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ARCH31030

Academic Year 2025/2026

Archaeology of Communities (ARCH31030)

Subject:
Archaeology
College:
Social Sciences & Law
School:
Archaeology
Level:
3 (Degree)
Credits:
10
Module Coordinator:
Dr Ryan Lash
Trimester:
Spring
Mode of Delivery:
On Campus
Internship Module:
No
How will I be graded?
Letter grades

Curricular information is subject to change.

What makes a community? What binds human groups together and rends them apart? How do people engage traditions, narratives, landscapes, and material culture to generate notions of heritage, solidarity, or distinction? Does the belonging and inclusion of ‘community’ always rely on the exclusion of some ‘other?’ How do we succeed or fail at developing collaborative responses to collective challenges? This module explores how materials, places, practices, and ideas work together to create and maintain communities. We will examine how notions of communal identity and belonging rely upon material infrastructure – monuments, landscapes, and objects – the evoke the past, engage the senses, and frame shared meanings. By exploring archaeological and ethnographic examples from around the world, students will learn to pose critical questions of their own communities and to view them within a broader comparative framework.

Readings, case-studies, and discussions will cover: ritual and religion; environmental and economic logistics; local face-to-face interactions vs. supra-local identities; reciprocity and gift-giving; shared craft practices and embodied experiences; and the cultivation of linguistic, narrative, and material heritage. Throughout, we will grapple with a recurring theme: the interaction of ideology and materiality in the creation and maintenance of communal formations.

About this Module

Learning Outcomes:

1. To appreciate and assess how material culture acts as infrastructure for ideas and social formations

2. To understand and apply archaeological and anthropological theories of community to past and present case-studies

3. To critically evaluate the exclusions often embedded in notions of ‘community’ and to think creatively about strategies for generating novel forms of belonging

4. To write, discuss, and present arguments that are framed by archaeological theory and well-grounded in empirical evidence

Indicative Module Content:

Theories of Community; Collective Action; Reciprocity; Landscape, Heritage, and Identity; Feasting and Ritual

Student Effort Hours:
Student Effort Type Hours
Lectures

4
Small Group

16
Seminar (or Webinar)

20
Specified Learning Activities

80
Autonomous Student Learning

80
Total

200

Approaches to Teaching and Learning:
Lectures; Flipped-classroom with student-led discussion; Group activities; Archaeological and anthropological case-studies; Problem-based learning; Peer Review

Requirements, Exclusions and Recommendations

Not applicable to this module.


Module Requisites and Incompatibles
Not applicable to this module.
 

Assessment Strategy
Description Timing Component Scale Must Pass Component % of Final Grade In Module Component Repeat Offered
Assignment(Including Essay): Video Auto-Ethnography - "What makes your community?" (5-minute video presentation)

Use theoretical concepts introduced in class to examine a community to which you belong.		 Week 4 Graded No
25
 No
Assignment(Including Essay): Creative Essay - Invent a Tradition (4,500 words, including bibliography)
Design a tradition that will foster belonging among people who might not otherwise associate with one another.		 Week 12 Graded No
55
 No
Group Work Assignment: Work with a team to lead class discussion during one module meeting (over the 12 weeks). Week 1, Week 2, Week 3, Week 4, Week 5, Week 6, Week 7, Week 8, Week 9, Week 10, Week 11, Week 12 Graded No
20
 No

Carry forward of passed components
Yes
 

Resit In Terminal Exam
Autumn No
Please see Student Jargon Buster for more information about remediation types and timing. 

Feedback Strategy/Strategies

• Feedback individually to students, post-assessment
• Group/class feedback, post-assessment
• Online automated feedback
• Peer review activities
• Self-assessment activities

How will my Feedback be Delivered?

Written feedback within 4 weeks after submission deadline. Feedback contains feed-forward details, which will help you think about how you could improve your approach in future assignments. The initial project will help you develop your ideas, and feedback from the project is intended to help you construct your final essay. In class peer-review of drafts of the final assessment will help refine your essay prior to submission. NOTE: Generative AI raises significant intellectual and ethical concerns, including its environmental impact, exploitation of workers in the Global South, and disregard for intellectual property. It also often fabricates non-existent citations, as well as content that is out-of-date or inaccurate. You MUST AVOID the use of generative AI to compose or revise text. Any unattributed use of AI is forbidden and will put you in breach of UCD’s Student Plagiarism policies.

Timetabling information is displayed only for guidance purposes, relates to the current Academic Year only and is subject to change.
Spring Lecture Offering 1 Week(s) - 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33 Mon 16:00 - 16:50
Spring Lecture Offering 1 Week(s) - 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33 Tues 14:00 - 15:50
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