How are we to represent the past? I call this a question of historiography, but I am by no means only interested in writing. Here are some themes

• non-representational forms rooted in real time event and process
• hybrid genres/hybrid forms
• deep mapping
• hence ~ theatre/archaeology - the performative
• 'fields' not objects or sites – relational thinking
• the question of media
• the implications of current conceptual, installation and performance art
• non-identity and anti-narrative (cf Adorno and Benjamin)

• overall issue – design and design history

Since 1993 I have been fortunate in working with two great artistic talents – Mike Pearson and Cliff McLucas, art directors of the site specific theatre company Brith Gof. They have taken my work into fields I could never have dreamed.

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Main publication

Experiencing the Past London, Routledge, 1991

Archaeology and the forms of history. In I. Hodder, M. Shanks, Alexandra Alexandri, Victor Buchli, John Carman, Jonathan Last and Gavin Lucas (eds), Interpreting Archaeology: Finding Meaning in the Past. London, Routledge, 1995

Photography and the archaeological image. In B. Molyneaux (ed), The Cultural Life of Images: Visual Representation in Archaeology. London, Routledge, 1997

Performing a visit: archaeologies of the contemporary past. With Mike Pearson. Performance Research 2: 42-60 (1996)

Art and the Early Greek State Cambridge University Press, 1999

Theatre/Archaeology With Mike Pearson. London, Routledge, 2001

Three landscapes: a visual primer. With Clifford McLucas and Dorian Llywelyn. In preparation.

Three rooms: archaeology and performance. Journal of Social Archaeology 4: 147-180 Also at http://traumwerk.stanford.edu/~mshanks/traumwerk