In this essay I scrutinise the non-anthropocentric discourses of the Anthropocene with the ultimate aim of starting a discussion about their use in archaeology. Specifically, I stress that these discourses inherit the hope for human progress that characterises Critical Theory of the Frankfurt School, i.e. 'critical hope'. This is a type of hope that renders the non-anthropocentric discourses of the Anthropocene self-contradictory. Even when they manage to escape the hold of critical hope, such

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... iscourses, I argue, still suffer from ethical failings due to their inherent lack of focus on human-human relations and largely ahistorical nature. I conclude the essay by advocating an Anthropocene archaeology not dominated by non-anthropocentric discourses and making a related call for a slow archaeology of the Anthropocene.