17th September 2008, 10:44 AM
lets throw another one in...
why should a university 'research' project, with a few hundred quid of funds, a 'director'(!) with limited field experience, a couple of second year supervisors, and a bunch of students, old dears and a plane table, get permission to dig up a abbey/castle/villa that is a SAM and is not threatened by anything other than time. Just because they write a research proposal -they don't have funding/skills etc, the sites never get written up, etc etc. There is precious little preservation by record with that scenario (other, competent research scenarios are available...). But its called serious academic research. Whereas I can't remove that bit of pottery from the section because its 'not going to be trashed', and I am a 'commercial' archaeologist who doesn't do proper research, and is looked down on by all these failed archaeologists who couldn't work out one end of matrix from the other...
If we cant dig the threatened sites properly, then why are we allowing people to trash un-threatened sites in the name of research/tv. Why the f*** are we digging up stonehenge and durrington walls if we cant sort out a decent framework for the stuff that is getting trashed?
why should a university 'research' project, with a few hundred quid of funds, a 'director'(!) with limited field experience, a couple of second year supervisors, and a bunch of students, old dears and a plane table, get permission to dig up a abbey/castle/villa that is a SAM and is not threatened by anything other than time. Just because they write a research proposal -they don't have funding/skills etc, the sites never get written up, etc etc. There is precious little preservation by record with that scenario (other, competent research scenarios are available...). But its called serious academic research. Whereas I can't remove that bit of pottery from the section because its 'not going to be trashed', and I am a 'commercial' archaeologist who doesn't do proper research, and is looked down on by all these failed archaeologists who couldn't work out one end of matrix from the other...
If we cant dig the threatened sites properly, then why are we allowing people to trash un-threatened sites in the name of research/tv. Why the f*** are we digging up stonehenge and durrington walls if we cant sort out a decent framework for the stuff that is getting trashed?