volunteers/volunteering: your thoughts please.

[mesolithic viking]

Have just been working on a paper on volunteers in archaeology. Some interesting views and situations come to light. I would just like to ask the BAJR forum their views on volunteers and volunteering in archaeology.

[Cautionary Tale]

I started out volunteering for local units, and consider that it was incredibly valuable, and having taken on volunteers have seen how useful it is from the other side. Where projects allow (ie where it does not put other units at a commercial disadvantage), the use of volunteers helps those at a certain point in their educations/careers to get a flavour of the work. Where the problems start is the excessive use of volunteers in a commercial context which means qualified individual archaeologists loose out.

Of the Clan Sutton

[1man1desk]

quote:Where the problems start is the excessive use of volunteers in a commercial context which means qualified individual archaeologists loose out

I would support the above. On a related point, tenders can be seriously distorted if one contractor is relying on volunteers and another is using professional archaeologists. Tender 1 will be cheaper, but likely to do a worse-quality job and unlikely to meet the programme.

1man1desk

to let, fully furnished

[Chris Cumberpatch]

I'd say that the issue of volunteers working on commercial sites is something of a side issue. Surely the most useful contribution that volunteers can make is to work on sites or landscapes that aren't threatened by immediate development but are nevertheless of interest. There is a tendency amongst some of us working in the commercial sector to think that this is all that there is to archaeology (and, I must say, for those who spend most of their time digging, to see excavation as synonymous with archaeology). But this is not the case of course. Survey of all types, work on parish or other documents, churchyard surveys and building surveys are all of value and as the bodies of data increase in number, are likely to provide a resource of real value to researchers in both archaeology and history. The Mellor project in Gtr. Manchester may offer a model for collaborative excavation projects.
I have worked for a number of groups funded by the LHI and similar, mainly to provide advice on the identification of pottery and in some instances to write reports on specific assemblages. Such groups usually include people with a diverse range of interests and skills and the remit of the projects is equally wide. There is enormous scope for a range of archaeological activities that fall outside the range of commercial archaeology and I am tempted to say - why bother with commercial archaeology (given the avialability of funding) when there is so much more to be done outside this area?
I know that certain individuals (naming no names - do I need to?) see this attitude as in some way patronising - but I fail to see why - the work undertaken by local and regional groups is often closer to real research than many of us in commercial archaeology can ever get. What it may (emphasise 'may') lack is a research profile which fits in with wider research agendas, but this is largely a logistical problem and is something that should probably be brought to the attention of the funding bodies and to local groups themselves. What is of some concern is that all the different local groups seem to be working in isolation from each other - I imagine that there is a lot of duplication in areas such as database construction, website design, fieldwalking and survey tactics and so on which could be eliminated to considerable advantage. Some forum or debate might also throw up common interests and so on which would feed into wider research agendas. Maybe this is something the CBA could address - I would suggest that RESCUE had a role here, but I think that currently we lack the infrastructure to tackle it.
Anyway, I'm impressed by the work being done by the groups I have come into contact with and I hope that the Lottery continues to provide money for them - far better than wasting it on a bunch of overpaid steroid junkies plodding round a track or throwing their orbs around on prime time US TV!

Chris Cumberpatch

[gumbo]

I dont think anyone is unaware of what volunteer groups can acheive; but I thought the point being made here is 'volunteering helped me get a paid job'. This approach is different from people who, for various reasons, want to stay as volunteers. I do agree with Chris when he says (and I paprphrase) 'why get into commercial work when you can satisfy your research agenda better as a volunteer'. However, surely for a lot of people its necessary to make a living and, heh, if you satisfy your quest for research on a good site once every two years or so thats a good thing...

G

[drpeterwardle]

Dr Peter here -archaeological consultant who has been running the Archaeological Consultancy for 14 years. I started off as a volunteer on a dig for UKP 8.60 per week (Thats right the price of three pints today.) I graduated and what was I expected to do - be a vol and claim dole money as well.

I can remember well turning down a "vols" job because it meant turning up on time and taking a pay cut compared to my dole money. I was asked why was I being so difficult.

I say the days of volunteers and subsistence payments and rescue archaeology belong in the past and should not be allowed in any kind of modern (professional/commercial) situation.

It was good fun though!!!!}

Dr Peter

[1man1desk]

I largely agree with Dr Pete on this, and I had very similar experiences as a 'volunteer' on subsistence (i.e. very low paid worker with no rights) in the 1980s.

The key thing is that volunteers, where used, should be genuine volunteers - i.e. not people trying to earn a living through archaeology. Potential categories of genuine volunteer could include:

• non-archaeologists with an amateur interest in archaeology
• people, usually but not always young, considering a career in archaeology but wanting a 'taster' before they commit

There could be others, but that's what comes to me at the moment.

No commercial unit should ever rely on volunteers (or students) as a significant part of their workforce (poor professional practice and unfair commercial competition), but there is room for one or two on some sites - especially larger excavations - to provide opportunities for the second category listed above. For such volunteers, I would support the payment of actual out-of-pocket expenses, but never flat-rate subsistence payments; that way lies the old, exploitative system.

1man1desk

to let, fully furnished

[troll]

Volunteering can be the only chance a member of the public can get.Volunteering is an old institution that has fostered generations of archaeologists from the public at large.There are plenty of us that would be doing something else now had it not been for the opportunity to volunteer.There are plenty of field archs about who started as volunteers and after twenty odd years are slapping new grads and P.Os into shape!Why should`nt members of the public have an opportunity to volunteer?Tiz a shared heritage ya know.If you want experience-volunteer to start with.A lot.I still volunteer because I get to dig in the Med! It breaks up the drudgery of a competative environment.I started as a volunteer as that was then a further requirement for undergrad applications.

..knowledge without action is insanity and action without knowledge is vanity..(imam ghazali,ayyuhal-walad)

[Orkynowot]

I believe volenteering is important, having done some excavation through university, it was the excavations that I did outside of uni as a volenteer that help me more than anything else, gain skills that I needed to do the job.

If it wasnt for the summers volenteering at Mellor I'd been in a bad state to do this job.

To be honest at first I thought volenteers where bad, you know they will put me out of a job and such things, but I feel they actually can provide support in certain condtions, I dont think they'ed cope where I am now but in other places they have skills and abilities, one volenteer taught me how setion draw, if it wasnt for them I'd never know.

So if a unit tries to use them exclusively its bad but where conditons are more suitable than I say use them.

May god go with you in all the dark places you must walk.

[Alfie]

Volunteering is an important pathway to becomming a profesional, indeed if it werent for this, archaeology would be the preserve of the middle class and the interpretation of the past would be biased toward those values.
Besides it teaches you to expect nothing for all your hard work which really sets the scene.