This volume offers a history of the discipline of archaeology in America. The book reveals the 19th-century century bourgeois value system behind the field, its goals and its current condition. The author argues that American archaeology has been shaped by an ethic of Manifest Destiny.

First published in 1998. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

"Alice Kehoe is often deliberately provocative, and this may be her most polemical publication. Do not be put off; though parts of the book are difficult, it is well worth reading... Archaeologists will want to investigate their backyards with this book. - American Anthropologist, Vol. 102, No. 3, September 2000.""A courageous, superbly written book! ...[A]n absolute must for every interested person who would like to assess the degree of reliability, of that scenario of the prehistory of the Americas, with hich we have been infoctrinated... Such a comprehensive qualification or competence, and outlook, has today become rare, indeed, within the ranks of our Establishments, professors not expected. - Migration & Diffusion, Vol. 1, Issue No. 4, 2000.""Kehoe's more complex and intriguing narrative focuses on what archaeologists see in the material remains of previous cultures and on what they systematically fail to see... It should be taken very seriously by fledgling archaeologists who may be more open to the reconstruction of their discipline than are they elders. ISIS. Volume 91, Number 2, June 2000 The scholarship is solid, and the prose...is often hysterically funny." -- The Key Reporter"Kehoe succeeds in summarizing how American archaeology has come to be what it is. She is at her best in discussing developments in Britain during the late 19th century, which in many respects set the stage for what would occur in America a short time later...Graduate students and faculty." -- Choice"Many books help us know. Alice Kehoe's helps us think as well. Feisty, passionate for truth and angry with those too lazy to pursue it, Kehoe writes with the fervor of a scholar unwilling to accept the unconsidered. The junk-yard dogs will howl, but perhaps they will awaken the neighbors to look afresh at the unconsidered preconceptions of American prehistory." -- Roger Kennedy, author of Hidden Cities, Director Emeritus of the National Museum of American History, and former Director of the National Park Service"The scholarship is solid, and the prose...is often hysterically funny." -- The Key Reporter"Solid scholarship, a consummate knowledge of the primary sources, and a willingness to think outside the normal boundaries of the discipline make this a book that every self-critical archaeologist must read." -- Journal of the West