Archaeolog

The Society for American Archaeology’s Committee on Ethics is pleased to announce the Fifth Annual Ethics Bowl. Graduate and undergraduate students are invited to organize a team of 3 to 5 participants with a faculty advisor to take part in the event at the SAA 73rd Annual Meeting in Vancouver, British Columbia on March 27, 2008.

The SAA Ethics Bowl is a debate-style competition based on several hypothetical case studies representing a range of ethical dilemmas encountered in archaeological practice. Case studies from previous years are wonderful teaching tools and study materials for teams preparing for the Ethics Bowl. These resources are available online:click here.

If your university is interested in participating in this year's event, please contact us at the e-mails below. The final date for registering teams in February 14th, 2008 (also the date the 2008 cases will be revealed).

We welcome submissions for the WAC session “Experience, modes of engagement, archaeology”. This session is co-organized by Matt Ratto (Sweden/Canada), Krysta Ryzewski (US), and Michelle Charest (US/Ireland), and will be part of the Theme: Archaeological Theory? Legacies, Burdens, Futures, organized by Andrew Cochrane, Ian Russell, Timothy Webmoor, and Christopher Witmore. We invite presentations that critically examine archaeological experience and modes of engagement; we aim to include a broad range of perspectives and approaches.

Session Abstract:
Are multimedia, information technologies, digital visualizations and web 2.0 forums indispensable (or quickly becoming so) to the 21st century archaeologist's toolkit? Are they as instrumental as "older" analog or paper-based technologies, such as 35mm film, 16mm tape, and printed maps? This session embraces emergent, analog and paper-based media and moves beyond the observation that they can be important tools of practice by demonstrating how they affect practice and theory. Participants will employ multimedia approaches to ask, how are archaeology and heritage experienced by archaeologists and/or non-archaeologists? And, how do these archaeologies of experience impact our practices, interpretations, and theoretical agendas?

Clockwise from bottom left: WWII graffiti by RAF and USAF in Eagle Pub, Cambridge (UK); Megan Goetsch participates in a peripatetic video (click here); Excavating the African Meeting House, Boston; Historical Postcard from Mexico; the Archive.

The session places emphasis on experience documented through media. This emphasis raises questions about: archaeology and digital representation, the creation and destruction of archaeological information, authenticity in reconstructions/interpretations, how archaeologists create their own identities, how archaeology affects non-archaeologists, the non-linearity of archaeological practice, the documenting of individual histories, and how the three dimensionality of multimedia recording affects contextual relationships of materials. By approaching archaeology through the lens of experience it is possible to blend the traditionally divided realms of theory and practice. This session works with the interrelated agendas of the present, and the changing pace and character of archaeology in the future. Participants are strongly encouraged to offer creative, non-traditional, or multimedia conference presentations.

Remixing Çatalhöyük Day
9am - 5pm PST
November 28, 2007

Join us for Remixing Çatalhöyük Day, a public program sponsored by OKAPI
and the Berkeley Archaeologists at Çatalhöyük. Visit OKAPI Island in the
3-D virtual environment of Second Life (see Getting Started below) and
explore the past and present of Çatalhöyük, a 9000-year-old village
located in present-day Turkey. OKAPI Island features virtual
reconstructions of the excavation site and multimedia exhibits of research
data. The Island was constructed by a team of undegraduate research
apprentices during the Spring and Fall 2007 semester. The Remixing
Çatalhöyük program includes lectures, guided tours, games, and much more.
Mark your calendars!

Review of Richard J. Gould: Disaster Archaeology, The University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City, 2007, ISBN 978-0-87480-894-0, 288 p., 55 figures, 5 tables, cloth.

Richard Gould has a long pedigree as an archaeologist concerned with the present: he has made important contributions to ethnoarchaeology, modern material culture, historical archaeology and the archaeology of the contemporary past (Gould 1978, 2000; Gould and Schiffer 1981). His new book shows us the usefulness of archaeology to understand contemporary disasters and the relevance of forensic methods for archaeology both in the past and in the present. Furthermore, the author eloquently defends the key public role of disaster archaeology: through the identification of human remains and personal belongings, it can bring closure to victims’ relatives and allow them to mourn their dead. The book has nine chapters. The first and last chapters are the more theoretical ones, with reflections on the nature of disaster archaeology and the archaeology of the recent past. The rest tackle particular case studies in many of which the author himself was directly involved. Through these cases, we are introduced into the practicalities, methods and problems of disaster archaeology. There are also two appendixes: the first one gives voice to several people working within Forensic Archaeology Recovery (FAR), the group set up by Gould (a nice example of multivocality, by the way), and the second one is a list of all the personnel involved in the FAR initiative. The book is well illustrated throughout with photos and drawings.