Archeology Theater

I have been thinking quite a bit lately how much of what goes on in CRM is really just Archaeology Theater. Archaeology Theater is creating and maintaining the pretense of doing archaeology, but not really doing archaeology. Basically, Archaeology Theater is what non-archaeologists think archaeology looks like. It's most prevalent with field methods (excavation and recording), but is also manifest in the myths, memes and shibboleths common in CRM. Archaeology Theater is actively harmful to doing good archaeology. Probably the worst thing about Archaeology Theater is that now archaeologists are convincing themselves that these practices constitute good archaeology.