Cosmopolitan Archaeologies Paperback - 2009

The contributors describe various forms of cosmopolitan engagement involving sites that span the globe. They take up the links between conservation, natural heritage and ecology movements, and the ways that local heritage politics are constructed through international discourses and regulations. They are attentive to how communities near heritage sites are affected by archaeological fieldwork and findings, and to the complex interactions that local communities and national bodies have with international sponsors and universities, conservation agencies, development organizations, and NGOs. Whether discussing the toll of efforts to preserve biodiversity on South Africans living near Kruger National Park, the ways that UNESCO's global heritage project universalizes the ethic of preservation, or the Open Declaration on Cultural Heritage at Risk that the Archaeological Institute of America sent to the U.S. government before the Iraq invasion, the contributors provide nuanced assessments of the ethical implications of the discursive production, consumption, and governing of other people's pasts.

Contributors. O. Hugo Benavides, Lisa Breglia, Denis Byrne, Chip Colwell-Chanthaphonh, Alfredo Gonzlez-Ruibal, Ian Hodder, Ian Lilley, Jane Lydon, Lynn Meskell, Sandra Arnold Scham