement, had no redeeming qualities (Bintliff 1993).Many archaeologists dreaded the mainstream acceptance of postmodernism in the discipline.Some argued that postprocessual archaeology might have gone too far by abandoning any form of objectivity (Peebles 1993, p. 253).
In academic circles, postmodernism only obtained widespread acceptance from the 1980s onwards, but it has a considerably longer history, starting with transformations in art and literature in the end of the nineteenth century (Lyotard 1984, Jameson 1991, Anderson 1998).This longer history is not often addressed in archaeology (as an exception see Walsh 1990), partly because what mattered to archaeology was the production of knowledge.As Lyotard argued, postmodernism had a long gestational period and it only truly emerged with the advancement of post-industrial societies and through technological means (Lyotard 1984).Whereas modernist knowledge was legitimized by the authority of the nationstate, postmodern knowledge was free from the boundaries of nations and became an important economic source.As Julian Thomas points out, archaeology as a discipline started as national projects (Thomas 2004).Certainly, archaeology still operates under the auspices of nation-states (Brück and Stutz 2016), but it is less explicitly so, partly due to the gradual emergence of global archaeology (Mizoguchi 2015, Kerr 2020).
While some people talk of postmodernism, others prefer addressing postmodernity.As Eagleton very succinctly describes, 'postmodernism' refers to a form of contemporary culture, whereas 'postmodernity' refers to a historical period (Eagleton 1996, p. vii).In most of the literature, postmodernism and postmodernity often meld into one, and it is difficult to differentiate them.At the University of Kiel, among the many ongoing projects, we have decided to take upon ourselves a more reflective position in relation to the contexts in which science operates.This includes understanding what it means to live and work in the postmodern age.

MARX AND THE CULTURAL LOGIC OF LATE CAPITALISM
Historically, postmodernity is intricately linked to late capitalism -just as modernity is intricately linked to classic capitalism.However, these economic and cultural movements are not distinct -postmodernity and late capitalism are the spiritual successors of modernity and capitalism.As Marx explains, the base is constituted by modes of production, which dictate the relations between employers and employees and the division of labour.These, in turn, affect the superstructure -which are the ideas and the cultural mores of a given time (Marx 1977(Marx [1859]]).Many advocates and critics of postmodernism try to paint this new period as the dissolution of classic capitalism, since industrial production and class struggle have become more muted.But there is little truth to this.As Fredric Jameson and others point out, the periodization of capitalist phases is difficult, but that is precisely one of the most dominant features of late capitalism and postmodernitythe inclusion, pastiche, and reproduction of a very wide range of features of different times and periods, all subordinated to capitalism (Jameson 1991, p. 4, Jeffries 2021 see also Callinicos 1989).Since the base can only change through revolutionary means, late capitalism and postmodernity are nothing more than the evolution of the capitalist base and the superstructure respectively.In fact, as Ernest Mandel convincingly argues, late capitalism is nothing more than an advanced stage where capitalism manifests a purer form (Mandel 1975).
The end of the second world war is commonly considered the starting point of both late capitalism and postmodernity, so it is important that we understand what was happening before, during, and after this period.From the 1920s onwards, Fordist economic principles were in full expansion, based on the idea of mass production and streamlining productivity.This was accompanied by a reduction in work hours and higher pay, so that the same working force could also become a consumer class.In the 1930s and 1940s, neoliberalism started gaining ground as the new ethical spirit of Europe, with France reiterating and resurrecting liberal values (Denord 2001), and Germany inaugurating an ordoliberal movement, which advocated for the intervention of the state in promoting market ideals, while suppressing welfare (Mirowski and Plehwe 2015).It was, however, in the post-war period that we begin to see the changes that will lead to postmodernity.First, neoliberalism takes a big step forward, built upon the ideas of Friedrich Hayek and members of Mont Pelerin, which gradually led to the economic philosophies of the final decades of the twentieth century, such as those of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan in the UK and US respectively.In the same period, Fordism gradually gives way to post-Fordism -Western nations start facing stronger international competition, with corporate profits falling rapidly, and inflation growing to unsustainable levels (Harvey 2007).This, in turn led to the crisis of 1973, a crisis caused by overaccumulation.
It is in the 1970s that postmodernity starts becoming visible, both in culture and the economy.The gradual substitution of Fordist practices led to a more diverse workforce, one that was not held down by permanent and exclusive employment.In 1970s we begin to witness the rise of flexible modes of accumulation -an abandonment of the rigidity of labour Postmodernity 125 processes and market in favour of innovative and flexible ways of providing services and goods (Harvey 1990, p. 147).This was accompanied by an intensification of new technological products, a gradual rise in the service sector, and the establishment of a gig economy.Prior to postmodernity, the workplace was structured according to a hierarchical structure, with the patriarchal father figure as head of company, but this was replaced by the network -a structure that was considered much more fluid and that honoured difference (Boltanski and Chiapello 2005).Whereas in the 1960s, companies were managed by limiting the power of managers, yet still keeping centralized control, in the 1990s, the hierarchy loses importance, as it was considered ineffective and repugnant in its moral overtones (Jeffries 2021, p. 312).
This shift in practices was primarily economic in character -capital was not to be found exclusively in the permanent job.Rather than soulless and grinding labour, postmodernity introduced more dynamic and varied forms of capital gain.The type of workforce behind large capital became the networker -the person who is valued not so much by what they know, but by who they know.Today's middle-class and upper-class are considerably more diverse than before since they are not tied exclusively to income anymore.As Mike Savage has smartly pointed out, class is now also dictated by the extent of one's professional network, the mobility across the workforce, and the quality of the consumption patterns of citizens, or to use Bourdieu definitions, the social, cultural, and symbolic capital of members of today's society (Bourdieu 1986, Savage 2015).Naturally, this type of workforce has led to changes in office design, with meeting rooms occupying large areas in the corporate world, and open office plans facilitating communication across employees.In addition to all this, the internet -an inevitable invention in the age of the networkhelped reduce distance and time, allowing for the economy to become truly global in character.
Given that late capitalism is not an actual shift in modes of production, Marxist critique of capitalism remains the strongest tool to understand it (Mandel 1975, Callinicos 1989, Harvey 1990, Jameson 1991).The basic laws of motion of capitalism, as discovered by Marx (1990Marx ( [1867]]), apply to postmodernity, especially if we assume that we have become primarily a 'consumer society' (Mandel 1975, p. 390).On this topic, the Marxist idea that is central to understanding postmodernity is the commodity.
The traditional labour and manufacturing market was built upon the commodity -and the motion of capitalism is marked by generalized commodity production (Marx 1990(Marx [1990(Marx [1867]], p. 20).Whereas commodities were fairly easy to trace in modern times, in postmodern times, the fluidity of the decentralized postmodern market has generated new forms of commoditization that are harder to capture.Take for example David Graeber's remark that John Maynard Keynes had predicted in the 1930s that by the end of the twentieth century, people would be working an average of 15 hours a week, but this of course did not happen (Graeber 2018, p. xiv).There are a variety of factors contributing to this situation, but the most important factor was the outsourcing of industrial jobs to Asia and the automation of most manufacturing jobs.Commoditization in the West did not disappear, however, it did undergo a transformation: rather than an economy of goods, the west developed an economy of services and creativity (Jeffries 2021, p. 28).
In the process, we have been flooded with new commodities; things we did not even know could be commodified.The fetishization of commodities has reached unprecedented levels, since what matters is not the commodity's use-value, but rather what it represents in terms of the relations between people (Marx 1990[1990[1867], p. 167, Harvey 2018, p. 41) Even movements that claim abstention from consumption are acts of consumption themselves -movements like primitivism, minimalism, and zero-waste have been co-opted by capitalist models and have become new forms of conspicuous consumption.Consumption is needed to keep the economy going, since this is the only way to forestall a crisis of overaccumulation.This requires the economy to constantly adapt to very rapidly changing fads.
The narrative held in postmodernity is that modernity has been overcome -it is a story of liberation from the constraining rationalism of the modern world.Liberated from the cogs of modernist machines, postmodernity releases humanity from oppression into a world of freedom of all sorts (Jeffries 2021, p. 7).In postmodern times, there is no limit to freedom -everything can be bought and sold, every person is entitled to change their identity, and every text can be read in whatever way possible.This is the dream made possible by unbridled consumption -through choice, citizens can have whatever they want and become whatever they want.
Capitalism realized that it did not need to be authoritarian; it is more effortless to be seductive, because a society immersed in selfgratification is easier to control.As argued by Herbert Marcuse, unrestrained desire might make citizens believe they are truly living freely, but what it actually does is lead citizens to desire their own domination (Marcuse 2002(Marcuse [1964]], Jeffries 2021, pp. 45-46).The only constant is transformationeverything is in flux because everything must change to accommodate the arbitrary changes in consumer desires.This leads to a history that accelerates out of control (see more on this topic in Harrison and Schofeld 2010, p. 7).The myriad of networks that have emerged in postmodernity have compressed time and space -everything feels faster and closer and we assume this is normal.This creates the perception that everything is always changing, since stability is so hard to capture (Crellin 2020).As Marx and Engels very pointedly predicted: Constant revolutionising of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones.All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify.All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses, his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind (Marx andEngels 2008 [1848], p. 38).
What Marx and Engels are describing is a maelstrom of perpetual change and becoming called 'modernisation' (Berman 2010(Berman [1982]], p. 16).In the later stages of capitalism, this process of modernisation has been sublimated into postmodernisation, which has expanded across the world and become a truly global culture (Hardt and Negri 2000).

ARCHAEOLOGY AND POSTMODERNITY
Given that postmodernity is not a distinctly new period of history but rather an evolution of modernity, many aspects in the production of knowledge, in general, and the production of archaeological knowledge, in particular, still disclose modernist Postmodernity 127 inflections.As Julian Thomas points out, the transition from antiquarianism to archaeology coincided roughly with the rise of nationalism in Europe (Thomas 2004, p. 109).Furthermore, in many places, especially those where postmodern culture had a later or subdued impact, archaeology is still very much viewed through nationalistic lens (e.g.Mizoguchi 2013, Greenberg andHamilakis 2022).There is also the fact that, while the hierarchical and patriarchal structure of the workplace has become more flexible, especially in small businesses and services, archaeology, namely the type practiced in the university context, still very much relies on a modernist hierarchical structure, with department chairs at the top and students and research assistants at the bottom of the pyramid.This is largely due to the fact that the university is an old and conservative institution, one that precedes the emergence of postmodernity by many centuries.
Archaeology has nevertheless adapted quite well to postmodernity, adopting many of its aspects and morals.In the broader scientific context, there has been a disavowal of strict identity and rules, which has led to a disunity of the sciences (Dupré 1983).The idea of a single united methodology, in which all the sciences could be subsumed, has been dismissed (even though some scholars still defend it).This idea of disunity has been translated into archaeology as a case of fragmentation and proliferation of lines of discourse (Kristiansen 2004, Gardner and Cochrane 2011, Moro Abadía 2017).In a way, much of the discussion on the fragmentation of archaeology is reflected in terms of discursive plurality, especially of gender and races that have been largely ignored, and also in terms of approaches, such as those separating the more natural-scientific /environmental/top-down approaches from those that are agent-centred/social/bottomup approaches (Kristiansen 2004, Stanton 2004, Arkush 2011).However, there has been little to no mention of specialization as the main process of fragmentation in archaeology, even though, in my perception, that might be the most striking change in archaeology of recent decades.
The outcome of specialization has been two key developments -a Fordist revolution and a post-Fordist revolution in archaeology, representing both modern and postmodern ways of conceiving labour.The Fordist revolution signalled the dissolution of traditional manufacturing in favour of mass production.This mass production is possible by breaking down the production process into key components, which are then worked upon in an assembly line.Like in traditional manufacturing, which was dominated by independent trades, there has been a process where independent manufacturers have become supplementary operators in the production of one particular commodity (Marx 1990(Marx [1990(Marx [1867]], p. 457).Whereas the dominant form of conducting archaeology in the past was to practice at a local scale, with more simple methods and with one archaeologist being capable of understanding everything there was to know about a region/period, a good chunk of archaeological practice today requires the help of specialists in archaeobotanics, archaeozoology, isotope analysis, modelling specialists, etc.That is why, the primary form of doing archaeology today is science (Sinclair 2016).This, in turn, has led to the popularization of the term 'interdisciplinarity' in archaeology, a term that has filled countless titles of journals, conference sessions, and of course, funding applications.
As Díaz-Andreu and Coltofean-Arizancu (2021) have pointed out, archaeology has always been an interdisciplinary practice, making use of ideas, techniques, and methods derived from different disciplines and collaborating with them.This new brand of archaeological interdisciplinarity, however, is quite different in that it applies methods of the hard-sciences in the study of data that has been recovered archaeologically (Ribeiro 2022b).More than a true effort of collaboration, much of the interdisciplinary work today in archaeology, requires a simple task -the recovery of data from the ground so that the scientific specialist can analyse it.
It is with the transition to the sciences that we see archaeological practice in a more postmodern and post-Fordist form.As has been pointed out, science has become less accessible to non-scientific members of society, in fact, it has become more elitist and controlled -as something that manifests incredibly complex language and graphs/figures (Hayes 1992).In other words, scientific discourse has become more commodified, becoming something that only a select few can access.This has been made possible by developments in technology, starting in the post-war period.As Lyotard (1984) points out, this is part of the postmodern condition -the subjugation of knowledge to scientific technology.Much like factories, technology became the means of production, and this has happened in science as wellscience has become a factory that produces commodities through technology.But technology is an expenditure, meaning that 'no money, no proof' (Lyotard 1984, p. 45).
While the structure of archaeological labour still retains elements from modernity, a new form of postmodern labour has been introduced -the specialized researcher (see Boltanski and Chiapello 2005, p. 79).One could argue that contract archaeologists are also a postmodern element, since they denote aspects of late capitalist economyworking in gigs and in an extremely mobile way, but it is the specialized researcher that embodies most elements of postmodernity.Researchers can specialize in multiple ways, with some focusing on a region and period, and others in scientific techniques.It is this latter group that has really stood out with the rise of the archaeological sciences.Whereas those who specialize in a region and period are limited to places where that region and period are of interest, for example, a specialist in Bronze Age ceramics of Southern Portugal will pretty much be limited to positions in Portugal and perhaps Spain, but a scientific specialist, such as someone who studies isotopes or radiocarbon dates, can work in most places in the world.This global character of the specialized scientific archaeological researcher represents one of postmodernity's most interesting facets -the fact that commodities and labour are now flexible and fluid, appearing over short periods (one to five years), in any place in the world.Another advantage of the specialist scientist is that they can integrate 'interdisciplinary' teams remarkably easily, since many scientific papers are produced as an assembly linewith the field archaeologists recovering the data, the heads of department commanding funding, and the specialized researchers translating the data into science.While single-author studies still play a role in archaeology, multi-authored studies have become quite dominant in terms of research output.These multi-authored papers allow for specialists to only work on what they are trained in, which frees up time for them to work on a large number of multi-authored papers, which in turn maximizes their productivity and speeds up the publication process.
Through new avenues of large-scale funding, such as the European Research Council (Kristiansen 2014, p. 13), the Horizon 2020 programme for research and innovation, including the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions, and through DFG projects in Germany, such as Excellenz Clusters and Collaborative Research Centres, like the one employing the current author, it has become possible to make archaeology a mass-produced commodity.Given the short-term logic of a large part of the research produced in archaeology, projects are devoted to objectives that are accomplishable in short Postmodernity 129 periods of time.This has shaped archaeological discourse, with areas of research that require slow and measured consideration, such as local microhistories, being disfavoured in relation to fast research.A good example is large-scale inductive research in archaeology (e.g.Big Data), which is a type of research that relies on harvesting databases and published work and generates quick results (Cunningham andMacEachern 2016, Ribeiro 2019b).One of the advantages of applying quantitative approaches to databases and published research is that it eliminates the possibility of falsification (sensu the hypothetico-deductive approach (Popper 2002(Popper [1935]]).Another advantage of relying on databases and published research is that it reduces expenses in fieldwork, especially when dealing with large-scale open area excavations, which can oftentimes take many months to prepare and can take many years to yield publishable results.
A central aspect of postmodernity is the avoidance of overaccumulation, a process which among other things, generates unemployment.If a commodity floods the market, its price decreases, leading businesses to fire the workers who produce those commodities.One of the ways archaeologists stay employed is by teaching archaeology in an academic institution, but the impact of COVID-19, the rise in tuition prices, and the rise in loan interests, have led many students to avoid archaeology (Brami, 2022, p. 2).Archaeological departments have had to cut costs, and in some cases, close down altogether, such as in Sheffield.This situation has led to limited placements of archaeologists within departments, with many claiming they do not believe they will be obtaining a permanent spot within the academic context (Brami et al. 2022, p. 6).As this happens, the mobile archaeologist, jumping from department to department, best represented by the specialized scientific researcher, stands out as the hero of our ages, much like the digital nomad in the tech industry.
Frédéric Lordon has pointed out that in our age, any identitary attachment to nation or race can be considered some form of proto-fascism (Lordon 2015, pp. 39-48) -with the mobile worker becoming the role-model for middle-class economics.Instead of staying in the same country, hoping that a dream-job magically appears, and collecting unemployment, the mobile worker abandons any link to country and/ or family in order to fill a market that is lacking.That is why, in archaeology, among other sciences, the most valued researchers are those who have studied and worked in different parts of the world.In fact, the Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions are aimed precisely at those who are willing to move to another country.
On a small-local scale, social networks do not need to be very expansive, but the same cannot be said when labour is global.That is why social capital has grown so much in importance in the postmodern age.This has changed archaeological perspectives on careers, with those in their mid-career having to travel considerably in order to establish an international network of allies (Brami et al. 2022, p. 7).While travelling has always been a crucial aspect of archaeology, the more modernist, and by extension, nationalist way of proceeding through a career was usually confined within the borders of one's own country.This, however, is proving itself more and more difficult as archaeological projects are now too reliant on large-scale funding because of technologization.With archaeology more dependent on technological expenditures, archaeologists from poorer countries will have to network with those of richer countries, and those of richer countries, in a neocolonial fashion, will take advantage of the extension into those financially poorer but more archaeologically exotic markets.
As globalization progresses and becomes the standard, networks expand and become more complex.Archaeology becomes less and less a project built by personal egos, since what is considered of high-quality today is research performed in large collaborative teams.This has led to the dilution of any one figure within archaeology, although some older luminaries still remain in the spotlight.The Fordist hierarchical figure of the male patriarch in archaeology, which we can maybe associate to figures such as Vere Gordon Childe, Lewis Binford, and Colin Renfrew, is slowly disappearing -what is valued today are the post-Fordist heterarchies, heterogeneities, and multitudes, and above all, how this morass of people are all interconnected.This has been the other shift in how labour in archaeology operates -it has become an affair where what matters are the connections to other archaeologists.
The establishment of a global network, best represented in the form of the internet, has compressed space and time, making history advance much quicker than what we are used to.Trends and styles, whether it is in clothes, technology, or even science, become mainstream incredibly quickly nowadays since China and similar countries can quickly flood markets with the latest hot commodity at very affordable prices.In this world, short-termism and the global network becomes moral imperatives -affecting all sectors of society.
Short-termism and the network metaphor has manifested in wide variety of ways in archaeology, not just in the conditions of labour.The network in particular has become the paradigmatic concept of archaeology.Whereas the hierarchical structure of modernity conceived knowledge through a tree-metaphor, with the roots serving as a foundation and the origins of knowledge, and the branches as the conclusion of it, postmodernity has preferred the symbol of the open-network (Jeffries 2021, p. 16).One of the most popular metaphors comes from Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari: the Rhizome.Unlike the tree structure and the narrative, which have a beginning and end, the rhizome is composed of ceaselessly established connections, it is always something in the middle, between things (Deleuze and Guattari 1987).
Archaeology's standard modes of explanation can be quite complex in principle, but they can be summarized to two main forms: causality and teleology, the former associated to the more scientific forms of conducting archaeology and the latter associated to agency (Ribeiro 2022a).The network, on the other hand, disavows any clear form of causality or teleology, preferring to emphasize the role played by connections between different entities within the network.This has led to the popularity in archaeology of network approaches, such as network analysis, actor-network theory, and assemblage theory (e.g.Webmoor and Witmore 2008, Knappett 2011, Jervis 2019).The network has also manifested in the form of globalization theory, which emphasizes very intense forms of connectivity, which manifest in the diffusion of ideas, trade, and migration (see Hodos 2017).Although not directly influenced by the network metaphor, the abandonment of the hierarchical structure in favour of the network did nonetheless open archaeologists to the possibility of different forms of social structure, such as heterarchies and stateless (sometimes called anarchist) societies (Crumley 1995, Angelbeck and Grier 2012, DeMarrais 2013).Like the network, this shift in attention is also largely due to postmodernitywith the transition from rationalist modernity and Fordist economics to flexible post-Fordist ways of living, it became popular to uncover those societies in the past that were not subject to state and/or hierarchical rule.Much like the postmodern text, which was free to be recomposed and manipulated in whatever way possible, archaeologists have Postmodernity 131 also recognized the possibility that past societies were not stuck in outdated typologies of social evolution, typologies that viewed societies as stranded in monolithic blocks, such as bands, tribes, chiefdoms, and state societies (Kang 2005).As one of the leading authors of socio-evolutionary typologies recognized himself, Elman Service, it was not always possible to classify societies in such a discrete manner (Service 1975, p. 304).With the establishment of postmodernity, such evolutionary typologies were thrown out the window, not only because they followed strict and rationalist identitary logic, but also because they implied a teleological and totalizing metanarrative of how societies developed.The critique of the socio-evolutionary model reached its apotheosis with the publication of The Dawn of Everything, which recognized considerably more agency among past societies, and acknowledged the possibility that social groups in the past could transition quite quickly and easily between different political and/or economic modes (Graeber and Wengrow 2021).
In addition to the sidelining of hierarchy, perhaps the greatest challenge to conventional wisdom concerns identity.According to standard philosophical convention, identity remains tied to formal logic that states, for instance, that a=a (Boole 1854, Russell 1998[1912]).In postmodernity, standard notions of identity, especially social identity, have been challenged.By appealing to the thynnine wasp, a wasp that is tricked into 'mating' with an orchid, which the wasp believes to be of the opposite sex, Deleuze and Guattari have argued that binary forms of identity have proven themselves insufficient to describe the world -rather than humans vs nature, humans vs animals, humans vs machines, it makes more sense to recognize that humans are nature, that humans are animals, and that humans are machines (Deleuze andGuattari 1983, Jeffries 2021, pp. 40-41).In archaeology, this meant a challenge to our perceptions of social identity.Just as postmodernity marked a shift in the political left that equated class with gender and race (Eagleton 1996, Anderson 1998), archaeology has promoted a perspective that recognizes the importance of women and BIPOC in archaeological practice and in how we produce knowledge of past and present societies.This was first manifest in the feminist and gender archaeology of postprocessual archaeology (Conkey and Spector 1984, Gero 1988, 1991, Marx [1990[1867], Spector 1993, Wylie 1993) and the representation of the subaltern Other (Hamilakis 1999, Hamilakis andDuke 2007).This latter topic has been of particular importance in recent years, with the rising popularity of genomic histories, which often tend to reduce past cultural identities to genetic signatures and equate them with discrete archaeological 'cultures' (e.g.Mathieson et al. 2018, Olalde et al. 2019).This has been vehemently critiqued by some archaeologists, who view the equation of genetic signatures to discrete populational groups, and these in turn to cultural groups, as a crude mischaracterization of how societies actually engaged with material culture and with each other (Furholt 2018, Frieman andHofmann 2019).Underlying these critiques is precisely the breakdown of identity as we conventionally think of it in archaeology, and its replacement by a more fluid postmodern way.
This has also been evident in the notion of relational identity, which has rejected the post-enlightenment and liberal notion of the person as an individual.By relying on the work of anthropologists such as Marilyn Strathern (1988) and Cecilia Busby (1997), archaeologists have been suggesting that perhaps, past societies did not operate according to hierarchical and individualist notions of identity -much on the contrary, places like Melanesia and South India follow a relational logic, where the identity of people only make sense in relation to other people, where bodies are partible or permeable (Thomas 2004, p. 125).With the Marxian notion of class becoming an issue concerning the Other, archaeology has opened itself up to a new ethics that promotes multivocality and heterogeneity -two attitudes that fit very well in the postmodern status quo.As Fahlander points out, from an epistemological position, postmodernity promoted the open reading and interpretation of texts, but with different contemporary groups there is the ethical issue of who 'owns' the past (Fahlander 2012, see also Hamilakis 1999, Hamilakis and Duke 2007, McGuire 2008).
We have discussed how labour and funding in archaeology operate, archaeology as specialized labour, short-termism, the dominance of network thinking, and the dissolution of identity, as symptoms of postmodernity, but perhaps the most explicitly postmodern element in archaeology are the posthumanisms.
Unlike the heavily poststructuralist archaeology of the 1980s and 1990s, commonly associated to postprocessual archaeology, posthumanism is a new brand of postmodern thinking.Whereas poststructuralism was based on the notion of 'text', posthumanism is based primarily on the 'object'.Another key aspect of posthumanism is the network, which decentres the human as the source of agency, and recognizes it as just another element among a plurality of objects, both human and non-human.As Terry Eagleton notes, postmodernity is such a portmanteau phenomenon that any claim asserted about one aspect of postmodernity will probably be untrue about another aspect of it (Eagleton 1996, p. viii).The same goes with posthumanisms, which while subscribing to some common tenets (see Ribeiro 2019a see also Fernández-Götz et al. 2021), also reveals a level of plurality that protects it from blanket definitions and critiques.This plurality and difference of positions within the posthumanisms is not an accident but part of its very essence.
While some posthumanists within archaeology have tried to differentiate it from poststructuralism, partly by classifying poststructuralism as idealist and by emphasizing the material aspect of posthumanism, there are in fact still quite a lot of similarities between them.For instance, the emphasis on objects, or 'things-in-themselves' (Ding an sich) (Olsen 2010, Olsen et al. 2012) does give one of the key movements in the posthumanisms, the New Materialisms, its very own flavour.However, as Slavoj Žižek has pointed out, there is still some residual idealism present in the New Materialisms (Žižek 2014).Traditionally, materialism is associated to a cold and mechanical logic, more often associated to scientific naturalism, whereas the materialism defended by the New Materialists is more similar to the idealism of early twentieth century, which views an aleatory dynamic that is immanent to matter -where emergent properties arise out of unexpected encounters between multiple 'actants' (Žižek 2014, p. 8, see also Moore 1903).The 'thing-in-itself' is a concept obtained from Kantian idealist philosophy, one which serves as the opposite of 'appearance' (Erscheinen), as has been pointed out in archaeology (Nielsen 2019).Part of this philosophy claims links to the idealism of Immanuel Kant, with reality expressed in terms of what is transcendent and what is immanent, which can be found in the work of Gilles Deleuze (2001) for instance.Furthermore, this commitment to idealism also reflects itself in the acceptance of the finitude of objects, an explicit adherence to Kantian idealism which always correlates thinking with being, the noumenon with the phenomenon, the ontological with the epistemological, and the transcendental with the immanent.As Quentin Meillassoux (2008) argues, the only way out of this predicament is through mathematical set theory and recognizing the Postmodernity 133 infinity of reality, rather than its finitude.The patent idealism of the posthumanisms has also been highlighted by Terry Eagleton -in a lot of cases, the so-called materialism of the posthumanisms is ethereal, more similar to the Hegelian notion of Spirit, than it is the hard materiality of the naturalists (Eagleton 2016, p. 8).In Eagleton's own words, the New Materialisms feel the need to save matter from the humiliation of being matter (Eagleton 2016, p. 10).That is why quite often, matter, objects, things, and the way they operate in networks is described as 'always something more than "mere" matter: an excess, force, vitality, relationality, or difference that renders matter active, selfcreative, productive, unpredictable' (Coole and Frost 2010, p. 9).The difference from materialist philosophies is that materialism disavows any connection to Kantian or Hegelian philosophy, and in the process, materialist philosophies do not recognize the distinction between ontology and epistemology, do not recognize Spirit, nor do they recognize the thing-in-itself (i.e.noumenal); they only recognize a single monistic empirical reality (see Schlick 1979, Ribeiro 2019a).
Much like the poststructuralist text, the posthumanisms often rely on the dissolution of identity, but instead of text, it is the material object that has been dissolved -anything and everything can be an object, as long as it is fluid, unpredictable, and interchangeable.This is also evident in the language of posthumanism, which in many ways still follows the style of earlier postmodern literature.Alf Hornborg has called out the impenetrable prose of some posthumanist writing, such as that of Haraway's Staying with the Trouble (Haraway 2016), which is often bogged down by poetic metaphors and unbridled associations (Hornborg 2017).This type of prose is also present on occasion in posthumanist archaeology, with Alexandra Ion having called it out (Ion 2018).
The posthumanisms have remained popular in archaeology and have challenged the disciplines in its way of perceiving material culture, which oftentimes still follows a modernist, rationalist, and functionalist logic.However, must like the economic status quo and its cultural logic, posthumanism also denote short-termism and follows the logic of fast science, with key-ideas changing rapidly, and with multiple posthumanist books and articles having been published in a very short-period of time.The posthumanisms are very topical -a large part of their appeal is because they reflect the contemporary conditions of the world.That is why the posthumanisms have been called the philosophy of current times (Cipolla et al. 2021, p. 7), but the problem is that time passes more quickly today than ever before, and while the posthumanisms might have reflected the cultural and political concerns of the yesteryear, they might not be able to keep up with the concerns of tomorrow.

FINAL REMARKS
The perception of postmodernism in contemporary society is a complex one, with some openly embracing all things postmodern while others explicitly disavow anything related to it.In archaeology, the perception of postmodernism has been narrowed down to concerns over knowledge claims, derived from poststructural thought, but as this essay has tried to outline, there is a much larger economic and cultural context called postmodernity, one that influences archaeology on a deeper level.
Archaeology is a child of its time and has been easily influenced by postmodernity.This leads to a fear of associating oneself to anything postmodern because, in general, people do not like to believe they have been manipulated or influenced.This is especially noticeable when one realizes that postmodernity is nothing but the ideological manifestation of late capitalism.This leads to several strange attitudes, the most common of which is the rejection of everything postmodern, the claim that it has been overcome, and that truth can be seen through the sheen of ideology.But as Žižek (1989) argues, the agent who believes they are seeing through the ideology of the system is in fact the system itself imposing an ideology.In other words, the more one believes they stand outside postmodernity, the more they are embodying it.
As Marx pointed out, capitalism is neither morally good nor bad because capitalism is amoral; the only thing that matters to capitalism is that it keeps the motion going (Marx 1990(Marx [1867]]).Thus, postmodernity cannot be considered either good or bad in principle.In true postmodern spirit, there is no singular postmodern ethos -there are countless of them.In the same way that lifestyles have become commodified, so too have ethical spirits.The only thing all these ethical perspectives have in common is that they cannot challenge capitalist motions.As a prison with no escape, the challenge is not to find a way out of this predicament, since that will only lead to further entrenchment, but to use these motions to our benefit, in order to make a fairer, more just, and less discriminatory way of doing archaeology.
. But this makes sense in the cultural logic of postmodernity -the greatest form of agency in this day and age is not political agency, but rather consumer agency: 'you are what you buy'.Postmodern consumption is not just what consumers acquire through capital, but also what books they read, what diets they follow, what Youtube channels they watch, where they go for walks, and in the case of academics, what research they follow and produce.