Much needed within scholarship related to archaeology, the construction of nations, and the politics of epistemic practice, the two books under review—Bureaucratic archaeology and Archaeology, nation, and race—are certainly welcome additions. The first, by Ashish Avikunthak, is a deep and engaged ethnographic study of the ways by which the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) produces archaeology, and links it to religiosity, at the excavation site. Through this study, Avikunthak lays open “this social, cultural, and scientific universe of postcolonial archaeologies and demonstrate the impact of bureaucratic ontologies on epistemological practices” (p. xix). The second volume, co-authored by Raphael Greenberg and Yannis Hamilakis, can be considered autoethnographic, fashioned around conversations during a seminar at Brown University. In a series of fascinating chapter-conversations, they provide nuance to otherwise very difficult, slippery and easily conflated arguments that bring together and reflect upon the histories of archaeological imaginaries and contemporary politics of Greece and Israel/occupied Palestine. Both texts are grounded in an ethnographic modality that allows for clarity of their epistemic critiques of the nation. It is remarkable how much political work both texts are doing by carefully holding and contextualising history and contemporary politics, while also providing critical insights into the ways in which archaeology is used to further the politics of the nation.

Bureaucratic archaeology is by far one of the most rigorous treatments of the ASI, identifying key nodes of investigation and providing epistemic critique. The genesis of this study emerged in the aftermath of the 1992–1993 Bombay riots, in which over 900 people died as tensions escalated in response to the Hindu karsevaks demolishing the historic Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. This was the cityscape within which Avikunthak tried to make sense of “the role of the past in the making of violence in India” (p. xiv), in particular, violence against Muslims spearheaded by Hindu nationalist groups—a query that continues to resonate meaningfully in contemporary politics. The methodology employed by Avikunthak was one of deep, sustained and rigorous ethnography, and as a strategy, it was the most effective for the question he strove to answer. Between 2003 and 2005, he conducted ethnography at Harappan sites in Gujarat, Rajasthan and Haryana. The sites “formed the core of a short-lived but controversial project undertaken by the ASI—the Saraswati Heritage Project (SHP)—with the goal of searching for the lost civilization of the Vedic Aryans (the authors of the ancient Vedic literature)” (p. xviii; for details, see also Chapter 2). Key to understanding the critique is the ethnography and how “scientifically linking archaeological evidence to religiosity” (p. xviii) takes place in the trench at the site, thus making clear the links between ideology and practice. The ethnographic study is contextualised within discussions of colonial histories and the development of archaeology as a field within a postcolonial (but not fully decolonised) nation-state.

Chapter 1 provides the theoretical and methodological framework, the political stakes, and some history of the ASI and its transformation from a colonial bureaucracy to the larger and far more complex, central position that it has in contemporary India. Understanding this positionality and power is important as it informs the way by which, in Chapter 2, Avikunthak carefully and with remarkable clarity outlines the contested politics around what constitutes Harappan against the backdrop of a reimagining of the Saraswati River. This work is rooted in ethnographic accounts, primarily from the sites of Dholavira, Hansi, Baror and Bhirrana. Importantly, this chapter articulates the re-emergence of Saraswati as a product of the epistemic relationship between colonial Indology and postcolonial science.

Through these ethnographic vignettes, one gets a sense of the people—the archaeologists themselves—and the ways by which they are disciplined into their subject positions. This is highlighted in Chapter 3 via a critical look at the organisational hierarchies of the ASI and how such a structure creates and maintains certain social and cultural ways of being that are clearly oppressive to all participants. Moving from the people within the system to the archaeological site where the system produces the science, Chapter 4 provides evidence of what Avikunthak calls “ideological manipulation of the landscape” (p. xxii). Grounded in thick description, this chapter illustrates how Hindu sanskar (tradition) informs all aspects of the archaeological site: from selection of the site to establishment of, and hierarchies within, campsites and the demarcation of excavation zones. Most interesting are the subaltern narratives lifted through the ethnographic study. In the context of Dholavira, Avikunthak's interview with Shambhudan Gadhvi sheds light on how narratives of discovery are constructed. That recognition of value was more significant than participation is explicit in a conversation with the site director, who said: “discovery is not about awareness but about recognition” (p. 123). These ethnographic insights provide reason to pause and think through the epistemic impact of such a claim and the embedded values that inform social relations.

Shaping that evaluation is the deep history informed by colonial masters, in this case Mortimer Wheeler and his singular theoretical and methodological impact on the archaeology of South Asia. Chapters 5 and 6 provide both the epistemological formation of the archaeological site and the theory of excavation, utilising deep archival research drawn into detailed ethnographic description. It is here that the insistence on stratigraphic clarity in a colonial time came to power, through the precision of a knife. ASI trenches are known for their razor-sharp and precise sections, as well as depictions of distinct layers in photographs. This ethnographic study reveals that the creation of scientific fact happens through the literal use of a knife and its demarcation of time and space on the section. What might have been left to interpretation is made fact by the drawing of sharp lines. In much the same way, Chapter 7 elucidates how excavation reveals materials that are categorised immediately, in the trench itself, thus moving through interpretation at the site of revelation. The impact is establishment of a practice in which the artefact leaves the trench as a fact.

The penultimate chapter reflects on the performance of archaeological representation and daily practice. In both drawings and photography, it is clear that the archaeological site was the locale for ideologically informed performances of the state and power. This is evident on multiple scales within the site hierarchies themselves, for example as labouring bodies were used as epistemic markers by Wheeler. The final chapter (9) coalesces everything in ‘The Absent Excavation Reports’. Coming back to the relationships between archaeology, the state, the courts and violence, this chapter focuses on the process of excavations at Ayodhya, exemplifying arguments made throughout the book. The ethnographic content in this chapter is truly remarkable, hugely important, and nuanced in its humanity.

Avikunthak successfully argues that ASI's bureaucracy, and the religious politics that inform the structures of those offices, run so deep in archaeological practice in India that it cannot but impact the very nature of the archaeological evidence that it produces and presents as scientific fact. The power of this bureaucracy is clearly enunciated in Avikunthak's framing:

All of us working in this field (both domestic and international) know this deep in our bodies. Although I was riveted by this study, I could not help but wonder about the masculine posturing and how archaeology in the ASI was the performance of masculinity, deeply linked to the ways in which patriarchy is embedded in the state itself. I cannot recommend this book enough. For anyone doing archaeological or heritage research in South Asia, this book is essential reading.

Unsurprisingly, the link between performances of masculinity/ideal body and archaeology also finds a place in Greenberg & Hamilakis's Archaeology, nation, and race. This book, modelled after a conversation, is interesting as a form. Its strengths lie in its ability to traverse disparate, yet related, topics as a constellation of ideas, and yet because it is, after all, a conversation between men, it feels more privileged than perhaps its politics might desire. Be that as it may, the volume expands the ways by which we can think about issues related to archaeology and the nation, and for that, I commend the authors.

The seminar co-taught by Greenberg and Hamilakis was entitled ‘Archaeology, Materiality, and National Imagination in Israel and Greece’. The idea of the seminar, and thus the resulting book, was to:

The introduction lays out both scholars’ backgrounds and how they came to their positions within archaeology. It is here that the tone of the text is established—an autobiographical approach that creates an autoethnographic framing. This is important, as both authors claim heritage and belonging to the states in question, making the political stakes of these conversations particular. Within that framing, then, the conversation about the colonial origins of national archaeologies (Chapter 2) reads as a deep engagement with personal histories of knowing: knowing the many layers of the origins of Greek and Israeli archaeology, the relationship between colonialism and nationalism, the impact of the Ottoman Empire in both states, and the ways all of these inform the national project. This chapter is remarkable in that it covers much history, with a nuanced lens, and it behoves the reader to follow these interlinked narratives carefully. The end of the chapter links the national project also to the idealised (white) body, setting the stage for later conversations around race.

Most intriguing is the conversation around the crypto-colony/buffer states that finds centre stage in Chapter 3. Utilising Michael Herzfeld's definition of crypto-colonies (states with “strong national sentiment that serve as buffer zones and whose political independence is accompanied by massive economic dependency” [p. 42]), Greenberg and Hamilakis draw comparisons between both states and their relationship to their histories. This is a fascinating conversation, as the relationship between the construction of the nation, its political economy and archaeology is carefully articulated in the analysis provided. The interconnected realities of buffer states, the many ways economic holds are placed upon them, and how that impacts the archaeology of the state, informs how national narratives are developed. It is complicated, particularly in the case of occupied Palestine, as these analyses have the effect of shifting the onus of settler occupation onto historical conditions (i.e. to blame the British), or onto economic relationships (i.e. to blame the United States), rather than how settler occupation of Palestine is now a Zionist state agenda.

As with any such political dialogue, after moving through complicated and murky political issues, the conversation turns to slightly easier topics, such as purity, race and the body. Chapters 4 and 5 deal with how archaeological science is used to provide evidence for the purity of a specific kind of (white) national body. This conversation across two chapters highlights national discourses related to ‘cleaning up’ an area, the affective modalities of how bodies of difference are understood within the contemporary landscape, and touches on archaeogenetics. The final conversation, on decolonising the imagination, is where the elephant in the room is finally addressed. Greenberg states

Both books reviewed here are worthwhile contributions to the scholarship contending with the relationship of archaeology, religious national projects and science. It is interesting to think through how ethnographic methods provided both volumes the capacity to launch an epistemic critique of the state. Both books navigate highly political and volatile waters, doing so with care and precision.