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Alphabet Soup 329
volume 8, on the occasion of his death) to the journal’s initial
patron, A. D. Trendall, and volumes 9–10 to Peter Connor—all
luminaries of Mediterranean archaeology down under.
In a speech made at the journal’s official launch, and published
in Meditarch 2 (1989), its editor delivered a revealing
programmatic statement: 14
The extraordinary development of Mediterranean archaeology in
Australia after the Second War, and in particular in the last 20
years, can be understood as part of the country’s rapid and radical
transformation from a rural British colony at the periphery of the
world to an independent, increasingly industrialized nation with a
growing awareness of its position in the Pacific and of its unique,
multicultural character. . . .
He went on to present a general survey of these developments,
in terms of fieldwork and museum initiatives, concluding: 15
In short, by 1987, it was clear that the time had come for the creation
of an Australian and New Zealand journal of Mediterranean archaeology
. . . At a meeting held in the War Memorial Gallery at the
University of Sydney in April 1987 . . . it was agreed that there could
hardly be a more auspicious year to start such a venture than 1988: the
year of the Australian bicentenary, the year in which the Department
of Archaeology in Sydney was celebrating its fortieth anniversary.
There are things to commend in this journal, not least the fact
that it networks a community of scholars living at some distance
from other ‘Mediterranean centres’; it makes known holdings in
unfamiliar Australian and New Zealand museums; it periodically
emphasizes, in salutary fashion, teaching and teaching with
artefact collections. On the other hand, the journal’s customarily
parochial alignment can lead to marginalization, nor does it
particularly seek to question established disciplinary confines.
Even more problematic, as the approving mention of the
Australian bicentenary suggests, Mediterranean Archaeology
presents itself as an oddly colonialist enterprise: the Mediterranean
is used to validate and celebrate development and success
on the other side of the world. The effort is indicated by the
14 J.-P. Descoeudres, ‘Preface: Australian and New Zealand Contributions
to the Archaeology of the Mediterranean World—A Preliminary Sketch’,
Mediterranean Archaeology 2 (1989), 3.
15 Ibid. 8.