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Migrationism and diffusionism
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{{short description|Archaeological theory for cultural changes}} The term '''migrationism''', in the history of [[archaeological theory]], was opposed to the term '''diffusionism''' (or "immobilism") as a means of distinguishing two approaches to explaining the spread of prehistoric [[archaeological culture]]s and innovations in [[artifact (archaeology)|artefact]]. Migrationism explains cultural change in terms of [[human migration]], while diffusionism relies on explanations based on [[trans-cultural diffusion]] of ideas rather than populations (''pots, not people''<ref>Carol Kramer, "Pots and Peoples" in; Louis D. Levine and T. Culyer Young (eds.), Mountains and Lowlands: Essays in the Archaeology of Greater Mesopotamia; Malibu, Undena, 1977; cited in Serge Cleuziou, "Introduction", Objets et symboles: de la culture matérielle à l'espace culturel : actes de la 1re Journée doctorale d'archéologie, Paris, 20 mai 2006, ed. Laurent Dhennequin, Guillaume Gernez and Jessica Giraud, Paris: Sorbonne, 2009, {{ISBN|9782859446222}}, p. 18, n. 12.</ref>). Western archaeology the first half of the 20th century relied on the assumption of migration and invasion as driving cultural change. That was criticized by the [[Processual archaeology|processualists]] in the 1960s and 1970s, leading to a new mainstream which rejected "migrationism" as outdated.<ref>Processual archaeology was further deconstructed by "[[Post-processual archaeology]]" which denied the possibility of ever forming objective conclusions based on archaeological evidence and denounced "materialist interpretations of the past" as being ethically and politically irresponsible.</ref> Since the 1990s, there has been renewed interest in "migrationist" scenarios, as archaeologists attempted the archaeological reflexes of migrations known to have occurred historically. Since the 2000s, the developments in [[archaeogenetics]] have opened a new avenue for investigation, based on the analysis of [[ancient DNA]]. Kristiansen (1989) argued that the reasons for embracing "immobilism" during the [[Cold War era]] were ideological and derived from an emphasis on political solutions displacing military action.<ref> "The Danish archaeologist Kristiansen (1989) has suggested that the reasons for the rising popularity of immobilism lie in post-war decolonialisation and in the development of the welfare state. In the public realm, this ledto an emphasis on political evolution rather than military solutions; in archaeology, this was translated into a belief in autochthonous development rather than 'invasions'." Härke (1998), citing Hills, C., [https://journals.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/index.php/vuf/article/download/16898/10715 "The Anglo-Saxon settlement of England. The state of research in Britain in the late 1980s"], in: ''Ausgewählte Probleme europäischer Landnahmen des Früh- und Hochmittelalters'', ed. M. Müller, (1993), p. 310. [https://web.archive.org/web/20170713215350/http://journals.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/index.php/vuf/article/download/16898/10715 Archived] 13 July 2017 at the [[Wayback Machine]].</ref>
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