Archaeology has recognized the potential for archaeology to bridge gaps in knowledge regarding the histories of literate and non-literate peoples. This has seen research focusing on people not commonly represented in dominant historical narratives, including the illiterate, indigenous peoples, women, children, the elderly, the infirm, the poor, the disenfranchised, providing an alternative and critical perspective on the past. Deborah Rose (1991) has characterized as 'hidden histories'. These hidden histories are the personal and community narratives of indigenous people that relate their experiences of the incursion of pastoralism, mining, towns, missions and transport routes onto their ancestral lands.

A growing body of historical (e.g., cultural geographical (Gill 2000; Howitt 2001) and anthropological research (have analyzed how dominant accounts of national identity have been created through exclusive narratives of settler achievement. It can be argued that aspects of the non-indigenous history, particularly the everyday work and domestic experiences of people is also partially hidden from the official records and may only be accessible through the material remains of the archaeological record. Archaeologists have only recently begun to analyze the input of different ethnic groups (eg. Chinese and Afghan) to the archaeological record of this period and to consider how archaeological research might contribute to this process of uncovering the hidden histories of marginalized people and groups.