Archaeologia Islandica - 01.01.2009, Síða 33

ICELANDIC VlKING AGE GRAVES: LACK IN MATERIAL - LACK OF INTERPRETATION?
struction of a person’s identity. Similarly,
everyday objects as pots or knifes may
have come to be or contain a key part of
self defínition and communication.
Therefore, these items may be argued to
be deposited in graves with human
remains, not as accessories of the
deceased, but because they were “a part
of the persorí’ (Fowler 2001, 160). In
that case, the classic approach of sorting
out the mess, removing non-humans from
humans and stripping clothes from bod-
ies, will inhibit our possibility to under-
stand this collective whole. The things,
the clothing do not only metaphorically
stand for the person, or identity, but are
rather parts of a literally integral phe-
nomenon - “the clothing-person” (Miller
2005, 32).
In her research among the Kodi in
eastem Indonesia Janet Hoskins (1998)
discovered just how ordinary objects
could “contain” the stories of peoples
lives. Through her stmggle to record the
life histories of her informants it became
ever clearer to her that their stories could
not be collected separately from the sto-
ries of the everyday objects they sur-
rounded themselves with. By being con-
stantly and intimately entangled in peo-
ple’s everyday lives ordinary possessions
became vehicles for self defmition and
identity - kind of “memory boxes” hold-
ing on to the passing moments, memories
of people and relations, and a means to
bring them back through their appear-
ance, smell and touch as well as their
practical use (Hoskins 1998, 2-5). An
ordinary object was therefore not simply
a “metaphor for the self’ but “...a pivot
for reflexivity and introspection, a tool of
autobiographical self-discovery, a way of
knowing oneself through things” (Hoskins
1998, 198).
In her work Hoskins seeks inspiration
from the ideas of sociologist Violette
Morin (1969) and her distinction between
“biographical objects” and “protocol
objects” in modem France. Though both
types of objects may be mass produced,
the relations people establish with the
former endows them with an identity
which is unique, localized and personal.
Unlike protocol objects, which are eter-
nally youthful and replaceable, biograph-
ical things share the life of their owners
and may hence grow old, fade and dete-
riorate alongside them. As a witness to a
person’s life, a biographical object may
anchor its owner to a certain time and
provide a mirror for identity construc-
tion, reflection and memory. As such
everyday things are not just what they
momentarily appear as, but may rather be
thought of as complex “gatherings”
through which we become entwined in a
web of relations between people, things
and places at a “spatiotemporal distance”
(Witmore 2005).
However, through their transactions
with people objects not only come to
contain or anchor the life histories of
people, as biographical things, but also
accumulate histories of their own -
become subjects of their own biogra-
phies. This idea is most often traced back
to Igor Kopytoff who, in an influential
article in 1986, was among the first to
argue for a “biography of things”.
Through the course of its life an object
travels through a range of places and
contexts, where its physical appearance,
role and identity are constantly trans-
formed. Therefore, Kopytoff argues,
things cannot be fully comprehended in
any isolated moment of their existence,
but through exploring the whole span of
their cultural biography. Like Violette
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