Tag Archives | Social Media

Education, Community and Irish Archaeological Research

By on July 4, 2012 in DayOfArch2012

Hi. My name is Christina O’Regan and I am the Fieldwork and Educational Director of Irish Archaeological Research (IAR). Three colleagues and I set up this non-profit social organisation in early 2011 with the aim of getting the public more involved with archaeology through education, workshops, and community events. We are all from commercial archaeological backgrounds and wanted to develop our experience in community archaeology.

A focus has been the delivery of school workshops, typically to second level students in years 8 – 12. These workshops begin with a general introduction to the archaeology of Ireland, followed by a practical session varying from how to make and decorate prehistoric-style pottery, learning about diet through artificial ‘poo’ dissection, hands-on interaction with genuine and replica artefacts and prehistoric hunting techniques. These workshops have been incredibly successful, with benefits for students and teachers alike.

My work in IAR varies from day-to-day as I develop workshops, plan for future events and shoot off a few emails to raise the profile of IAR within the archaeological and educational sectors.

For this year’s Festival of British Archaeology, we have decided to host two family-orientated events; the first at Glenariff Forest Park (July 21st & 22nd) and the second at Gosford Forest Park (July 28th & 29th). Our experience with the school workshops has shown us that the more practical the day, the better. Pottery workshops, archery, demonstrations of flint knapping and a children’s activity area will ensure there is something for everyone to enjoy. There will also be a mini museum, with an interactive artefacts table as well as information on the archaeology of the areas where the events will be held (Antrim and Armagh). The Northern Ireland Environment Agency have very generously granted us a loan of some artefacts from both counties and I joyously spent an afternoon sifting through their stores, picking out choice artefacts with the help of Andrew Gault from the Agency. We are also busy planning similar events for National Heritage Week in the Republic of Ireland, August 18th – 26th.

A trial run of the Open Air Museum at the Carnival of Colours, Londonderry showed us the enormous benefits this type of venture can have in increasing awareness of local heritage within communities.

Social media has been a lifeline for IAR with our Facebook page now ‘liked’ by over 1,000 people. The page allows us to announce all of our upcoming events as well as share archaeological discoveries and support other institutions and companies. Facebook also allows us to easily disseminate our free online magazine, Irish Archaeological Research and we have just put out a call for articles for the fourth (summer) edition. As editor of the e-zine, I envisage many late nights over the coming weeks organising layout and thinking up witty headlines!

For more information on any of our events see www.irisharchaeologicalresearch.com

 

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The Usual Unusual Day

By on July 2, 2012 in Community Archaeology, Day of Archaeology, DayOfArch2012, Digital Archaeology, Education, Excavation

At Bristol Temple Meads

It would be incorrect to say that today was unusual, despite being away in Bristol rather than at my desk in Worcester.  This is because it would be hard to define a ‘usual’ day as HER Officer.  I am responsible for maintaining and developing Worcester City’s Historic Environment Record (#WorCityHER), and very few days are ever the same.  From the more mundane data entry, through to organising events within the local community, it’s certainly a rich and varied tapestry.

My Day of Archaeology began with a fairly uneventful train journey, during which I checked my emails and my Twitter account, remembering to tweet my support for #DayofArch.  The Bristol HER was hosting our regular Local Engagement group meeting today, which is always a really inspiring catch-up with fellow HER Officers and English Heritage, and as ever I left buzzing with ideas.  The main focus of today was trying to establish the longer term aspirations of the group and where we want to go with it all.  We were all fired up with ideas and further fuelled by a fascinating discussion about the use of smart phones to get  people sharing information about their own areas.

Comfrey growing at the WYAC Allotment – a great natural fertiliser

A regular part of the group’s catch-up is sharing what we’ve  been doing in our own HERs.  Projects that the group members have been working on include Bristol HER’s fantastic ‘Know Your Place’ and South Gloucestershire HER’s work with local communities via a soon-to-be launched Ning social media site.  I was able to report back on a number of projects that we in Worcester have in the pipeline, including a bid to reinterpret a scheduled Civil War Fort and involvement with Worcestershire Young Archaeologists’ Club (www.wyac.co.uk & @WorcsYAC).  The club have been working on the Lansdowne Allotment Project (#WYACAllotment), undertaking training excavation, recording finds and working towards growing a variety of historic crops using traditional methods.  And tweeting whilst we do so!

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A Day in Monrepos-Archaeological Archaeological Research Centre and Museum for Human Behavioural Evolution

By on July 2, 2012 in Day of Archaeology, DayOfArch2012, Education, Journalism, Museum Archaeology, Prehistory, Science

I’m an archaeologist in Monrepos – Archaeological Research Centre and Museum for Human Behavioural Evolution. Our Centre is located in Neuwied in Germany -between Frankfurt and Cologne. As mentioned above we are interested in everything related with the Ice Age. We consist in a group of scientists, volunteers, students and technical employeers.

Our building is an old castle that is still in the renovation period. Thats the reason why our Museum is closed since November 2010.

Since last year my daily work was in the museum or museum related. I did the guide tours for kids and adults. At the moment I’m doing the public relation work, mostly the Social Media like Facebook, Twitter and Co, beside other organisational things.

I think Public Relation is very important in the archaeological fields. So I’m really happy about the Archaeological Day 2012. If we are only doing our researches the rest of the world will not be interested what we are doing and we don’t get their support and they will not understand why our work is important for them. So we need more “mediators” between Archaeologists and the Public.

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Looted Heritage

By on June 30, 2012 in DayOfArch2012, Digital Archaeology

Earlier today, I mentioned that one of the nice things about digital work was that, well, I could timeshift as necessary. So now, with kids in bed, and a quiet moment, I return to another project of mine that I’ve been working on since January – Looted Heritage.

This isn’t funded, or part of anything larger – just one guy and some students, as time and energy allow. I started this project partly as an exercise in some of my classes, but partly out of an interest in the shady side of the interest in the human past – the market for illicit antiquities. By some counts, it’s the third largest black market out there, after drugs and guns. With Looted Heritage, we use the Ushahidi platform to grab and monitor tweets, blogs, news aggregators, and various social media streams for notices of looting, cultural heritage vandalism, or other items of interest. We turn these into reports, and pin them to the map. Periodically, we download all of this information (and you can too!) and mine this data for trends in this market.  There’s an ios and android app available too, so if one happened across a field where tombaroli were active, you could snap a pic and send it to us.

We’ve already written up our results from the first quarter of 2012 here; our data is all there too if you’d like to explore it. If you’d like to keep an eye out for anything happening in the illicit antiquities market, it’d be great if you could submit reports on Looted Heritage. They say ‘many eyes make for better code’; many eyes can also help bring the illicit trade into the light.

You should also take a look at WikiLoot and Loot Busters, who are working with more of the primary materials related to this trade. Me, as a digital guy, well I’m sifting the dirt of social media…

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A day of archaeological geomatics

By on June 29, 2012 in Commercial Archaeology, Community Archaeology, DayOfArch2012, Digital Archaeology, Survey
Unmanned Aerial Vehicle in flight.

Unmanned Aerial Vehicle in flight.
Image © Callen Lenz

Well, firstly, I can’t believe it’s been a year since last time! Doesn’t time fly? What’s happened since then I hear you cry? I’m still the Geomatics Manager for Wessex Archaeology, responsible for GIS and Survey. The big news is my desk is now paper free and I’m trying to keep to a paperless work regime, essential seeing as most of my workspace is taken up with computer equipment, leaving no room for unnecessary clutter. In the photo you can see not only my laptop but the recently rebuilt GISBEAST machine with it’s quad cores, 64-bit OS and 12Gb RAM, tooled up with all the software I need to do what I do. Continue Reading →

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A Shovelbum Story: Commercial Excavation in Deepest Darkest Kent…

By on June 29, 2012 in Commercial Archaeology, Day of Archaeology, DayOfArch2012, Excavation, Prehistory

Working on site all day gives you no chance to compile a minute-by-minute beautifully crafted blog post.

Thankfully, we have Twitter!

My life on Twitter began at around the same time my archaeological career did. I had promised myself that I would set up an account once I had handed in my BA dissertation and, co-incidentally, my first job in fieldwork started on the very day of that deadline. Usually I tweet every so often about what’s happening on site – if we get any good finds, if something unusual turns up, if I’m working on a particularly interesting/beautiful feature, or if  when we shovelbums develop fever-like symptoms (‘trench’ and ‘cabin’ varieties, depending on the weather) – but today, of course, was an exception. My aim was to document everything I was doing. Yes, even my breakfast!

 

6.30am

 

7.30am

 

7.45am

 

8am

The palaeochannel is FULL of Early Mesolithic flint. The main features in this area – predominantly ditches – were excavated and recorded a few weeks ago. It is thought that we may have a hand-axe production site, as several were found when the area was first opened by machine. Now we are using test pits into the palaeochannel to sample this material and see if we need to develop and implement a different excavation strategy for the whole area.

 

9.20am

The other test pits had produced nothing from the 3rd spit!

 

9.40am

 

10am

 

11.40am

 

12.10pm

 

1pm

 

1.40pm

Trench-fever kicking in…??

 

2.50pm

We finish early on a Friday – usually to maximise the time available to spend in the pub at the end of a long week…!

 

3.30pm

 

3.40pm

A ring ditch in Area 5 turned out to be two-in-one! There were 8 slots dug through it. That’s a lot of section drawings and context record sheets to amend… And that’s before you even get started on the matrix for the area…

 

5.30pm

 

I’d say today wasn’t entirely an average day in the field for this site, and for commercial archaeology in general. An average day in Kent would be whacking the fill out of a ditch/half-sectioning a whole load of postholes and recording it all (filling in forms, doing scale drawings of the feature, and photographing it). The fiddly nature of our excavation strategy for these test pits means your speed is limited – something which is usually a problem for a project that is developer-funded as there is always a schedule and a budget to stick to. But this Early Mesolithic stuff deserves the time we’re spending on it, and it just means my ‘Day of Archaeology’ submission describes one of those rare days when you never really put your trowel down!

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Bits and Pieces

By on June 29, 2012 in DayOfArch2012, Education, Excavation

A day of many colours, it started with dark grey clouds and a blue green sea with white-topped waves, as I headed to a finds drop! I had to hand over a box of finds to a National Trust colleague,  from a dig we did on Brownsea Island so they can create a display for Festival of the British Archaeology event at the end of July. A drive through the glistening rain to the Warminster office, past lush green trees and between kamikaze birds jumping out of bushes! First another finds drop, this time a feely bag activity for another NT  colleague to use in Gloucestershire for FofBA. Then up the stairs past magnolia walls to my desk, first sort out more activities stuff for yet another FofBA event, this time  at Corfe Castle, spinning and weaving kit, colouring sheets, a notice to say we are closed for lunch (so my volunteers can get a break) and some pictures of mosaics. One thing I really wanted to get done was a photomontage in memory of ‘Gerry the Rope’, who passed away recently and we  will miss him so much at our event. He was a historical interpreter who had been coming to Corfe Castle for about twenty years doing rope making (both Medieval and Victorian), games, pole lathe demonstrations and candle making. He was a great communicator and friend.

As late afternoon approached I had to turn my mind to getting everyting ready for our excavations that start on Monday!  write and print risk assessment, get day volunteer form printed, and  go to the shed to sort the tools.  We are digging up the last of the mosaics at Chedworth Roman Villa; they had been re-covered by the Victorians. It’s the last part of a big Heritage Lottery Fund project to put a new cover building over the mosaics and the reinterpretation of the site. Three weeks of mosaic digging, Yay! Red, purple, green, yellow, blue ’gorilla’ buckets, soft bruhses, hand shovels and a pick axe!  The last item is for prising up the tarmac path. Note to self ‘bring foot pump to blow up flat wheelbarrow tyre’

Nearly the end of the day,  just a couple of things to do before the weekend. One is to send a flint report, web link and finds drawing to an artist, Simon Ryder, who is making an art work for the ExLab project, part of he Cultural Olympiad down in Weymouth. He is getting a 3D scan and printed model of a Mesolithic Portland Chert microlith which we excavated from a site on the cliff edge near Eype in West Dorset, an exciting project. The final job was to check a newsletter article about a pottery grenade found at Corfe Castle and finally identifed 25 years after it was dug up!  Thanks to the Wessex Archaelogy  finds specialist for posting the pot on the Medieval Pottery Research Group facebook site, the wonders of social media.

So into my Red Berlingo and southwards to Weymouth, with the wheelbarrow rattling in the back.

 

 

 

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Friday Casual: Today’s Brushes with Archaeology

By on June 29, 2012 in DayOfArch2012, Education

Another year, another Day of Archaeology. Kudos and thank yous to the core staff facilitating this blog!

That said, this year provides more ways to connect with my first academic love, archaeology. Today, I’ve spent time culling through links in my social media feed for the latest archaeology reports and news, a practice I do daily. In fact, just yesterday, that practice yielded an article find completely pertinent and timely to my online course’s discussion of past subsistence practices and diets. The students like it when I bring archaeology into the cultural anthropology discussion, because it lets them appreciate how the subfields unite to generate a richer picture and record.

After keeping current on research online, I listened in on a 1.5-hour webinar presentation from an astronomer on Maya calendar studies. It gave me some ideas about a project approach I could use in the design process for a new class activity, and was great insight into interdisciplinary research occurring on the other side of the United States from me.

Tonight, I look forward to reading through the stack of anthropology/archaeology professional organization journals I put to the side during the spring semester and the ones which arrived while I was at a teaching workshop last week. I might also take a look at my schedule and see if I can get to an archaeology museum this summer to visit an exhibit I would really like to see.

While I am teaching one cultural anthropology class online this summer, I use my summers for prepping projects for the upcoming year too. My week included networking with professors at other colleges in my region, including discussing how we can join our students together to learn more about archaeology, and discussing a service learning project with a non-profit director. Moreover, my work included starting to tinker with a conference paper to hopefully have it ready to submit for publication submission soon. I’ve added more sources to my to-read-this-summer book list in hopes of starting plans to design an archaeology course in the next year and activities for a student club which will hopefully be up and running in the next semester. Lastly, my experiences in the midwest last week for a workshop have brought me back to our group website, looking for teaching and anthropology materials I could incorporate into my courses come fall. Although I would like for more hours in each day to be archaeology-focused, I still come back to it often enough for contentment and to enhance my students’ learning experiences.

Even though I wasn’t in a field, lab, or in a classroom today, archaeology hasn’t been far from mind or from the independent workload I’ve designed for myself for this summer. It’s always a pleasure to share a bit of the diversity of work opportunities with those interested in archaeology.

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Mud-Avoidance

By on June 29, 2012 in Community Archaeology, DayOfArch2012, Digital Archaeology, Education

My Day of Archaeology, is, as it was last year, meta.  I am one of the founders of the Day of Archaeology project, and I have spent my day (mostly) online, editing and posting articles and Tweeting about the project.  This is pretty much as good as my Day of Archaeology is going to get.  The loosest relationship my day had to field archaeology was when I went to see my back specialist this morning about a back injury I exacerbated last year when I was digging in Poland -  I went a bit mental with the de-turfing and hurt my back so badly I had to return to the UK and missed out on working on the most amazing 14th C. Baltic site.

A pal on Twitter said to me yesterday that I was mud-avoidant.  I will be the first to admit that what  I do for my PhD isn’t exactly archaeology.  I am a PhD student at the UCL Centre for Digital Humanities, and my research is ‘Public Archaeology in a Digital Age’.  So I’m looking at how, where and why archaeology and the public meet online and how archaeology as a sector creates, sustains and uses online community.  There are a few things that keep me awake at night about my research, mainly because it’s just so damn fascinating.  At the moment, I am researching the concept of archaeological authority and knowledge-ownership -  I think that  changes to the landscape of communication in archaeology are simply a technologically-facilitated continuation of longer-term developments within the sector as a whole (get me).  But  how far has the growth of participatory media impacted the archaeological sector in the UK?  How have these media facilitated collaboration between professional and layperson? Has the encouragement of audience participation gone any way towards supporting any real acknowledgement of multi-vocal approaches to heritage issues? What evidence exists that social media dialogue is about sharing archaeological authority at all, in an online context?  Which part these ‘non-professional’ digital voices will be considered inauthentic, and why?  So many questions…

I do a lot of research through surveys, and talking to people, but a lot of my work is also observation.  How people interact, what is said, how it is said, where it’s said.. so today has been interesting!  I absolutely love my PhD topic and feel hugely privileged to be funded to undertake it.  I get to read lots of sociology, which is my new Best Thing, and I have learned so much by being part of the Centre for Digital Humanities, and the interdisciplinarity there.   It has been the most interesting 2 years of my life ever (and I’ve had some interesting years, believe me)..  I just hope someone will employ me at the end of all this, the big worry for every PhD student.

I have recently moved back home to East Anglia, mainly because it’s cheap, but mostly for some peace and quiet.  The flat, open landscape here created the archaeologist inside me (she really ought to get out more, poor girl).  The wealth of wool churches, the Norman castles, the shadows of Norse in the dialect, and the Scandinavian street names led me to study medieval archaeology 21 years ago, and although I am all about archaeology and communication, AD 400 – 900 is my secret passion.  But if anyone asks, I’m strictly social media & comms, right?  Right?

For us Public Archaeologists, understanding how we meet, discuss and inform the public and understanding the technologies we can use to do this is, I think, vital.  I just hope that my research outcomes will play a small part in having an impact on how archaeology exploits Internet technologies.  Part of this understanding is the development of the Day of Archaeology itself.  I am overwhelmed by the support we have been offered by archaeologists worldwide, for free, for the love of archaeology, because we believe it matters, not just for ourselves but everyone. That we have managed all this through the power of the Internet is witness to the increasing importance of Public Archaeology at a time when archaeology is being given the death of a thousand cuts.  Without public support, we will wither.

Better get writing then, eh?

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Simple location plan with trenches to south of road and Silbury Hill to the north

Communicating Archaeology

By on June 29, 2012 in DayOfArch2012, Digital Archaeology, Excavation

I was reminded by the blustery wet south-easterly tail wind on my cycle to work this morning that summer has yet to arrive to this part of the world. However, as an Archaeological Information Systems Manager for English Heritage based down in Fort Cumberland, Portsmouth, I’m mostly office based so the weather is only an issue when I venture out to get a cup of coffee.

It has finally become apparent to me that communication is one of my main focuses. I am always asked what period or location I specialise in, the truth is I don’t take this approach to archaeology. My passion is for archaeology and archaeologists, how we communicate with each other and how we communicate with the public (who’s support we depend to continue doing what we do).

So back to my day…

After arriving in my office and making a cup of coffee I turned my attention to finalising a paper I’ve been writing called ‘Can you hack (the) communication?’ I gave a presentation on this at CAA in Southampton (http://caaconference.org/) (it’s a computers and archaeology conference) back in March. This paper looks at how we as archaeologists capture digital information in the field and particular my perspective on the experience of implementing a digital recording system for archaeological excavation called Intrasis to our teams. We’ve used the system now on our last few projects.

Simple location plan with trenches to south of road and Silbury Hill to the north

This is a screenshot of a map of the excavations of the Roman Settlement across the road from Silbury Hill.

As main ringleader of social media at the fort, I started receiving my colleagues’ posts for Day of Archaeology by mid-morning. That I know of two others are participating, one from our zooarchaeologists and another from @nicola_hembrey, our finds archaeologists.

Through out the day, like most days I’m keeping an eye on my Twitter feed for good content and information @hscorley. I also am keeping an eye on the @EHArchaeology twitter account which I am primary curator. This account has been active for about 3 years now and I’m amazed how popular it has become.

Looking at Twitter today, it is of course, abuzz with Day of Archaeology content. Particular praise is due to London Archaeological Archive & Research Centre (LAARC)  for the LAARC Lottery. If only I had thought if it myself. You pick a number for a shelf, they then go and find what’s on that shelf and blog about it. I like this for several reasons, not only is it interactive and raises awareness about their archive but it also means no one has to think to hard about what to write about, it’s all there just waiting to written about.

As my day wraps up I’m going to prepare to face the elements again, the wind does not appear to have shifted and despite a bit of sunlight earlier it looks like it might rain.

Hugh Corley

@hscorley

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