Rubbish!: The Archaeology of Garbage

264 Pages·22.351 MB·English

by  William L. Rathje, Cullen Murphy

T H t A R C ~H A E ll L 0 G Y 0 F " G / TRTB A GE
.
WHAT OUR GARBAGE
WILLIAM RATHJE
& CULLEN MURPH
CANADA $31.00
Along with death and taxes, garbage is one of life's
great certainties. Whether it c omes in the form of old
newspapers, bottles and cans, thrown-away food, or
the overflow of basements and attics, our collective
trash demands to be confronted — not only as an
ecological conundrum, but as a mirror of modern life
and the American character, one that reflects us all
in enlightening and surprising ways.
It i s from the discards of former civilizations that
archaeologists have reconstructed much of what life
was like in the past, and it i s through its examination
of today's garbage that Rubbish! takes an unexpect-
ed and revelatory look at the present. For the past
twenty years the University of Arizona's Garbage
Project has been sifting, sorting, and classifying the
detritus of our lives — all told, a quarter of a million
pounds of garbage. This "hands-on" analysis, coupled
with survey data and other research, has yielded
insights into politics, economics, and demographics,
into history, and into the ineradicable quirks of
human behavior. Excavated from landfills or exam-
ined fresh from the truck, garbage offers a reality
check, telling us how we really act, what we really
consume. Some of the unusual findings of recent
garbage research reveal that:
' W hile it h as long been a cliche that children don't
eat their vegetables, adults are just as guilty; fresh
produce is the biggest contributor to food waste in
our garbage.
When questioned about their eating habits, people
consistently downplay their consumption of such
items as cottage cheese, liver, and tuna. Their gar-
bage tells a different story.
• After Halloween, garbage contains lots of candy
wrappers but almost no candy. After Valentine's Day
garbage also contains lots of candy wrappers — most
often with the candy still inside.
(continued on back flap)
»0Q
c"
1

RUBBISH!
Digitized by the Internet Archive
in 2011
http://www.archive.org/details/rubbisharchaeoloOOrath
RUBBISH!
THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF GARBAGE
William Ra th j e and Cu 11 e n M urphy
HarperCollinsPublishers
To the memory of Thomas Price
rubbish! Copyright © 1992 by William Rathje and Cullen Murphy. All rights
reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be
used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except
in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For
information address HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 10 East 53rd Street, New
York, NY 10022.
HarperCollins books may be purchased for educational, business, or sales
promotional use. For information, please call or write: Special Markets
Department, HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 10 East 53rd Street, New York, NY
10022. Telephone: (212) 207-7528; Fax: (212) 207-7222.
FIRST EDITION
Designed by Ruth Kolbert
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Rathje, William
Rubbish! : the archaeology of garbage / W illiam Rathje and Cullen Murphy. —
1st ed.
p. cm.
ISBN 0-06-016603-7
1. Garbage Project (University of Arizona) 2. Refuse and refuse disposal —
Research — New York (N.Y.) 3. Refuse and refuse disposal — United States —
Case studies. I. Murphy, Cullen. II. Title.
TD793.3.R38 1992
363.72'8'097471— dc20 91-50452
92 93 94 95 96 DT/RRD 10 987654321
I (D IS U U B9 V 1
PART I
An I ntroduction to t he G arbage Project
1. Yes, Wonderful Things 3
2. Garbage and History 30
3. What We Say, What We Do 53
PARI II
The landfill Excavations
4. Into the Unknown 81
5. The Myths of Biodegradation no
PART III
Interlude: Diapers and Demographics
6. A Garbage Census? 133
7. The Diaper Dilemma 151
PARI IV
Garbage and the F uture
8. The Technological Fix 171
9. Closing the Loop 188
10. Life-style Override 214
11. The Ten Commandments 234
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 246