Current Archaeology editorial

[trowelfodder]

The key role played by current archaeology is to inform people about the archaeology being undertaken in britain today. And illinformed editorials such as this do not foster a spirit of cooperation with commercial archaeologists we want people to know about our work and what we do but do not support the portratal of us as money grabbing authority figures! I love my job and how many of the most enthusiastic ametuers would spend ten years for poor pay poor conditions and no stability. My job at the moment is machine watchin im the rain on a building site. Theres no archaeology so far just three mind numbing days of nothing with potentially two more weeks to go. But there is some great prehistoric archaeology found nearby so is vital im here. How many ameturs want this job and how many would be safe to do so

[Drunky]

I may have to read the artical again as i am reading off a phone but i have no idea what hes on about, it seems a very exciting world that he lives in, goverment agenders, wheels within wheels and a plucky group of amuters fighting against the evils archaeology that there can't have any input in unless its in there own time.

I would like him to explain how watching an access road fits in to the goverments evil agend

[vulpes]

I suspect that Mr Selkirk's real gripe with the CBA is that, actually, they are much more representative of British Archaeology across all sectors, and not only that, they produce a much better magazine than his, free of such diatribe, and which presumably is hitting CA's market share quite hard.

[P Prentice]

calling diggingthedirt - calling diggingthedirt -
maybe you can post the recent article as none of the assembled seem to partake?
and i'm absolutely certain the editor in chief will relish the chance of airing on the forum!!

[vulpes]

Is October 2010 classed as recent? Well... in archaeological terms I suppose.:face-approve:

[P Prentice]

seems to me that anybody wanting to build an extension to their home on a SAM such as a Roman town etc might well find that the archaeological costs effectively double the cost of the extension. this is one way of restricting development and it is no good for professionals who wont get the work based on cost and it is not surprising if mr and mrs normal get a bit peeved and write to their elected member - and not then surprising if local amateurs feel they could help out.
the problem is that the local amateurs might not be able to do the job properly and are unlikely to be able to do the specialist bits for free (a few might be able to write a pot report etc but most wont) and will have to pay specialists the same as we do. SMC would require best practice and can stipulate who can and who cant do the work but LAs cant on unscheduled sites.
amateur groups are likely to be entitled to do any dev con work they can get so long as they adhere to the same rules and standards we do

therefore we should now be insisting that to do dev con work all archaeologists should be RO and RO status should be more difficult to get than currently is the case

[the invisible man]

I really wouldn't get too worked up about Mr S. Certainly he does a lot of damage in that he influences the mildly interested amatuer, society members and extra-mural course attendees with his somewhat bizarre and ill-informed opinions but the more they learn the more they are likely to become aware of his, err, eccentricities. 20 odd years ago it was me sitting in Birkbeck Certificate lectures... I trecall one fellow student thinking CA and Mr S were 'radical'. I suppose they are in one sense!

About 10 years ago now I had a letter in CA responding to one of his diatribes about the 'role of the amateur' and the difference between pros and ams - this latest thing is nothing new. In fairness he did publish it but totally misunderstood everything - he put an Eds Note in italics under my letter saying how much he agreed, and went on to disagree and reiterate his original 'point'@.

I still buy his rag, as it has some nice pictures sometimes and often some quite interesting articles - written by others obviously. But I agree that BA has always been the better of the 'popular' mags.

[diggingthedirt]

Called!

I can?t speak for the publication, but do publish there regularly (and even had the cover story in the edition where this was first published). Seeing as you?ve asked so nicely, I can probably shed some light on this forum thread.

The link you have here, and the other ?editorial? mentioned, comes from a section of the magazine called ?Last word? published over a year ago. This is the Editor-in-Chiefs place to air his views on whatever the hell he likes. It is an opinion piece, like opinion pieces written by columnists in every national newspaper. What can you do; he owns the shop, and has therefore earned the right to have the last word.

The editorial stance of the magazine is often at odds with the views expressed in this section ? such as the ?Archaeology after the Cuts? edition that mounted a strong defence for commercial archaeology in the face of the axe-mans blade. The former editor and the current editor have worked like Trojans to build bridges with professional archaeologists. Did I say build bridges? I meant bought lots of pints.

Now to the argument itself: Andrew Selkirk has been saying this for a long time now ? and published a short pamphlet on this in 1997 called ?Who Owns The Past: A Grass Roots Critique of Heritage Policy? (Adam Smith Institute) in which he argues persuasively to ditch the ?artificial? heritage market created through planning policy guidance because this ultimately distanced archaeology from it?s natural constituency (the independent enthusiastic amateur tradition). He argued instead for free market where amateurs undertook rescue archaeology as part of a ?leisure economy.? The more people get to do archaeology, the more people will like archaeology, the better for archaeologists and archaeology in general. He continued in this line further at the recent Mortimer debate (perhaps the other 'editorial' mentioned on this thread) where he argued that Melton's argument (that archaeology inhibits development) could be met half way if amateur societies were allowed to take on small projects at their leisure for little or no cost to the developer.

One man?s utopia can be another man?s dystopia? or is it? Selkirk?s rightwing, libertarian vision might not be a million miles from the ?Editorial Stance? of Bajrfed (if you are in the habit of tarring the entire production with an opinion piece written by the proprietor).

Try this one, shooting in from the left:

http://antiquity.ac.uk/projgall/connolly327/

The more people get to do archaeology, the more people will like archaeology, the better for archaeologists and archaeology in general. :face-stir:

You know what I think: Amateurs Shamateurs. Slam the doors and lets get chartered.

PS. Oxbeast. Invisible Man. Come on now. That whole Blur/Oasis thing is so 90s!

[Wax]

Most amateur archaeologist know very little about commercial archaeology or even where archaeology fits into the planning process. Explaining the structure of the current system to the public is one of the key things that professionals should be doing, join your local groups give lectures and talks open their eyes to how the system works (or currently the threats to it). Don't let ill-informed individuals with axes to grind drive a wedge between professionals and amateurs. Archaeology is for all and is a wide enough discipline to encompass both sides. Amateurs could not and would not want to undertake the volume of work currently carried out by the commercial sector. The day of the " gentlemen archaeologist" is dead any return to it would be disastrous it was a club for rich eccentrics with too much leisure time on their hands, some were the fathers of modern archaeology most were treasure hunters. That era is long past.

[Marcus Brody]

I'm aware that this is something that I've said several times on a number of different threads, but I've never really understood why local societies would be so keen to work on development sites. It seems to me that the big advantage societies / amateurs have is that they can pick a nice site (a cropmark or earthwork, for example), ask the landowner's permission, and then dig it, with a fair degree of confidence that they'll actually find something interesting. Meanwhile, most professional archaeologists only get to work in areas where development is happening, which may not be where the archaeology is!