3rd September 2005, 07:12 PM
Troll,
Curator's official, mandated role is to be an advisor to the planning authority, as part of which role they impose expensive requirements on applicants for planning permission. That is a very important role - possibly the most important in British archaeology - but in our adversarial system, no applicant (commercial developer, public organisation or private individual) will ever see them as an impartial source of advice.
I have posted on other threads about what consultants do and why it is necessary. You might think that curators should do some or all of these functions - but the fact is that they can't. Try reading some of those other postings and thinking about the points made before dismissing a whole branch of the profession as un-necessary.
You may have had bad experiences - so have I. There are consultants that I wouldn't trust behind my back. The same applies, though, to units and to curators. Wherever they work, people are individuals - some good, some bad - so generalisation will always be garbage.
1man1desk
Curator's official, mandated role is to be an advisor to the planning authority, as part of which role they impose expensive requirements on applicants for planning permission. That is a very important role - possibly the most important in British archaeology - but in our adversarial system, no applicant (commercial developer, public organisation or private individual) will ever see them as an impartial source of advice.
I have posted on other threads about what consultants do and why it is necessary. You might think that curators should do some or all of these functions - but the fact is that they can't. Try reading some of those other postings and thinking about the points made before dismissing a whole branch of the profession as un-necessary.
You may have had bad experiences - so have I. There are consultants that I wouldn't trust behind my back. The same applies, though, to units and to curators. Wherever they work, people are individuals - some good, some bad - so generalisation will always be garbage.
1man1desk