ABSTRACT

Morag Cross provides a thought-provoking examination of the interrelationship between disability and archaeology in multiple ways that have previously been neglected. Hence beyond considering the social and medical constructions of disability she also examines a variety of other subjects. These include the potentially positive role of archaeology in creating disability ‘culture’, the absence of ‘disability’ in archaeological parlance in favour of disease (see for example Roberts and Manchester 2005), and the need for change in archaeological attitudes to disability. ‘Access’ is a key word, at least in British society today, and Cross examines how we can make archaeology accessible to the disabled at a variety of levels – indicating, as should be obvious, that archaeologists are not immune from social responsibilities, nor is the archaeological record from which we interpret past identities somehow removed from contemporary concerns and issues.