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“Archeologia della Guerra”: caro nonno ti scrivo
“Archaeology of War”: dear granpa, I write to you
De Guio, Armando
2016
Abstract
The Great War and the related archaeological study can be assumed as a watershed between a still rather distant past at the cognitive level, a closer, more tangible (and sometimes emotional) Grandfather’s Archeology and an even more recent Archaeology (or Ethnoarchaeology) of Us in which, not only the archaeological (arte/eco-factual) record turns out to be traceable, but the cognitive aspect (Archaeology of the Mind) assumes a key role for various relevant social actors (“mental-maps” or “mind-facts”) in relation to the hosting society and territory. Along this line of thought, the archeology of the Great War offers the chance to trace a subtle parallelism between the Post Traumatic Stress Disorder suffered by the veterans and the equally traumatic physical transformations undergone by the landscapes of the front (warscape), still going on along the morphogenetic line of a never-ending formation process of the archaeological record. The characteristic approach undertaken in the study of this multi-layered landscape can be set along two main guidelines: an Archeology of the War in the strict sense, whose target of investigation is precisely the physical evidences left by the Great War, and a distinct Archeology through the War, in which the disruptive changes in the landscape caused by the war impact provide frequent preferential breaches (stratigraphic windows) opportunistically opened for the study of a more remote past. In both approaches (sometimes separated only from the theoretical point of view) the technical-methodological toolkit is highly homogeneous, preferring a Minimum Tillage Policy (minimally intrusive) on the record, by relying mainly on remote sensing, surface recognition, prospecting and laboratory analysis in one all-encompassing High Tech/ Low Cost perspective. Finally, five different case studies are proposed, illustrating the different objectives pursued through the investigation of Great War contexts from a widened perspective that ranges from a proper scientific research to the protection of a constantly changing and threatened landscape of war (ECRM/ Eco-Cultural Resource Managenment), up to the mise en valeur of marginal areas with the lively involvement of local communities (Public/ Community/ Participatory Archaeology and Archeology for Development).
La Grande Guerra e lo studio archeologico a essa connesso si pongono come linea di demarcazione tra un passato ancora piuttosto distante a livello cognitivo, una più vicina e tangibile (e talvolta emotiva) Archeologia del Nonno e la concezione di una ancor più recente Archeologia (o meglio etnoarcheologia) di Noi in cui, non solo il record archeologico eco/ manu-fattuale risulta riscontrabile, ma l’aspetto cognitivo assume un ruolo fondamentale intorno all’individuo stesso (mentefatti) in relazione alla società e al territorio. In questo senso, l’archeologia della Prima Guerra Mondiale permette di tracciare un parallelismo tra il Post Traumatic Stess Disorder sofferto dai reduci con le trasformazioni fisiche subite dai paesaggi del fronte (warscape), talvolta ancora in atto come processi formativi del record. L’approccio caratteristico intrapreso nello studio di questo paesaggio pluristratificato si può impostare su due linee guida principali: un’Archeologia della Guerra in senso stretto, il cui target di indagine sono proprio le evidenze della Grande Guerra, e un’Archeologia attraverso la Guerra, in cui i mutamenti del paesaggio indotti dall’impatto bellico forniscono delle “finestre preferenziali” (finestre stratigrafche) per lo studio di un passato più remoto. In entrambi gli approcci (talvolta separati solo dal punto di vista teorico) il bagaglio tecnico-metodologico applicativo risulta omogeneo prediligendo una politica del Minimum Tillage (impatto/intrusività minimi) sul record, preferenzialmente attraverso il telerilevamento, la ricognizione di superficie, le prospezioni e le analisi di laboratorio tutte in un’ottica High Tech/ Low Cost. Infine vengono proposti cinque differenti casi di studio esemplificativi dei differenti obiettivi perseguibili attraverso l’indagine dei contesti della Prima Guerra Mondiale in un’ottica che spazia dalla ricerca scientifica, alla tutela di un paesaggio in continuo mutamento/ sparizione, fino alla valorizzazione di aree marginali con il coinvolgimento delle comunità locali (Archeologia Pubblica, Archeologia Comunitaria, Archeologia Partecipatoria/Archeologia per lo Sviluppo).
The Great War and the related archaeological study can be assumed as a watershed between a still rather distant past at the cognitive level, a closer, more tangible (and sometimes emotional) Grandfather’s Archeology and an even more recent Archaeology (or Ethnoarchaeology) of Us in which, not only the archaeological (arte/eco-factual) record turns out to be traceable, but the cognitive aspect (Archaeology of the Mind) assumes a key role for various relevant social actors (“mental-maps” or “mind-facts”) in relation to the hosting society and territory. Along this line of thought, the archeology of the Great War offers the chance to trace a subtle parallelism between the Post Traumatic Stress Disorder suffered by the veterans and the equally traumatic physical transformations undergone by the landscapes of the front (warscape), still going on along the morphogenetic line of a never-ending formation process of the archaeological record. The characteristic approach undertaken in the study of this multi-layered landscape can be set along two main guidelines: an Archeology of the War in the strict sense, whose target of investigation is precisely the physical evidences left by the Great War, and a distinct Archeology through the War, in which the disruptive changes in the landscape caused by the war impact provide frequent preferential breaches (stratigraphic windows) opportunistically opened for the study of a more remote past. In both approaches (sometimes separated only from the theoretical point of view) the technical-methodological toolkit is highly homogeneous, preferring a Minimum Tillage Policy (minimally intrusive) on the record, by relying mainly on remote sensing, surface recognition, prospecting and laboratory analysis in one all-encompassing High Tech/ Low Cost perspective. Finally, five different case studies are proposed, illustrating the different objectives pursued through the investigation of Great War contexts from a widened perspective that ranges from a proper scientific research to the protection of a constantly changing and threatened landscape of war (ECRM/ Eco-Cultural Resource Managenment), up to the mise en valeur of marginal areas with the lively involvement of local communities (Public/ Community/ Participatory Archaeology and Archeology for Development).
Journal
Source
Armando De Guio, ''“Archeologia della Guerra”: caro nonno ti scrivo'', in: ''Aquileia Nostra'', 87 (2016), pp. 11-42
Languages
it
Rights
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
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