11th December 2008, 01:44 PM
Quote:quote:Originally posted by Dirty Dave Lincoln
and i've often wondered if it is because apart from the last couple of centuries what impact have non-white people had on the day-to-day history of the last several thousand years in this island-how can they have any affinity for what is essentially white history? does this have some reason for the apparant lack of interest among non-white people? It would be a shame if it does as I like learning about everyones history.
yes but there's a long (and often ignoble) history of white europeans travelling the world excavating history that is decidedly non-white. so it's pretty clear that you don't need an ethnic connection to find something interesting.
to be honest, there is probably a whole thesis in this (and getting into it would take us waaaay off topic!) but i suspect the reasons go deeper and would involve talking about how people get to feel "ownership" of a past. (hmm, i'll bet there has been stuff written about this from an irish perspective.)
plus, i believe in the sciences that the perception of what "a scientist" looks like has been identified as barrier to kids from some ethnic minorities even considering science as an option. that might well be at work in archaeology too, making a kind of feedback loop that will need to be broken...