I agree with Angela. And dare I say, I think the defence of contemporary archaeology can also be used as a bit of a smokescreen. We spend several thousand words justifying what we are doing, rather than doing it.
As Jeff pointed out earlier, the response to Lisa Hill's campsite dig that was posted on the Times website (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/travel/outdoors/article6815635.ece) was bizarrely unpleasant in places (but you'll have to subscribe to see it), I think that says more about angry people that comment on websites and like the phrase 'taxpayer's money' (haha wouldn't that be nice). Lisa's dig purposefully highlighted why we need contemporary archaeology and why it needs to be rigorous, sophisticated and able to engage with other disciplines, and to develop its own methodology. And if the point was lost on some people, so it goes... I personally have far less of a difficult response from 'the public' who I think are fairly sophisticated in the main, not married to the archaeos and interested, not just in what's left in remote places (see the Letter of the Week on the subject of the van posted by Paul earlier), but what's left, and not left, here and now. I suppose to some degree the sophistication is because of the speed of the media and the modern day (would anyone blink if Tony Robinson and Dr Alice applied their archaeological selves to the remains of a motorway pile-up - I doubt it), but also I think because our subject is more immediate, and we do have methods that open it up in new ways. It's not nostalgia, more intellectual curiousity for the tantalizingly close but curiously different.
Whereas I have been told by an Eminent Marxist Archaeologist that if I were his student he wouldn't have let me loose on anything so controversial as the recent past as a doctoral subject and although I may have done my time in conventional archaeology nobody will know that if the Dr doesn't relate to Something Old.
I am happy to report, however, that responses to recent past work that I have been involved in with Atkins and EH has been free of negative comment, and certainly positively received by the people whom it concerns. No flies on us - ergo no crap.
Sef
___________________________________
From: Discussion List for Contemporary and Historical Archaeology [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of AAPiccini [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 06 October 2010 12:57
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: re. is contemporary archaeology crap?
the poll is interesting and supports calls from dan, rodney and sarah among
others:
pointless or point-full is not the point.
the same could be said of much archaeology regardless of time period or
locale.
the more important questions might be:
- what is the *work* that contemporary archaeologies do?
- what would *good* contemporary archaeologies look like and how would we
recognise their worthiness and who says?
- what would we (collectively?) aspire for contemporary archaeologies?
the debates about propriety are akin to those faced by
heritage/museum/museum archaeologists back in the 1990s. all of that work
was gendered as female and largely worthless - at least it didn't make you
a *real* archaeologist.
worrying about being liked or accepted can get in the way of getting on
with things and we know that disciplining subject areas is a matter of
power, etc, etc.
i(and others) may be guilty of *polluting* the discipline through uses of
improper languages and images. but we got over the post-structural poetry
phase of the early 1990s and even that contributed positively to
archaeology now.
angela
--On Wednesday, October 6, 2010 12:33 +0100 pmgb
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> If you look at the results of the bajr poll, it seems that the most
> recent vote was march 2010:
>
> http://www.bajr.org/bajrforum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=778&results=1
>
> P
>
> On 06/10/2010 10:37, MAY, Sarah wrote:
>> Just looked through Paul's blog onteh Van and the comments were from
>> within the Ironbridge team and were fairly mild. But as far as I can
>> see they also come from before the beginning of the project. I would be
>> interested to see what the same people thought of the results of the
>> project. The comments responding to the blog posts were all positive
>> (though that's pretty common on archaeology blogs (probably a sign that
>> they aren't functioning quite the way that other blogs do)
>>
>>
>> All the best
>> Sarah
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Discussion List for Contemporary and Historical Archaeology
>> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Horning, Audrey
>> J. (Dr.) Sent: 06 October 2010 10:28
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: re. is contemporary archaeology crap?
>>
>> If the intention of the original post was to find comments in print
>> criticising or questioning contemporary archaeology, one could look at
>> some of the comments posted on Paul Belford's blog about the Van
>> project, http://contemp-ironbridge.blogspot.com/
>>
>> Audrey
>>
>> --------------------------
>> contemp-hist-arch is a list for news and events in contemporary and
>> historical archaeology, and for announcements relating to the CHAT
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>> For email subscription options see:
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>> --------------------------
>>
>> --------------------------
>> contemp-hist-arch is a list for news and events
>> in contemporary and historical archaeology, and
>> for announcements relating to the CHAT conference group.
>> -------
>> For email subscription options see:
>> http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/archives/contemp-hist-arch.html
>> -------
>> Visit the CHAT website for more information and for future meeting dates:
>> http://www.contemp-hist-arch.ac.uk
>> --------------------------
>>
>
> --------------------------
> contemp-hist-arch is a list for news and events
> in contemporary and historical archaeology, and
> for announcements relating to the CHAT conference group.
> -------
> For email subscription options see:
> http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/archives/contemp-hist-arch.html
> -------
> Visit the CHAT website for more information and for future meeting dates:
> http://www.contemp-hist-arch.ac.uk
> --------------------------
----------------------
Dr A A Piccini
Drama: Theatre, Film, Television
School of Arts
University of Bristol
CantocksClose, Woodland Road
Bristol BS8 1UP
T: 0117 331-5087
E: [log in to unmask]
Skype: aapiccini
W: www.bris.ac.uk/drama/staff_research/angela_piccini/
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