Beyond borders and boundaries in prehistoric research

This text reflects a desire to move beyond established boundaries in the study of the prehistoric past. On the one hand, it embodies the intention to overcome a disciplinary regime characterised by mutually exclusive schools of thought. On the other hand, it is contexted in a growing demand for a critical evaluation of narratives founded on the notion that prehistoric societies were composed of bounded and distinct populations of human beings, internally connected by shared cultures, kinship relations, and the occupation of a discrete geographical territory. Actually, the parallel development of archaeogenetics, post-humanism and the new materialisms, has destabilised our understanding of the relationships between things and people and the way that we can think about collective identities. I will seek to tease out the implications of these parallel developments and pursue the argument that we can think of identity more as a process than as a stable entity.