Preconceptions and the Past

I recently gave a talk at the Fresno County Archaeological Society's monthly meeting, and while it required a good deal of prep work and stress, I am very glad that I did it - it was a good audience, and alot of fun to give the talk. 

After the formal presentation, there was a Q&A period, as is common at these types of events, and I was asked a range of questions, most of which got into the information that I had left out of the presentation (when you are giving a 1-hour talk for the lay public, you have to leave out alot of interesting and important details, unfortunately.  It's a matter of making sure that the audience has enough information for your main points to make sense, while hopefully whetting their appetite to look further into the topic on their own - hopefully stoking their curiosity rather than "dumbing down" the subject matter).   However, there was one question that struck me as interesting, but not for the reason that the person asking it intended.

After I had answered several questions, I called on a well-dressed, middle-aged man near the back of the room.  He stood and asked "so, you say that these people were hunter-gatherers, but they had to have grown some crops, so what did they do to fertilize them?"  He then rattled off a description of Native American crop fertilization that could have been taken verbatim from one of my elementary school Social Studies books.  He followed this up with some additional comments about how "every society must have agriculture."

Had he stopped before giving his example of Native American agriculture, I would have assumed that he was asking a slightly different, and very interesting question.  But his insistence (even after I answered his question to the best of my ability) that the Chumash (the Native Californian group about which I had been speaking) engaged in some form of agriculture, complete with the intentional fertilization of planted crops, was just the most recent example of something that I have noticed among the lay public ever since I first became interested in both history and archaeology.

Most of us have preconceptions regarding the past based in part on half-remembered snippets of our educations, in part on our conception of the present, and in part on our basic assumptions about how humans behave.  This fellow was unable to accept that there are human populations who do not engage in agriculture, even after I explained the full spectrum that runs from highly mobile hunter/gatherers to farmers*.  Similarly, the people that I encounter very often seem to have difficulty grasping that there are, indeed, societies that don't really recognize the concept of private property, or lack clearly defined social strata (no, not every society has a leader, at least not a permanent one).  Both of these ideas (private property is a natural part of human psychology, all humans follow leaders and all human society are stratified for this reason) are based on assumptions that we make which aren't actually backed up by field data.  Or, to de-nerdify the way that I phrased that, we like to think that these things are true because they either justify our current society.

Similarly, we have certain notions regarding the human past based on pop culture.  The very notion of "back in caveman times" is ludicrous and informed more by Warner Brothers cartoons than archaeology.  Some past humans lived in caves...but, you know, some modern humans live in caves.  When you think of the "caveman days", though, you are thinking of a point when humans were anatomically modern (or at least nearly so), but somehow not quite human...primitive, savage, lacking language and culture.

This was never the case.  Nobody knows for sure when language began, but it was likely before we became anatomically modern humans.  Likewise, culture pre-dated modern humans - the presence of stone tools and artwork associated with our ancestors demonstrate that.  By the time we evolved into our currently physical form, we had everything that makes us human.  When you think of the ways that the mobile hunter-gatherers of the American Great Basin lived, you are also thinking of something very close to how our common ancestors in Africa lived 50,000 years ago.  All of us are, and were, human, not "cavemen."

Our prehistoric ancestors began as highly mobile hunter gatherers, spread throughout the world, and adapted to mobile conditions (and quickly changing conditions with the end of the Pleistocene, ca. 12,000 years ago).  Some groups began agriculture, became sedentary, and began to form towns and eventually cities, while other remained mobile and nomadic, some adopting animal husbandry and some retaining hunter/gatherer lifeways...and there were many steps in between all of these points that various human societies adopted.  In each case, though, the form of culture developed in response to local environment.

And this seemed to be where the fellow asking the question was having a problem.  He seemed to think, based on how he phrased his question, as well as the follow-up comments that he made, that a lack of farming was a "caveman" trait.  That I was talking about Native Americans 250 years ago, not early people on the African savannah 50,000 years ago...and therefore the people about whom I was speaking clearly must have been engaged in cultivating crops, and he was unwilling to accept the word of myself or anyone else who had actually studied the matter to the contrary. 

But, of course, the fact of the matter is that humans will do what their environment** demands.  For some, this means that agriculture becomes necessary.  For others, it does not.



*This is definitely a spectrum, too.  It is common for us to think that there is some sort of clear line where a culture "becomes" agricultural.  But where does that line fall?  Clearly, people who plant annual crops and engage in irrigation and fertilization are farmers.  But what about people who scatter plant seeds but don't prepare fields or irrigate them?  What about people who don't intentionally plant seeds, but prune or otherwise tend to plants to promote the growth of some over others?  What about those who burn areas of field or forest to promote the growth of disturbance vegetation?  There are many steps on the way from forager to farmer, and it's not necessarily clear where one ends and the other begins.

**This includes both the natural environment and the social environment.

Interview Available

So, a while back I was interviewed by Steve Jarjoura of the podcast Postcards from the Dungeon.  The podcast is about role playing games, and specifically about the introduction of various storytelling concepts and methods into role playing games.

I was interviewed to talk about archaeology, and to discuss how anthropological principles can be applied to designing societies in fantasy world.  The interview is available here. 

SAA Memphis Part 2 - It's Gettin' Real at the Convention Center

See Part 1 for the "story up to now..."


Okay, so there I was in Memphis, walking out of the hotel, trying to find the shuttle, only to be informed that the shuttle already left, a little bit early, already full.  Three other archaeologists were already standing there - an older woman, a young professor, and an Albanian graduate student* (sounds like the setup to a joke, I know).  So, the four of us decide to get a taxi.  This worked out well enough, but the cab ride was considerably pricier than any of us expected (topping $30).  Luckily, the professor had an expense account and so he covered it for all of us, which we all very much appreciated.


I got checked in to the conference, and high-tailed it over to my session just before it began.  On the way, I ran into an old friend, Dave Robinson (the fellow for whom I have been doing faunal analysis), and we had a bit of a chat on the way in, and in between papers.  Dave is quite brilliant, and I have always enjoyed talking shop with him.


Anyway, my session began, and, as the other speakers are presenting, I suddenly realize that there are a number of things that need to be changed about my paper.  So, out comes my red pen (yes, I do typically carry one), and I begin re-writing sections on the print-out that I have.  I am becoming increasingly nervous as I go, and realizing that the Powerpoint presentation that I had created and sent to the symposium organizer bears only a vague similarity to the paper as it now exists.  Earlier than I had been scheduled, the organizer announces that one of the papers had been cancelled, and as such I am now up.


I am horribly nervous, panicked, and not wanting to go up.  I look around the room, and it has a number of brilliant archaeologists, almost every colleague who I hold in high esteem: Lynne Gamble, Terry Joslin, Dave Robinson, Jennifer Perry, Amy Gusick, Bill Hildebrandt (who also runs one of my company's main competitors), John Johnson, and my mentor, Michael Glassow.


Shit.


Well, there was nothing else for it.  I began talking.  As I was in the middle of modifying the damn paper when I was called up, I had to fudge a few sections, explaining the concepts and data without having a good script from which to work.  I was able to ease things along by cracking a few jokes about the microscopically small font size on some of my Powerpoint slides, and I was able to make the Powerpoint presentation work with what I had.  I was very unhappy with the paper when I gave it, but I managed to at least get through the presentation without hyperventillating.  As always when I do these talks, I sat down believing that I had blown my credibility with everyone in the room.  I was feeling pretty terrible.


I was the last speaker, so I fully expected to slink out unnoticed.  But then one of the more senior archaeologists accosted me.  He came towards me, and instead of the upbraiding that I was expecting, he enthused "that was great!  Some of what you were talking about is stuff that always bothered me, and I am glad to see that someone else also saw it...and the approach you took was pretty cool!  Here, take my card, I want you to email a copy of that paper to me!"


I was a bit confused, but played along.


John Johnson then spoke with me, and described the research that he would like to do on the subject, while complimenting what I had said.  Now, John is probably the absolute nicest guy in Anthropology (he is at least in the running along with Michael Jochim), so I half-way suspect that he was just being polite, but still, he seemed enthusiastic.


Dave also was enthusiastic, which helped. 


And then I ran into someone who was now with Harvard's Peabody Museum, but who, 30 years ago, had worked in the same region where I did my Masters thesis research.  He told me that he had come to the session because he had read the paper I had published recently, and really wanted to hear what I had to say about this other topic.  So, that was pretty damn cool.  Anyway, he and I spoke about our mutual research interests for a little while.  And then I realized that my boss, who knew the fellow from Harvard, had been in the room during the presentation.  However, she was enthusiastic and seemed to feel that I had done quite well.   


So, all in all, I am going to call this a win. 


I then headed out, and ran into a friend from graduate school who I had also worked with at my first full-time CRM job.  He and I headed out to lunch, and spent some time talking business, research, and about the academic job market.  It was nice, but we were both eager, after lunch, to get back to the conference.  He went to attend a paper, and I went to attend another session, but was stopped on the way by another old friend who now worked for the Forest Service.  Being as how part of how my company justifies sending us out to these conferences is business networking, and I really just wanted to talk with my friend, I allowed myself to get distracted, and we both made sure to mingle business talk with our catching-up.  We parted company, and I headed up to the book room, where I ran into more old friends, and a couple of former coworkers. 


I then headed out to the lobby, and  had my only bad interaction with another archaeologist at this conference.  I should explain that it is not uncommon for academic archaeologists to look down on CRM.  This is less common than it used to be, as an increasing number of academic archaeologists have become involved in CRM work, but it is still not rare.  This particular fellow told me that he was on the faculty of a university-not-to-be-named, and then looked at my name badge (our name badges bore the names of our employers), sniffed, and said, "oh, well...I see that you're still doing CRM" with a tone that seemed to say "you phony archaeologists are so adorable, but you'll never be in the same league as us grown-ups."  He made a few minor disparaging comments, and I pushed back a bit by asking him questions about how long he'd been unemployed before finally getting his current position, asking about the vicious politics of tenure, asking about the family that I was well aware he both wanted and didn't have because of the way his career had been going, and then brought up my retirement plan.  Yeah, it was petty, I was being an ass, but I have long since grown tired of this attitude.


After that, I headed over towards another talk, only to be waylaid by a former boss who is also tied into a couple of my company's current projects.  I always liked this guy, and I had a good business reason for sitting and talking with him for a bit (in fact, it arguably would have been irresponsible for me to not sit and talk with him), so I did so.  We talked shop a little bit (I was very cautious to avoid saying anything or inquiring about anything above my pay grade, and to not say anything that would have been considered in any way inappropriate by my current boss, so as not to create any trouble for my boss).  We also talked a bit about why I left.  When I left, I had told him that it was for family reasons, and because I was constantly being required to work untenably long hours and be away from home far too often, which was true to an extent.  However, a big part of the reason is that a person had been put in charge of a huge project, about whom the best that I can say is that I would not weep had I discovered that the CIA kidnapped him and used him for experiments involving weaponized ebola.


My former boss then told me that I wasn't alone.  Apparently a number of people jumped ship when this guy was there.  Finally, though, the guy did enough damage, and my former boss had enough.  He put one of the former subordinates in the place of the now ex-project manager, and she has been running the project quite successfully, and from what I have heard, the employees under her have developed alot of respect for her and are quite happy with her as their new supervisor. 


It was oddly satisfying to hear that. 


By the time we finished up, the day's papers were over.  Normally, I would have gone to find some people to have dinner with.  But I was only going to be in Memphis for this night, so I decided to grab my camera and go wandering about. 


Of course, it started raining.  I bought an umbrella, and proceeded to wander Memphis, seeing what I could see.  Yeah, it was cold, yeah, I was wet, yeah, I couldn't use my camera without pulling it out of the case and getting it soaked.  But I didn't care.  I was out, exploring a new city in a new region, and I was having fun. 


I realized around 9:00 that I hadn't yet had dinner, and most of the non-pricey places had closed up, so I ended up going to a fast food chicken place that I had not previously heard of, got some chicken, fried okra (I don't care what anyone else says, I enjoy fried okra, and have ever since my grandmother introduce me to it when I was a kid), and a biscuit, and had my dinner while I waited for the shuttle back to my hotel. 


As I sat at the shuttle stop waiting, I fell into conversation with a very grizzled fellow who, as it turned out, was the State Historic Preservation Officer for Guam (despite being a territory and not a state, Guam's guy is still called a STATE Historic Preservation Officer...go figure).  He and I talked shop for a while, and while it wasn't the most enjoyable conversation I have ever had (he was a remarkably frustrated man, though it sounded as if he had cause to be), it was interesting.

Finally, the shuttle arrived, we got to the hotel, I trundled up to my room, got the malfunctioning door handle to work after a couple of tries, and then went to bed.  I was so astoundingly exhausted that I slept solidly despite the 747s passing overhead causing the building to shake.




*I suddenly felt very awkward, as if this guy would somehow know that whenever I need to pull up some random nationality for a fictional character or an absurdist joke involving cab drivers (as overly-specific as it may sound, I crack these jokes quite often), I always choose "Albanian."  Well, regardless, I ran into him a few more times, and found that I enjoyed his company, so there you go.

The Talk is Over, on to the Next One

By the time this posts, I will have delivered a paper at one of the symposiums (symposia?) at the Society For American Archaeology's 2012 meeting in Memphis Tennessee.  Hopefully, at the time that this posts, I will be sitting in a barbecue place with a former boss of mine who is originally from Memphis enjoying some ribs.

I deeply, deeply loathe public speaking, and yet I keep agreeing to do it.  I am always concerned that I am going to come off sounding like an idiot, especially in a case like this, where my actual paper topic diverges from the symposium topic (for the record, I checked the topic with the symposium organizer before I wrote it, and she said it was fine).  The truth of the matter is that very few people will likely hear the paper (I am the last speaker in my symposium, and all of the big name speakers will already have come and gone by the point that I end up at the podium), and those who do will likely forget it after they leave - I am picking on a little-known subject in southern California archaeology, which doesn't tend to lend itself to being memorable for anyone who doesn't share my particular interests and irritants. 

So, now that I have spoken, and hopefully not made myself look too terribly foolish, I am hopefully enjoying a nice lunch, and tomorrow I catch a late flight back to California, and a 3.5 hour drive back to Fresno from the San Francisco Airport. 

And then I start on the next project.  I will be speaking to the Fresno County Archaeological Society [http://www.scahome.org/about_ca_archaeology/fresno.html#fcas] on May 7th (anyone in the Fresno area should feel free to come see the talk).  I will discuss the history of research in the Santa Ynez Valley, in Santa Barbara County, California. 

And then?  Well, hopefully then I will have nothing pressing that needs be done for a while.  I have realized recently just how stressed-out and tired I have gotten lately, and I need some time to relax, especially considering that I am going to be a father come September and that I need to be able to devote my energies to that when the time comes. 

That being said, there are a few projects that I would very much like to do - some small writing projects, and a paper that I would like to publish on an abnormally old projectile point found in Yosemite.  But I think that I need to balance my research interests against my impending family life, my job, my non-research writing interests (such as this blog), and my non-archaeology interests, and the fact of the matter is that the research is probably the thing that can be most easily minimized without impacting the overall quality of my life. 

So, we'll see.  I'd like to publish more, but I may very well decide that it's not worth the effort when compared to other things that I could be doing with my time.

Talks, Conferences, and Downtime

So, this coming weekend, I will be in Memphis, TN attending the Society for American Archaeology annual meeting.  I have to finish a paper and presentation (the paper's written, I'm working out the details of the presentation), and as such I will be pretty busy this week.  I may post a few photograph blog entries, as I like posting photographs, and this requires minimal effort from me, but otherwise I am unlikely to post much this week. 

After I finish the conference, I will be preparing a talk for the Fresno County archaeological Society (to be delivered on May 7th, in case you are in the Fresno area), so I will remain a bit busy for a few weeks to come.

I am looking forward to being done with all of this, and not having big things that I have to do for a while.

Postcards From the Dungeon

So, in keeping with my on-going goal of talking about archaeology with anyone willing to let me (AKA, talking about archaeology with different audiences), I was interviewed by the Role-Playing Game podcast Postcards From the Dungeon (it's a reference to Dungeons and Dragons, not BDSM!). 

It was alot of fun, more like a conversation than an interview.  I'll post a link when the podcast drops.

Photographic Evidence of my Dark Side Connections

I promised in an entry earlier this week that I would post some photos from the presentation that I gave at Lucasarts, so here they are (please note, all of these photos came from my girlfriend Kay's camera, and most were taken by her).


Jawas dig me.



I have written before about various different...for lack of a better word I'll call them "adventures" that I have had due to my career path. Whether it be getting stuck in the mountains, encountering boats in the desert, having near-panic attacks on helicopters, battling macrobiotic dieters, being attacked by hornets, or having weird run-ins with cattle, I have had some very, well, unique experiences. Of all of these, though, the coolest by far happened recently, and that was the opportunity to speak at Lucasarts, one of the subsidiaries of Lucasfilm.

As stated in the previous post, what made this so cool wasn't simply the chance to give a talk on anthropology and use Ewoks and Sand People as my ethnographic examples (though that was very cool), it was also the chance to talk ot some very enthusiastic costumed hobbyists, meet many Lucasfilm employees, and get a tour of Lucasfilm's San Francisco facilities(courtesy of my friend Stacy, who set the whole thing up to begin with).

It was a damn cool day, and here's the photographic evidence.

As I mentioned in the earlier post, the day started with me meeting a group from the Twin Suns Star Wars club from the Visalia area. The fellow in the photos is Barry, who dresses as Obi Wan Kenobi, and in this photo looks as if he is threatening me with a lightsaber (he was actually showing off his prop-building prowess, which is quite remarkable).


After meeting the fine folks from the Twin Suns, we headed to the main lobby, with this delightful statue out front:


Not to quibble, but I really think that Yoda should have been en-pointe with the water spraying from his mouth.

You might think that Lucasfilm would be a wild place, filled with whimsy and amazing things, but as shown in this phot, it really is just a workplace like any other:


At the lobby, we met with the Stormtroopers of the Golden Gate Garrison of the 501st Legion, where Kay, her sister, and her father all were interrogated by these minions of the Empire.




...and then time came for me to give the talk:




...leading to the Stormtroopers bringing me in as one of their own. Now I can force the galaxy to do my bidding! (see how Francisco cowers in fear!)


Members of the 501st Legion, Twin Suns, and myself, Kay, and Stacy

But I hid my connection to the Dark Side well, and even the old Jedi Master still sought my counsel:


After the talk, we took the tour. These buildings were filled with movie propos, special effects models, and alot of photo opporuntities. Here's a selection:







And, as a parting gift, here's a photo to warm the very cockles of your heart. Jar-Jar Binks getting what he deserves:

Teaching Anthropology to Stormtroopers

So, yesterday I woke up early, made the trek up to San Francisco's Presidio, and did the Voodoo that I do so well. I delivered the talk.

Things got off to a rough start. An old friend of mine was driving from Portland to Los Angeles, and needed to stop at my place for the night. This was not a problem. However, the fact that he didn't arrive until nearly midnight and I needed to be gone around 7 the next morning was a problem. So, Kaylia and I dragged our sorry carcasses out of bed, got in the car, fortified ourselves with coffee, and headed north to San Francisco.

We had prepared for gnarly traffic, but encountering no such thing, we arrived at Lucasarts an hour early - just in time, as it turns out, to pull into the Lucasarts garage and see Obi Wan Kenobi helping two other people pull large plastic boxes out of their car.

This would presage the rest of the day, really.

As we had plenty of time to kill, we went over to have more coffee with Obi Wan and his friends, one of whom would be dressed as a female Tusken Raider before the day was done, the other of whom was just a very pleasant, mellow guy. I also knew that a number of people dressed as Stormtroopers would be joining us at the lecture hall. I have written about bad experiences with costumed hobbyists, and was a bit wary when I heard that such a group would be in attendance. But, as it turns out, these folks were all very friendly, very nice, and had a great sense of humor about what they were up to.

At any rate, we slouched about with the costumers for a while, first at the coffee shop, and then at the Lucasarts lobby, and finally my friend Stacy (who had set this whole thing up) came to gather us. We headed over to a small theatre, where the stormtroopers, Jedi, Sand People, and Lucasarts employees got comfortable, and I set up my computer to start the presentation.

My original intention had been to give a brief overview of anthropological theory and then spend most of my time talking about how this might be applied to alien races in Star Wars. In the end, I actually ended up using Star Wars as a way of introducing topics that are of interest to anthropologists and archaeologists, and providing a large number of examples to illustrate points from North America and Australia.

The talk done, we headed over to the dining area. I realized two things:

A) Lucasfilm employees have the best cafeteria on the planet. Aside from a wide variety of outstanding food, they also have views of the Golden Gate Bridge and the Palace of Fine Arts.

B) There are very few things more surreally funny than watching a Stormtrooper do such mundane things as order a sandwich and get Coke from a soda fountain.

From there, Stacy led us on a tour of the facilities, including the opportunity to look in on ILM's offices/workshops in San Francisco, and also the chance to check out the merchandising office. All in all, it was a very cool back-scenes look at how Lucasfilm works.

I was also asked if I would give the talk again. And, if invited, I think I will.

Kaylia took photos, and I will post some in the next few days. In the end, we had very sore feet, were very tired, but were very happy that we had come. It was an excellent experience, and one that I would welcome again.

I wonder, if I were asked to speak again, if they would be interested in a talk on the archaeology of San Francisco. That is a fascinating topic.

Ewok Archaeology

A few months back, while I was sitting in a hotel room with the air conditioner turned up full-blast in the vain hope of avoiding the 110 degree evening in western Kern County, I received an email from a friend of mine who works at Lucasfilm (appropriately, Return of the Jedi was playing on the television at the time). She informed me that Lucasfilm is in the habit of bringing in experts in different fields to speak about what they do in the hopes that this exposure to other lines of work and points of view will benefit the employees both as professionals and as people.

On the whole, a pretty cool idea, really.

My friend had informed her boss that she knew an archaeologist, and so he asked her if the archaeologist would be willing to come and speak. This email that I had just received was the invitation. Without hesitation I responded in the affirmative, not having the foggiest idea what I would talk about.

Now, if the group that my friend works with was responsible for developing the Indiana Jones property, then this would be easy. I could come up with all sorts of ways that archaeologists can approach our movie pseudo-doppelganger. But this was a group responsible for developing the Star Wars property.

I hadn't a clue.

However, I have, over the source of my career, been very vocal as to the necessity for archaeologists to address the public in new and creative ways (I am a particular admirer of blogger DiggingtheDirt's idea of archaeology gigs), so I figured that I really ought to do this.

And so, sandwiched in between a lot of last minute project deadlines and too much travel, I have been writing a presentation, titled (at my friend's suggestion) "Ewok Archaeology." I am looking at two different groups from Star Wars - the Ewoks and the Sand People - and attempting to use anthropological/archaeological theory to fill in many of their gaps. It's been an interesting project, working my research muscles on a fictional creature, and I am quite enjoying it.

However, I am very nervous about the presentation (public speaking is always nerve-wracking). Still, this may be a way of subtly introducing archaeology and anthropology into places where most people wouldn't expect to see them, and that is very cool.




In retrospect, the University of Corruscant should have seen the flaws inherent in sending children out as ethnographers. However, nobody else would fit the costume.

The Talk

Since the dawn of time, humans have been working to avoid public speaking (see Libby, I do listen to what you say). And then there are those freaks, mutants, monsters, and ne’er-do-wells such as myself that keep putting ourselves into the position where we have to speak publicly. Even worse, we have to speak in front of audiences that know what we are talking about and can immediately spot any bullshit that we try to sell.

For the last several years, I have been presenting papers at the annual conference of the Society for Californian Archaeology (SCA - not to be confused with the Student Conservation Association, which I am also a member of, Steven Carl Armstrong, who is my father, or the Society for Creative Anachronism, with which I had some rather bad experiences). Although the experience has generally turned out to be positive (my first year, I even received some good, constructive criticism from the fellow who, three years later, would be my boss), it has never been fun in the lead-up.

Two years ago, I was asked to present a paper in a symposium dedicated to my MA advisor, one Dr. Michael Glassow. The idea behind the symposium was pretty simple, really. Mike’s students – past and present – would present papers on those aspects of their own research that was influenced by Mike’s work. I was asked to present, and I agreed, thinking that it would be a friendly gathering mostly comprised of Mike’s current and recent students, most of whom were friends of mine.

What I hadn’t taken into account was that a very large number of the pre-eminent archaeologists in California were trained by Mike. I also had taken into account that the loyalty that Mike’s students felt towards him was not limited to his current and recent crop, but that his past students still held a good deal of affection for him as well. If you were one of Mike’s students, you knew that you would be worked hard, but come out ahead as a result, and we all appreciated that, and apparently nobody ever forgot it.

So, when the program came out, I was shocked to see that two of Mike’s current students (including myself) were on the bill – and so was nearly every major archaeologist who works in California. I was more than a bit daunted. Still, I had agreed to present a paper, so I continued to work on my presentation, not sure what kind of a reception I would get.

Well, the day finally came, and I sat through the morning session, hearing about some very good research, but also hearing some pointless bickering amongst the other archaeologists.

And then my turn came.

My hands were sweating, my mouth was dry, my throat was sore. I walked up to the podium, stepped behind it, and plopped my notes down in front of me. Making certain that my PowerPoint presentation was functioning, I began to speak.

Luckily, I was so well rehearsed in the presentation that I was able to turn on auto-pilot and just speak. I cannot recall what I said, how I said it, or much else about the talk. I can remember that I was very nervous, that I had lost feeling in my hands and feet, that my throat was dry and every word felt as if it were being yanked out accompanied by a Brillo pad, and that I was sure that I could see complete disapproval on every face in the audience. I recall that I could feel my undershirt soaking in sweat. And I can remember thinking “I’m babbling. Nothing I’m saying makes any sense. These people all know that I am an idiot.”

After my talk concluded, I hastily took my seat, and was grateful that I was followed by a rather well-known archaeologist that everyone was eager to see. I had hoped that my talk would fade from everybody’s memories. But, just in case, I spent the rest of the day avoiding the people who I had seen in that room.

The next day, I was in the book room, when I was cornered by somebody who was both a very well-known archaeologist, and who had heard me speak.

“Hey,” he said “are you Matthew Armstrong?”

“Yes.” I felt my stomach trying to find a new home by crawling into my lungs.

“I saw your talk yesterday.” He had a neutral expression, and I was sure that I was about to get it (what, precisely, is "it" anyway?).

“Oh…”

“Yeah. You raised some good points about my work. Glassow’s students tend to be pretty sharp.” And with that, he shook my hand. “Also, that was a pretty tough room, and you held your own pretty well. I wish I had your confidence when I was your age.” And with that, he left.

As I would later learn, the rigidity of posture, tone of voice, and furtive glancing about that I had been engaged in out of nervousness had been mistaken for confident poise, a strong and certain voice, and confident engagement with the audience. In other words, everyone had gotten exactly the wrong impression, and I was better off for it. And nobody thought I was an idiot.

There is often a wide chasm between what is and what is perceived.