In Pursuit of a Reflexive Recording. An Epistemic Analysis of Excavation Diaries from the Çatalhöyük Research Project

Abstract

This paper investigates the excavation diaries recorded under the principles of a reflexive method, as defined by Ian Hodder and his colleagues of the Çatalhöyük Research Project. The primary goal is to examine their content and assess their epistemic value for creating a more robust and better-contextualised archive. This study defines such epistemic value by considering the information types found in entries, the textual format of diaries, their relationship to the project’s research agenda and usefulness for writing up excavation reports. Ultimately, this analysis is useful for advancing an alternative approach for reflexive recording, which takes better account of previous criteria and is unrestricted to excavation diaries.