Commentary

Does non-anthropocentrism necessitate a turn away from marginalized people? This is a crucial question, asked lately by a growing number of archaeologists. Some see a turn toward things as a turn away from people, while others take a more nuanced view. Greer falls into the latter group, exploring this question by highlighting important contributions and corrections from Black Studies. Although the paper is framed as a challenge to posthumanism, I read it as a broad critique of non-anthropocentric approaches; after reflecting on these relationships over the last few years, I no longer draw strong associations between posthumanism and symmetrical archaeology, entanglement theory, or even ANT; for me, posthumanism involves a relatively greater degree of social and political concern than the others.