Archaeology, like many of the sciences, works to a masculine metaphor, the [male) archaeologist as hero explores and tames the mysteries of his [female) subject. Feminisl theory has made important criticism of positivist science on these grounds, drawing on much the same postmodern theory as 'post-processual' archaeology. How do the 'post-processuals' appear, seen in the feminist light?The character of post-processual archaeology Recent critiques of the 'new' or 'processual' archaeology have been grouped in a new orthodoxy, 'post-processual' archaeology. Although its few practitioners show some diversity and even internal criticism (as Shanks & Tilley's criticism of Hodder) there are obvious points of consensus. Post-processual archaeology is united in its criticism of positivist, functionalist, adaptational models of the past which emphasize a scientific, objective, hypothesistesting approach and would appear to limit archaeology to the analysis of technology, economy and the effects of physical and biological processes -'middle-range' theory. The post-processual critics have variously proposed Marxism, symbolic anthropology, hermeneutics, structuralism and poststructuralism -or mixtures of these -as alternatives. United in criticizing the old 'New Archaeology', post-processualists present divergent views on what the new orthodoxy is or even if it is a new orthodoxy. A replacement archaeology can be seen in the proposed 'contextual' archaeology (Hodder 1986). Shanks & Tilley (1987a propose a plurality of archaeologies. Such divergence may be inherent in their philosophical position, related primarily to poststructuralist/postmodern thought and a seeming reluctance openly to propose a new metatheory. Much post-processual work takes the form of polemical criticisms of what went before, a discourse which has created strong, polarizations in theoretical and methodologically oriented archaeology.Some common themes can be viewed as positive proposals rather than simply deconstructions. One finds a renewed emphasis on culture, and an interest in material culture as not only reflecting but also as active in constituting social relations, and thus an emphasis on the social, symbolic, ideological as well as the functional.This structuralist and poststructuralist stance relates to developments in symbolic and critical anthropology (Scholte 1988) where the social, ideological, and symbolic are not seen as epiphenomena of supposedly more basic, functional, cause-and-effect relations. One joins the functional with the social, ideological, and symbolic analyses of the mundane aspects of everyday life (Engelstad in press). The material cultural remains relating to all aspects of mundane, everyday life become important for understanding both material and non-material aspects of this life.Relatively new to archaeology is an emphasis on the individual as active rather than the passive pawn of previous adaptation-oriented archaeologies. The relationship between agency and structure, and the importance of * ANTIQUITY 65 (1991): 502-14
