Epistemics refers to how knowledge is articulated and conveyed.
In the case of archaeology, it refers to the way in which the data extracted from the soil become part of a logically coherent system. We may refer to this as a process of “grammaticalization”. In and of itself, the physical record is inert and opaque, a mass of bits and pieces that do not emerge from the ground in any meaningful configuration. They become properly “known” when they are inserted into a grammatical system.
There are three aspects to epistemics so understood.
- Organization. – A system must be established that accounts for all the pieces as found.
- Process. – There are several operations through which the data are acquired and then integrated into the grammatical system.
- Publication. – Grammaticalization is not an end in itself. It rather serves as a trampolin for making the data available “publically.” In other words, grammar is intrinsically related to publishing.
In the section that follows, I will discuss some of the basic principles that inform epistemic analysis as it refers to archaeology.
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