Miller 1984 Case Study George Orwell

A major flaw in Miller’s (1984) case study is that human agency is implied within the model and language used, but the word ‘agency’ is never explicitly stated. For example, Miller (1984) states that the area surrounding the modern-day village in question is completely “anthropogenic” (73). This statement implies that humans have the ability to affect the environment surrounding them, meaning that they are agents that can affect their surroundings. Another example of this occurs during the analysis of hearth and middens in modern-day Malyan. During the analysis, she concludes that the majority of carbonized material was “intentionally” put in the fire, so plants that were used in household activities were the most commonly preserved (Miller 1984:75). By using the word “intentionally” she imbues the humans in question with agency. Through using such an anthropocentric model, she acknowledges human agency, but never fully states that it exists. Not only does this weaken her argument, by not stating a staple assumption within her work, but it also does not allow for further thought about the agency of plants within this framework. Since the Miller (1984) case study uses the theoretical lens of ethnoarchaeology, it demonstrates that the use of human agency within this framework is important. Not only does the language used allude to the inclusion of agency within the theoretical lens, but the model itself is based on testing how …show more content…
Although ethnoarchaeology uses an anthropocentric method of interpretation, the agency of plants can easily be added to these interpretations. Through adding this dimension of thought to interpretation, the archaeologist in question can expand their interpretation to include more information than what humans ate or what the past environment looked like (van der Veen