1JZGauQ
1JZGauQ
1JZGauQ
You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles
YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.
6: AN ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE IRON CURTAIN<br />
border guard stations allowed for new stories, new perspectives. Something<br />
that would not have been noticeable when the border guards were here<br />
crowding these spaces or something the texts and documents in the archives<br />
could never convey. This is also what we somehow ‘expect’ from an<br />
archaeological site, for the people to have left, a hangover from studying<br />
periods where people are long gone and all that remains are pieces. Here<br />
studies of a more recent past do differ from studies of earlier periods. Often<br />
we study the abandoned, such as ruins, which we in some way seem to be<br />
more comfortable with. We know what to do here, our methods just work.<br />
But what happens with those sites that are still used<br />
Archaeologists are used to dealing with the abandoned. In fact one of the<br />
criteria for protecting an archaeological site through policy and legislation<br />
in Sweden is that it has been abandoned for a considerable amount of time<br />
(varaktigt övergiven) which means it is no longer in use and will not be<br />
taken into use again (SFS 1988:950). Even though this definition may not be<br />
present as such in other countries’ heritage laws it demonstrates a general<br />
attitude within archaeology of how we deal with that which is abandoned<br />
and no longer in use. But what does this mean when we are pushing the<br />
materials that we study further and further into the present I do not believe<br />
it to be a coincidence that the sites that contemporary archaeologists, including<br />
my own research, tend to search out are the places that are deserted<br />
and uninhabited (although see Kiddey and Schofield 2011 for a different<br />
approach). This is what we are used to and what our methods generally<br />
allow us to look at. Andreasson et al. as well as Pétursdottír and DeSilvey<br />
make a very good case for how the material stands out clearer when not<br />
crowded by people. How in the abandoned we can see the ‘thingness’ of the<br />
objects left behind. But what happens in places where people are still<br />
present Where materials and humans are still acting together creating<br />
networks and connections Do we ask people to leave the scene or should<br />
we wait until a place have been abandoned Something that has become<br />
clear during my research is that we need to develop and adjust the methods<br />
that we use to allow people and objects both to take centre stage without<br />
one crowding the other. Surely this emphasis on things in a ‘material turn’<br />
should not increase the divide between things and humans; rather it should<br />
bridge it by putting them on equal terms<br />
Of course ruins often entice our imagination. Political scientist Anca<br />
Pusca (2010) writes of how the decay of buildings is often connected with<br />
the notion of dystopia and explains that as spaces and buildings were often<br />
highly important for the communist utopia their subsequent fall and ruin<br />
197