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Archaeological classification: theory versus practice

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

William Y. Adams
William Y. Adams*
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506–0024, USA
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Abstract

Classification is fundamental to all artefactual archaeology, and no one who works with artefacts can be unaware of the doubts that surround many classifications. How similar are the similar things that belong together? How different are the different things that belong apart? What do the classes of similar things actually amount to? This paper looks at some fundamental questions of classification, believing that classification is too important a practical matter to be left to the theoreticians.

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Antiquity , Volume 62 , Issue 234 , March 1988 , pp. 40 - 56
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Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd 1988

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