Dear allI think some sort of mentoring is really good idea and something I've long wanted to do - but time is the critical factor! The mostly English based archaeobtany working group (administered through English Heritage) can go some way towards this for British based specialists. I'm not sure if there is an equivalent working group in Ireland (and obviously Ireland is outside my area of influence as an EH employee). I'm intending to focus a bit more on the archaeobotany working group over the next few months and perhaps increase the discussion forum side of things. We need to meet more regularly (twice a year would be good) to get the momentum going but then we can look at mentoring in a more formalised way. It has long been an issue. Commercial archaeobotany really is the foundation on which a lot of research is based, yet is really suffers from a lack of joined up support, mentoring for new specialists and continued career development. The AEA and in the UK the IFA are potential avenues to explore, ideally with support from academic institutions, while archaebotany working groups are vital.Mentoring in commercial and academic sectors presumably have rather different roles. We need very much grass routes mentoring in the commercial world - support with identification, building reference collections, libraries, report writing/quality control of reports etc. Academic mentoring will I guess involve more support for teaching, supervision, academic writing and so on. But they are linked - as we have been discussing.Best wishesRuth
From: The archaeobotany mailing list [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of nikolah gilligan
Sent: 03 December 2013 14:20
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Mind the gap: commercial versus research environmental archaeology - how do we reduce it?Nicola,That's a great idea. It's difficult to be a free-lanced archaeobotanist at the start of you career with no attachment to an institution in your country. Could this possibly be extended to include Ireland? I also feel that there is a gap between commercial archaeobotany and research. While brilliant work has been done by Meriel et al (which I constantly refer to), it's often difficult to get clients to pay beyond the most basic ID work and so much time has to be spent on researching options to study the material further.Regards,Nikolah
On 3 December 2013 14:15, Nicola Whitehouse <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
Hi all,
One item that has come up quite a lot in the discussions here is mentoring. It seems to me that setting up a mentoring scheme might be something useful, especially for individuals working in the commercial section, either done via informal networks or done via an organisation. The obvious organisational route might be via the AEA. I would be happy to raise this as an item at the next AEA committee meeting, along with Ruth if this was seen as a being a useful avenue. Equally, informal mentoring can also work well. I am sure there would be a number of academic staff who might be interested and willing to act in a mentoring capacity; often, its a case of encouraging and providing a useful sounding board - perhaps a critical buddy or friend. I for one would be very happy to be involved in mentoring. I already provide some mentoring advice for younger academic colleagues, where mentoring is quite widespread but it is clear that offering mentoring to individuals not working in the academic sector might be a useful avenue - as long as the areas being advised upon were mostly academic/research.
Best wishes
Nicki
So, all that's stopping me get my reports onto academia.edu<http://academia.edu/> is copyright, funding unfunded time and, to be honest, confidence. I'd appreciate some mentoring, as mentioned in earlier emails.
On 3 Dec 2013, at 13:00, Lisa Gray <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
Grey literature problems seem to come in two forms. The first is specialist reports being integrated into archaeological reports so its very hard to get access to the original specialist report however useful the online databases are. The next is copyright. What right do I have to share reports I've written for a client? Also, now I'm freelance I'm not often told if anything of mine has been published so I can't direct someone to a publication.
I've ended up making the best of freelancing and enjoy the fact that now I'm responsible only for myself I can fund myself to be better equipped and attend more workgroups, conferences and training than I could as an employee. This is very difficult to fund and its often debt management rather than using any profit but I only have myself to worry about. As a freelancer I've been able to add processing and digging to what I do and this has enhanced my archaeobotanical perspective.
I really appreciated getting a travel grant to go to the archaeobotany workgroup in Durham last March. I also got an EH scholarship to to my maritime MA. Both of these were aimed at people in my situation. I'd not have had the time off to do my part-time MA if I was employed. I've got ideas from my recent MA dissertation that I'd like to get into publication so any advice regarding grant funding to do that would be welcome.
I feel my years after my MSc at the Museum of London were my apprentice years and my freelance years are my journeyman years. I consider English Heritage to be looking over my shoulder while I work and am always trying to improve what I do. The commercial world is intense and there's often no time to stop and just get up to date with reading outside of one's current project, let alone keep up to date with my accounts.
web:www.lisagray.co.uk<http://www.lisagray.co.uk/>
I'm happy to help out where I can. This is something that needs to be addressed. It is very easy to feel isolated. I now have a deadline to meet so will drop out of this conversation for now but if any of you want to contact me directly about anything you are welcome to do so.
facebook:https://www.facebook.com/lisagray.archaeobotany
Skype: my.skype944
Freelance Archaeobotanist -16 years experience in post-excavation, sample processing and outreach
Recent digging experience with Canterbury Archaeological Trust and Kent Archaeological Projects
Based in South-East England
Associate level membership of the Institute for Archaeologists
PI Insured with Towergate
MSc Bioarchaeology, MA Maritime Archaeology from UCL
BA hons Archaeology and Environmental Studies from LampeterOn 3 December 2013 12:20, Denise Druce <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
Hi all
Following on from previous messages, I regularly use the English Heritage regional reviews and Allan Hall's and Philippa Tomlinson's Archaeobotanical Computer Database for information on both regional data and specific taxa. However, as some of the authors themselves would no doubt agree with, both can be/are drastically out of date. I think a database like the ABCD would be an extremely useful resource if the means was put in place to keep it up to date (am I correct in thinking Allan was making moves to do this?). As well as access to 'grey literature', there also needs to be a constant drive to get details of published information from both commercial organisations and research institutions into circulation. The ABCD or something similar, and the AEA newsletter/bibliography may be good starting points. Not forgetting the role of social media, it is also extremely useful that many researchers make their publications visible through discussion groups such as this one, and on Academia.
I guess 'accessibilty' would go some way in addressing this 'gap', but bridging 'commercial' with 'research' is probably an even greater challenge.
I would very much welcome any involvement with this topic should you require any more 'home-based' workers. Yes, thank you Liz and Wendy for spearheading this!
All the best
Denise
p.s. I just read Otto's message-RADAR certainly sounds like a good model!!
--
Dr D Druce
Environmental Project Officer
Oxford Archaeology North
Mill 3
Moor Lane Mill
Moor Lane
Lancaster
LA1 1QD
[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
--
Dr D Druce
Environmental Project Officer
Oxford Archaeology North
Mill 3
Moor Lane Mill
Moor Lane
Lancaster
LA1 1QD
[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
--
Dr D Druce
Environmental Project Officer
Oxford Archaeology North
Mill 3
Moor Lane Mill
Moor Lane
Lancaster
LA1 1QD
[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
--
Dr D Druce
Environmental Project Officer
Oxford Archaeology North
Mill 3
Moor Lane Mill
Moor Lane
Lancaster
LA1 1QD
[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
--
Dr D Druce
Environmental Project Officer
Oxford Archaeology North
Mill 3
Moor Lane Mill
Moor Lane
Lancaster
LA1 1QD
[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
--
Dr D Druce
Environmental Project Officer
Oxford Archaeology North
Mill 3
Moor Lane Mill
Moor Lane
Lancaster
LA1 1QD
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