To add my own little anecdote ... I published an article on conducting archaeology at Long Kesh/Maze prison in British Archaeology in the summer of 2005. I can't remember the exact wording but the next edition of BA contained a letter asking, in rather scathing tones, why I bothered examining the prison site as the 'real' archaeology would be found in the below ground context. I was given a right to reply but didn't see the point: if you don't want to get it, you won't get it!
> Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2010 14:43:55 +0100
> From: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: [CHA] re. is contemporary archaeology crap?
> To: [log in to unmask]
>
> I used to get a lot of "why dig, we know it all anyway" from military
> historians in regard of Great War conflict archaeology. There was a
> Chairman's piece to that effect in an edition of either the Bulletin of
> the Western Front Association or "Stand To" the WFA journal.
>
> In addition, I did cite a retired Admiral telling me that there was no
> point in digging at Thiepval (Somme Front Line) because it would be
> "pulverised" in my contribution to Lila Racozcy's volume on The
> Archaeology of Destruction.
>
> The letter in BA about the van and the community archaeology with down &
> outs appeared in the current edition (114). The letter basically
> suggested a link between some of these more avant garde projects and the
> threat to the Bristol Department. For the Academics amongst you, the
> letter and the two articles would make an excellent starter for a
> seminar or essay question!
>
> Interestingly it's the same article that carries my article about a
> Great War project and our identification of a missing soldier killed in
> 1917. Clearly there's no point to contemporary archaeology - Private
> Mather's family agree... Or maybe not!
>
> Best
>
> Martin
>
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