Assembling the Past: Narratives, Materials and Archaeologists – 18 December 2025

Date: 18 December 2025

Location: Surgical Theater (room A1.01), University Library, University of Amsterdam (Vendelstraat 2, 1012 XX, Amsterdam)

Credits: 1/2 ECT

Assembling the Past is an international conference that aims to contribute to the study of material
culture – a fundamental aspect of our discipline. It is this year’s iteration of a symposium organised by
Research MA students as part of the University of Amsterdam’s course ‘Matter, Materialities and
Material Cultures’ in conjunction with the National Research School ARCHON. As such the
Symposium seeks to present discussions, debates and research that engage the material both
theoretically and through material findings, and from a variety of perspectives, including but not
limited to Symmetrical Archaeology, new materialism(s), posthumanism, Material Engagement
Theory, Speculative and Agential Realism.

We consider the conference to be a matter of assemblage; being itself an assembly of perspectives,
fields, materials – as well as an opportunity to consider the various theoretical conceptualisations of
assemblage (explored by Deleuze & Guattari, DeLanda, Fowler, Bennett, Hamilakis, among others).
Other topics and questions include the narratives pressed upon but also made possible by material
artefacts, the affordances of vast and varied approaches to human-material interactions (as well as the
debates surrounding that distinction), and the changing role of archaeologists therein – especially in
the context of archaeology as a field that is wanting to decolonise itself, engage environmental issues
and questioning modes of conservation.

Programme:

Session 1, chaired by Emma Tiben
9:30 – Welcome and introduction
9:45 – Guest speaker: Matthew Edgeworth (University of Leicester) – On the vibrant
matter of archaeology
10:30 – Short break
Session 2, chaired by Bluma Brecher
10:40 – Speaker 1: Nikki de Buck – Imagining the Past: Material engagement theory and the agency of absence
11:00 – Speaker 2: Maud de Wit – Material violence: the role of ‘things’ in sustaining
structural and slow violence
11:20 – Speaker 3: Nicole Correa da Silva e Vargas – Ways of Becoming: A Materiality of Faith, or How Pious Peasants Turned Militant Crusaders
11:40 – Discussion
12:00 – Lunch break
Session 3, chaired by Emma Tiben
13:00 – Speaker 4: Tessa Russchen – Beyond Anthropocentrism: Towards A Heritage
of Change
13:20 – Speaker 5: Teodora Scorţan – Between the Accurate Past and
Authentic Present: Daco-Roman Reenactments in Present Day Romania
13:40 – Speaker 6: Bluma Brecher – Understanding ‘Alternative Archaeologies’: Pseudoarchaeology and the Assemblage Theory Concept
14:00 – Discussion
14:20 – Coffee break
Session 4, chaired by Bluma Brecher
14:40 – Speaker 7: Emma Tiben – A Bog’s Body: The Case of Yde Girl
15:00 – Speaker 8: Serina Maylene Barba – Ephemeral Materiality along the Arizona
Borderlands
15:20 – Speaker 9: Rob Niesert – Semiotics: a road to somewhere?
15:40 – Discussion
16:00 – Short break
Session 5, chaired by Emma Tiben and/or Bluma Brecher
16:10 – Guest speaker: Maikel Kuijpers (Leiden University),
16:55 – Thank you and end talk
17:00 – Borrel

Registration: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScWtb_y7EFax2X5z_YoMNKorlw08-0dY_6jY3bYiYPDkabiDQ/viewform

Credits: ARCHON members can receive 1 ECT for attending the conference and handing in a reflection report afterwards. ARCHON members can also receive 1 additional ECT for presenting at the conference, by handing in their (Powerpoint) presentation. Both should be sent to secretary@archonline.nl within a month after the conference.