ABSTRACT
Over the last two decades, historical archaeology has continued to grow and mature across the globe. Calls for archaeology to be a science of the modern world have pulled together international scholarship and have further opened up the broader processes of modernity to detailed study and comparison. The widening and diverse field of historical archaeology still continues to struggle over issues of scale, representation, complexity, and relevance. Differences in development and context and the definitions and domains of historical archaeology hinder collaboration and considerations of what past and present is valid for study by historical archaeology. Although international debate over these considerations has not been ameliorated, these concerns are a sign of the growing maturity of the discipline. Advances in technology, the expansion of subfields such as contemporary archaeology, and engagement with representation, inclusion, and current issues have helped to identify and address some of these obstacles and grow a global historical archaeology of the modern world.
