3rd September 2012, 01:21 PM
Wow, this thread has opened up a bit while I've been off drinking in a field (again) :face-approve:
As has been discussed many times on here, a university degree is totally irrelevent to digging - a very large proportion of the pre-PPG16 digging circuit never had one, or had one in a different subject (hence archaeologists' uncanny ability in the old days to supplement their incomes by winning pub quizzes, we were a collective polymath...), you just tended to get work because you had a reputation as a good digger.
@ David Petts - the Durham BA course back in the early 80s was rubbish, didnt teach me anything useful directly, BUT, to paraphrase Terry Pratchett, if you leave students near enough books for long enough some knowledge is bound to seep across. My main gain from 3 years at Durham (apart from learning to drink) was from making money on the side for various lecturers doing bits of PX, skelly-washing, free afternoons in the conservation lab and the like - all useful real-world skills, plus I now have long-standing contacts with a number of your specialist staff which is handy commercially. My experience from 6 weeks of uni training dig was that, already being an unusually experienced 'trainee' from 'volling' as a teenager on DoE funded excavations was that that just meant I got all the tricky jobs that were beyond the others, no question of them being taught how to do it instead. And there was actually an element of horror from the department that me and a mate were being quite inconvenienced having to keep 3-week windows clear in our otherwise busy getting-paid summer digging schedule in order to go work for free for the Prof for 3 weeks. I'm sure it's much better now ASUD/DUAS/ASDU or whatever they're calling themselves this week are running things.....not sure where this is going but you were asking how it worked more than 20 years ago....state-funded archaeology = loads of opportunities at the bottom end, just look at EH research digs where someone like me from recent experience can't get a place due to all the trainees
As has been discussed many times on here, a university degree is totally irrelevent to digging - a very large proportion of the pre-PPG16 digging circuit never had one, or had one in a different subject (hence archaeologists' uncanny ability in the old days to supplement their incomes by winning pub quizzes, we were a collective polymath...), you just tended to get work because you had a reputation as a good digger.
@ David Petts - the Durham BA course back in the early 80s was rubbish, didnt teach me anything useful directly, BUT, to paraphrase Terry Pratchett, if you leave students near enough books for long enough some knowledge is bound to seep across. My main gain from 3 years at Durham (apart from learning to drink) was from making money on the side for various lecturers doing bits of PX, skelly-washing, free afternoons in the conservation lab and the like - all useful real-world skills, plus I now have long-standing contacts with a number of your specialist staff which is handy commercially. My experience from 6 weeks of uni training dig was that, already being an unusually experienced 'trainee' from 'volling' as a teenager on DoE funded excavations was that that just meant I got all the tricky jobs that were beyond the others, no question of them being taught how to do it instead. And there was actually an element of horror from the department that me and a mate were being quite inconvenienced having to keep 3-week windows clear in our otherwise busy getting-paid summer digging schedule in order to go work for free for the Prof for 3 weeks. I'm sure it's much better now ASUD/DUAS/ASDU or whatever they're calling themselves this week are running things.....not sure where this is going but you were asking how it worked more than 20 years ago....state-funded archaeology = loads of opportunities at the bottom end, just look at EH research digs where someone like me from recent experience can't get a place due to all the trainees