Old Copper Complex Summary

In his writing on archaeology, Binford investigated the claim by Willey and Phillips that “’American archaeology is anthropology or it is nothing’,” which he cited right at the beginning (217). Binford supplied a very long introductory section in which he posed the problem that archaeology faces; he explained that in anthropology it is viewed simply as finding artifacts and that archaeology does not provide any explanatory value when attempting to answer important anthropological questions. In efforts to counter the anthropologists’ view of archaeology, Binford introduced various archaeological ideas such as the sub-classes of material culture, as he called them; these were “technomic, socio-technic, and ideo-technic,” (p. 217). He went into great detail explaining these sub classes so that he could utilize them to exemplify archaeology’s worth in the field. Binford used the “Old Copper complex” example in reference to Native American peoples.
“It has long been observed and frequently cited as a case of technological ‘devolution…”, stated Binford – citing Griffin – to start of his argument (220). He explained how the Old Copper complex in the Americas was baffling to anthropologists because it was inefficient to the point that it appeared to be a regression in technology. After giving some basic archaeological knowledge in his introduction, Binford was able to take a couple of pages to describe archaeology’s role in unravelling the mystery. Although he wasn’t able to come up with a definite answer, he was able to give an explanatory theory based on the information that they had, referring to it as more of a “systematic frame of reference,” (223-224). Binford couldn’t come to a conclusion, but he proved – at least in my opinion – that archaeology can be valuable to