A comment to the "Forbiden Archaeology" entry reminded me of something...
While I was in graduate school, I sometimes shared an office with a couple of other anthropology grad students. On the office wall as a poster that bore the title (if memory serves) "Important Points in Black History." The aim of the poster was, rather clearly, to provide a sense of pride in the ancestry of people of African descent*. A fair assesment of history and archaeology provides a huge amount of material for such a poster. Volumes have been written about the accomplishments of people within Africa and by African people and their descendants throughout the globe, and volumes remain to be written yet. From Great Zimbabwe to the accomplishments of African-American scientists and writers to the contributions that contemporary Africans have made to world agriculture, the humanities, and politics, there is a wealthy heritage of which anyone could be proud.
It's unfortunate that the producers of the poster ignored all of that and went straight for the pseudo-scholarship.
The poster had individual frames claiming that the people of Africa were responsible for everything from the rise of Hellenistic Greece to the establishment of pre-Columbian empires in the Americas**. Prominent people from several ethnic groups were labelled as "black" by the producers of the poster, often based on nothing more than urban legend***.
In the case of claiming the rise of Greek culture, it's easy to brush these claims off. In the case of the claims of the founding of empires in the Americas before the 15th century, though, there is a weird issue at play. The purpose of such claims, and I have heard them many other times from members of the public and people on television and radio, is to reclaim the past from Europeans - the argument being that European (read: white) scholars have been writing the histories for centuries, and have downplayed or simply denied the role of non-whites in human history. This is, to a degree, a fair point. Certainly, many people think of "world history" as being essentially the history of Europe and post-1492 North America. It is common for Africa, India, China, and pretty much anywhere that isn't in Europe to be given token mention, if that, in elementary and high school "world history" classes****. Early archaeologists often developed overly-complex hypotheses concerning "vanished white races" in Africa and the Americas in order to explain the architectural wonders (and implied high degree of social organization) found in these places.
However, this has been changing over the last 120 years. Anthropologists have now long since turned away from the assumption that there is a "hierarchy of man" with Europeans at the top, professional historians have long made efforts to acknowledge the importance of areas outside of Europe, and while the faculties of many universities continue to be disproportionately white and middle class, even that is in the (admittedly slow) process of changing.
Nonetheless, it is true that Africa continues to get short shrift. It is, therefore, understandable that people would want to do research that reflects well on Africa itself and the people of the African diaspora. That's fine and good, and I see no problem with it. However, the poster in the office was produced not by responsible scholars with an interest in Africa or the African Disapora, but by a fringe group. This fringe group (and it is a fringe, no matter how vocal it sometimes is) of academics and laypeople has taken this a step farther and attempt to claim that all good things come from Africa, and not really anywhere else. This group, typically referred to as "Afrocentrists" has made quite a stir in certain circles, and tends to see itself as being the cure for racism, but is in fact rooted in some deeply racist thought.
When the Afrocentrists attempt to claim, for example, that all of the philosophy of Socrates was stolen from the library at Alexandria, which is in Africa, and therefore, they will usually tell you, an achievement of black peoples, they are making a number of basic factual errors (the fact that ethnicities in classical Alexandria were constructed and perceived differently than our modern black/white dichotomy and therefore this construction isn't relevant, lack of evidence for Socrates ever traveling to Alexandria, and the little fact that the library was opened nearly a century after the death of Socrates), but the harm done is negligible except to the believer's understanding of history.
By contrast, when Afrocentrists try to claim that the societies of the Pre-Colombian Americas were organized by African colonists, matters are a bit different. First off, there's the simple fact that inherent in such a claim is the racist notion that the native peoples of the Americas were somehow incapable of achieving the architectural feats that they achieved, or developing the cultures that they developed. It is, quite simply, racist to claim that the monuments and societies of the Americas were not the work of the "savages" living here, no matter the skin color of the "noble race that brought civilization." It's racist when Eurocentrists do it, and it's just as racist when Afrocentrists do it.
Secondly, the people of the developing and industrial nations in Latin America have been having a hard enough time controlling heritage goods (a problem that my own profession is, unfortunately, often aggravates), and having yet another group try to lay false claim to these items not only removes a part of the cultural heritage, but also further fuels the colonial attitudes ("these people are savages who don't appreciate their past!") that fuels both political and social mistreatment of these peoples and nations.
It's a weird and curious trend, and it should be noted that few people other than members of this movement take the movement at all seriously. But I have always found it bizarre that there was a "counter racism" movement that engaged in the same sorts of racism, down the exact same arguments, as the people who they are arguing against.
*I guess I should say "recent African descent" as I know that some smart-ass paleoanthropologist is going to point out that all of use are ultimately descended from African populations.
**Next to the part of the poster claiming this, one of the archaeologists in the department placed a "post-it" not saying "This is not true."
***It was reminiscent of a classical music album a friend once showed me. It was titled something like "Gay Classics" and was music written by composers who the album's producers believed were gay. I have no idea about most of the composers listed on the album, but one was Frederic Chopin, who was apparently included because he was the lover of the author George Sands. The problem, though, is that George Sands was the pen-name of a woman, so the claim that Chopin was gay is rather dubious. If you do a little homework...
****A weird side effect of this is that many people, being unfamiliar with the historic contributions of these places, have simply assumed that they didn't have any, a view which anyone who is better versed in history knows to not be true.
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Dead of Winter, Mark 2
If you, kind reader, will permit me to talk hobbies for an entry, I want to plug a friend's event.
This last weekend, I attended the second annual Dead of Winter Horror Invitational, a role-playing game convention held in the Brookdale Lodge, an allegedly haunted hotel in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Last year's event was a blast, so I was eager for this years, and I have to say that the event didn't disappoint. The players were brought by invitation and chosen by Matt Steele who picked those who he felt would play a good game and entertain each other as well as themselves. If the people at the game tables that I attended are any indication, he chose well.
Okay, for those unfamiliar with the term, a role playing game is best described as a type of interactive fiction or storytelling. It's a game in which one player (usually called the Game Master, although there are other titles as well) develops a rough story outline and populates it with minor characters. The other players play the parts of the story's central protagonasts (or, sometimes, antagonists) which are represented by both the player's performance and by a set of attributes (usually, though not always, numbers representing skills and abilities) on a characetr sheet. All site around a table and the Game Master narrates general events and the actions of the minor characters, and the players narrate the actions of their characters. When there is a conflict (the players want their characters to do something difficult, the players want their characters to do something in oppoisition to the Game Master-controlled characters, or the one player's character wants to do something against another player's character) then the rules of the game are invoked in order to settle the conflict, which usually involves comparison of attributes and/or dice rolling in order to determine the outcome. These games reflect genres of fiction, and as a result come in nearly every genre (though fantasy and science fiction are probably dominant, while genres such as romance and drama are present but uncommon). The genre reflected at this convention was horror, usually supernatural horror although other types were also represented.
The venue for such a convention could not have been better. As noted, the Brookdale Lodge is allegedly haunted, and is a damn creepy place even without the ghost stories. It is in the redwoods, along a mountain highway. Although the location is very accessible from both Santa Cruz and San Jose, the topography and the forest make it appear isolated. The hotel is in considerably better condition than it was last year, and therefore didn't seem to be actively trying to kill us but is still rather run-down and therefore a bit unnerving.
The first night, there were no games, but everyone met in the hotel bar and socialized. The first year, I found this a bit awkward, but this year, I knew more people (we all remembered each other from last year, and everyone was friendly and welcoming) and the first evening was alot of fun. We sat about, talking and joking, and feeling a sense of comeraderie that only a geeky hobby such as ours can bring.
We played in the Log Cabin, which is, well, a log cabin connected to the rest of the hotel by means of a wodden hallway/tunnel next to the brook room. It is poorly insulated, but has a huge fireplace. Last year, the fireplace was malfunctioning, and so we were frequently unable to heat the room, and there was a major storm, meaning that we all had to be bundled up to play. This year, however, the weather was better AND the fireplace worked meaning that we were never cold, were usually quite comfortable, and on a couple of occasions were even uncomfortably warm.
In all, the better hotel conditions and the nice weather were not the boon that they would be for most events. Given that this was a horror game convention, the spooky atmosphere was heightened by the storms and dilapidated hotel last year, and these set the stage perfectly for the ghost stories and monster tales that our games were based around. Weirdly, this was an event where the atmosphere benefited from what would be bad conditions for every other kind of event. However the organizer did everything that he could to create an appropriate atmosphere (set it during the darkest time of the year in an hotel with a reputation for creepiness, and invite Game Masters and players who have a proven record of being able to evoke good atmosphere from their games) and the weather was going to cooperate or not regardless of what he did. In other words, the organizer did good but the weather gods are bastards.
The games were an interesting mix, and while some worked better than others, and based on what I saw and heard I don't think that there was a dud in the mix - the worst that can be said about any game was that it was well constructed and run, which at most events would be high praise. I played in three this year. The first was a game run by my friend Mike, who took what was essentially a super hero story and overlaid it with a tale of ghostly revenge for a good, creepy story. Our characters were able to effect the outcome, but against the threat that we faced, we were less powerful than characters of our sorts would generally be expected to be. The end result was a solid, well-paced, suspenseful game in which we were forced to think our way around problems that our characters would normally just pound their way through. Mike is a talented Game Master, and this fact was evident in his entry.
The next game in which I played was a science fiction/humor game called HOL (for Human Occupied Landfill). The game's setting establishes that the players are prisoners (for anything from being framed for minor infractions to actually being horrible depraved criminals) who have been sentenced to live on a planet that is also used as the galaxy's garbage dump. Robotic cameras wander the landscape broadcasting the character's misery to the rest of the galaxy for their amusement. The game master created "terrain" for the game miniatures (many games use small models to illustrated where characters are and what they are doing) by dumping a trash can out on the table. The players included myself, the organizer Matt Steele, two long-time Bay Area gaming convention players/game masters, and the designers of the game Cthullutech and a social-networking/gaming website (EDIT - it's up and running and looking for folks, so go here). The game was hysterically fun, each of us playing some sort of weird reject with next-to-useless equipment having to negotiate a truly weird setting. In the end, one character used his abilities to play rock music to lure monsters away from us, another used the giant hamster-ball in which his character was trapped to get close enough to investigate a mysterious substance and help deal with it, my character mocked the laws of physics into submission, another made heavy artillery out of a radio, and another surrendered to the evil force we faced in order to distract it while the rest of us blew it to where it came from. The game had what was clearly intended to be horror elements, but the out-right gonzo lunacy of the game diluted them to where the game was more slapstick comedy than anything else. Alot of fun, and good work by the Game Master, but possibly not what the event was intended to be about.
The third (and final) game in which I played was interesting, but disturbing. It was set during the Eastern Front of WWII (see here for information on why this was so disturbing). The Game Master used a game system that is designed to imitate George Romero-style zombie stories. He also dropped hints that the Russians had been doing experiments to resuscitate dead soldiers, and one of the player characters was given a background narrative that had him having seen these resuscitated soldiers. Our characters were soldiers fighting in the eastern war. In the end, the zombie sightings were revealed to be the product of a soldier suffering from mental breakdown, and the game master put us into situations where simply trying to reduce the harm to innocent civilians led our characters to become paranoid tools of a man with a vendetta. Afterwards, the Game Master explained that he wanted the players to be confronted with the fact that neither the Soviets nor the Germans were monsters, but were humans in a situations and living under political leadership that fed on and rewarded the worst human traits - in other words, were we unlucky enough to be born in Germany or russia in the 1920s, then by the 1940s we would have been the ones committing the acts that as 21st century people we can look on in disgust. The leadership of both Hitler and Stalin and their inner circles was, indeed, evil, but most soldiers were just trying to survive and were swept up in the chaos that ensued when Hitler and Stalin made eastern Europe their personal dueling grounds. All of the players left the session deeply disturbed and truly horrified. The Game Master put it this way: there is no horror worse than what humans can do to each other, because we all have the potential to be monsters if we are not careful.
This was a valid lesson regarding morality, and if you view these not as games but as forms of storytelling (which they arguably are), then to use it as an essentially educational tool in this way is valid. However, we had all come to use them as games, and while potentially valuable, this was heavier than anyone had anticipated. So, I don't know what to make of the experience. I do think, however, that should I ever teach history (which could happen), I may take a lesson from this in trying to teach about war and war crimes.
So, to wrap it up, the last gaming experience aside, it was a fun event. I am very glad that I went, and I plan on attending next year. Hopefully the weather will be a bit more hostile next time. Regardless, as I know a couple of the other attendees read this, it was good to see everyone, and I look forward to next time.
If the readers will grant me just a bit more patience, while everyone that I met was fantastic, my memory for names is poor, so I want to say that everyone was a pleasure to meet and game with. I would like to acknowledge a few specific people who returned from last years and who really made the con especially enjoyable for me: Mike Ripley, whose gaming group I was in and whose company I miss, it was good to see him; the always gracious Matt DeHayes, and his girlfriend Nicole, I hope to get to spend a bit more time talking with them next time around; Shannon MacNamara, who is quite possibly one of the friendliest people I have ever met; Jack Young, who injected a sense of class into whatever part of the proceedings he was near; Mr. Grau and Mr. Muldoon, who were pitch-perfect for the HOL game and a hell of a lot of fun; Kris Miller (new this year, but memorable) the physicist/professional telescope operator/game convention impresario, and really interesting, cool guy; and of course, the host, Matt Steele, who made the event a success two years running - here's looking at year 3.
This last weekend, I attended the second annual Dead of Winter Horror Invitational, a role-playing game convention held in the Brookdale Lodge, an allegedly haunted hotel in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Last year's event was a blast, so I was eager for this years, and I have to say that the event didn't disappoint. The players were brought by invitation and chosen by Matt Steele who picked those who he felt would play a good game and entertain each other as well as themselves. If the people at the game tables that I attended are any indication, he chose well.
Matt shows off the tumor that he removed from a Venezuelan farmer's stomach using nothing by an Exact-o knife and a roll of "Fruit by the Foot".
Okay, for those unfamiliar with the term, a role playing game is best described as a type of interactive fiction or storytelling. It's a game in which one player (usually called the Game Master, although there are other titles as well) develops a rough story outline and populates it with minor characters. The other players play the parts of the story's central protagonasts (or, sometimes, antagonists) which are represented by both the player's performance and by a set of attributes (usually, though not always, numbers representing skills and abilities) on a characetr sheet. All site around a table and the Game Master narrates general events and the actions of the minor characters, and the players narrate the actions of their characters. When there is a conflict (the players want their characters to do something difficult, the players want their characters to do something in oppoisition to the Game Master-controlled characters, or the one player's character wants to do something against another player's character) then the rules of the game are invoked in order to settle the conflict, which usually involves comparison of attributes and/or dice rolling in order to determine the outcome. These games reflect genres of fiction, and as a result come in nearly every genre (though fantasy and science fiction are probably dominant, while genres such as romance and drama are present but uncommon). The genre reflected at this convention was horror, usually supernatural horror although other types were also represented.
The venue for such a convention could not have been better. As noted, the Brookdale Lodge is allegedly haunted, and is a damn creepy place even without the ghost stories. It is in the redwoods, along a mountain highway. Although the location is very accessible from both Santa Cruz and San Jose, the topography and the forest make it appear isolated. The hotel is in considerably better condition than it was last year, and therefore didn't seem to be actively trying to kill us but is still rather run-down and therefore a bit unnerving.
The victims gather in the hotel bar.
The first night, there were no games, but everyone met in the hotel bar and socialized. The first year, I found this a bit awkward, but this year, I knew more people (we all remembered each other from last year, and everyone was friendly and welcoming) and the first evening was alot of fun. We sat about, talking and joking, and feeling a sense of comeraderie that only a geeky hobby such as ours can bring.
Jack looks dapper, the rest of us schlubs didn't bother to change after work.
We played in the Log Cabin, which is, well, a log cabin connected to the rest of the hotel by means of a wodden hallway/tunnel next to the brook room. It is poorly insulated, but has a huge fireplace. Last year, the fireplace was malfunctioning, and so we were frequently unable to heat the room, and there was a major storm, meaning that we all had to be bundled up to play. This year, however, the weather was better AND the fireplace worked meaning that we were never cold, were usually quite comfortable, and on a couple of occasions were even uncomfortably warm.
The log cabin was rather cozy. Too bad it's floor and walls were coated in maple syrup residue
In all, the better hotel conditions and the nice weather were not the boon that they would be for most events. Given that this was a horror game convention, the spooky atmosphere was heightened by the storms and dilapidated hotel last year, and these set the stage perfectly for the ghost stories and monster tales that our games were based around. Weirdly, this was an event where the atmosphere benefited from what would be bad conditions for every other kind of event. However the organizer did everything that he could to create an appropriate atmosphere (set it during the darkest time of the year in an hotel with a reputation for creepiness, and invite Game Masters and players who have a proven record of being able to evoke good atmosphere from their games) and the weather was going to cooperate or not regardless of what he did. In other words, the organizer did good but the weather gods are bastards.
Okay, smart-ass comments aside, the fireplace was one of the best things for building atmosphere, and I was glad to have it.
The games were an interesting mix, and while some worked better than others, and based on what I saw and heard I don't think that there was a dud in the mix - the worst that can be said about any game was that it was well constructed and run, which at most events would be high praise. I played in three this year. The first was a game run by my friend Mike, who took what was essentially a super hero story and overlaid it with a tale of ghostly revenge for a good, creepy story. Our characters were able to effect the outcome, but against the threat that we faced, we were less powerful than characters of our sorts would generally be expected to be. The end result was a solid, well-paced, suspenseful game in which we were forced to think our way around problems that our characters would normally just pound their way through. Mike is a talented Game Master, and this fact was evident in his entry.
In keeping with the horror theme of the con, Mike explains that disruptive players will be dismembered and buried beneath the floorboards.
The next game in which I played was a science fiction/humor game called HOL (for Human Occupied Landfill). The game's setting establishes that the players are prisoners (for anything from being framed for minor infractions to actually being horrible depraved criminals) who have been sentenced to live on a planet that is also used as the galaxy's garbage dump. Robotic cameras wander the landscape broadcasting the character's misery to the rest of the galaxy for their amusement. The game master created "terrain" for the game miniatures (many games use small models to illustrated where characters are and what they are doing) by dumping a trash can out on the table. The players included myself, the organizer Matt Steele, two long-time Bay Area gaming convention players/game masters, and the designers of the game Cthullutech and a social-networking/gaming website (EDIT - it's up and running and looking for folks, so go here). The game was hysterically fun, each of us playing some sort of weird reject with next-to-useless equipment having to negotiate a truly weird setting. In the end, one character used his abilities to play rock music to lure monsters away from us, another used the giant hamster-ball in which his character was trapped to get close enough to investigate a mysterious substance and help deal with it, my character mocked the laws of physics into submission, another made heavy artillery out of a radio, and another surrendered to the evil force we faced in order to distract it while the rest of us blew it to where it came from. The game had what was clearly intended to be horror elements, but the out-right gonzo lunacy of the game diluted them to where the game was more slapstick comedy than anything else. Alot of fun, and good work by the Game Master, but possibly not what the event was intended to be about.
It started with just a bit of garbage.
But we added to it over the course of the evening.
And then it threatened to encroach on the rest of the event.
The third (and final) game in which I played was interesting, but disturbing. It was set during the Eastern Front of WWII (see here for information on why this was so disturbing). The Game Master used a game system that is designed to imitate George Romero-style zombie stories. He also dropped hints that the Russians had been doing experiments to resuscitate dead soldiers, and one of the player characters was given a background narrative that had him having seen these resuscitated soldiers. Our characters were soldiers fighting in the eastern war. In the end, the zombie sightings were revealed to be the product of a soldier suffering from mental breakdown, and the game master put us into situations where simply trying to reduce the harm to innocent civilians led our characters to become paranoid tools of a man with a vendetta. Afterwards, the Game Master explained that he wanted the players to be confronted with the fact that neither the Soviets nor the Germans were monsters, but were humans in a situations and living under political leadership that fed on and rewarded the worst human traits - in other words, were we unlucky enough to be born in Germany or russia in the 1920s, then by the 1940s we would have been the ones committing the acts that as 21st century people we can look on in disgust. The leadership of both Hitler and Stalin and their inner circles was, indeed, evil, but most soldiers were just trying to survive and were swept up in the chaos that ensued when Hitler and Stalin made eastern Europe their personal dueling grounds. All of the players left the session deeply disturbed and truly horrified. The Game Master put it this way: there is no horror worse than what humans can do to each other, because we all have the potential to be monsters if we are not careful.
This was a valid lesson regarding morality, and if you view these not as games but as forms of storytelling (which they arguably are), then to use it as an essentially educational tool in this way is valid. However, we had all come to use them as games, and while potentially valuable, this was heavier than anyone had anticipated. So, I don't know what to make of the experience. I do think, however, that should I ever teach history (which could happen), I may take a lesson from this in trying to teach about war and war crimes.
So, to wrap it up, the last gaming experience aside, it was a fun event. I am very glad that I went, and I plan on attending next year. Hopefully the weather will be a bit more hostile next time. Regardless, as I know a couple of the other attendees read this, it was good to see everyone, and I look forward to next time.
If the readers will grant me just a bit more patience, while everyone that I met was fantastic, my memory for names is poor, so I want to say that everyone was a pleasure to meet and game with. I would like to acknowledge a few specific people who returned from last years and who really made the con especially enjoyable for me: Mike Ripley, whose gaming group I was in and whose company I miss, it was good to see him; the always gracious Matt DeHayes, and his girlfriend Nicole, I hope to get to spend a bit more time talking with them next time around; Shannon MacNamara, who is quite possibly one of the friendliest people I have ever met; Jack Young, who injected a sense of class into whatever part of the proceedings he was near; Mr. Grau and Mr. Muldoon, who were pitch-perfect for the HOL game and a hell of a lot of fun; Kris Miller (new this year, but memorable) the physicist/professional telescope operator/game convention impresario, and really interesting, cool guy; and of course, the host, Matt Steele, who made the event a success two years running - here's looking at year 3.
Monday, December 13, 2010
Why I Stay in Archaeology
I have had mixed feelings about my line of work. I have written previously about the annoying schism between resource management archaeologists such as myself and academic archaeologists. I have written about frustrations with a few (thankfully, very few) clients and projects, as well as frustrations with some agencies.
And yet I stay in this profession. I would even go so far as to say that, despite my occasional angst, I enjoy this profession. Why?
Well, a part of it is that it feels good to protect something for the sake of other people. It is a rare thing that I recommend protection of a site and then am able to do research-related work on it myself. Rarer still are the sites that I recommend protection for that I am able to visit for non-research or management purposes later. When I do recommend protection, I usually recommend the least impactful thing possible, which means that I recommend against archaeological investigation if at all possible, so I don't make any additional money off of the site, either. What this means is that the site is preserved for interested parties (Native Americans in the case of prehistoric and some historic sites, descendants or members of the interested public for other historic-era sites) and for research archaeologists, who will be armed with the tools and methodology to do a better job than the constraints of my job sometimes allow. The point is, I don't usually benefit from this, but I feel good knowing that someone else will.
Another significant reason that I stay is, for lack of a better way of putting it, I have been developing a sense of adventure. Now, archaeology is not an Indiana Jones-esque enterprise in which we risk life and limb on a regular basis (in fact, if our safety protocols have been well developed and executed, we should be in considerably less risk of harm than the average construction worker). However, we go places that most people don't, and we see things that most people can't on a regular basis. On any given work day, I am as likely to be in the field as in the office, and while much field work is enjoyable but unexciting, there are many days when I will be walking along a ridgeline looking down into the agricultural valleys of southern California, or I'll be hugging a cliff side in the Sierra Nevadas, or I'll be opening up a 1,000-year-old grave in the Napa Valley. Also, I am the only person I know who is not in the military who, in the course of a single week, has used as transportation all of the following: a helicopter, a 4-wheel drive truck, a boat (mutha'fucka'), and my ol' trusty hiking boots. I have been caught in freak snowstorms (twice), walked through Kern County's oil fields in 110+ degree temperatures (while carrying 30 pounds of equipment strapped to me), hiked for three hours carrying all of my camping and excavation equipment on my back, and stayed in 4-star casino hotels for meetings in which I would be accused of all manner of evil-doing by county planners. I have learned to speak diplomatically to armed ranchers who are worried about trespassers, to chase off packs of dogs using nothing but my voice, and how to deal calmly with the nut-jobs that one sometimes finds in isolated places. My job is often frustrating, sometimes unpleasant, but it is rarely boring. Considering that just a few years ago I considered spending a few days away from home an annoying disruption of my routine, I would say that the fact that I have come to appreciate, and even crave, these sorts of events indicates definite personal growth.
Related to the last point, another reason that I stay in archaeology is that I have the best work-related stories. Seriously. Most of my friends have work stories about what a tool their boss is or what wacky things their co-worker did with the photocopier, or more seriously, what they are doing to work their way through their employer's advancement process. These stories are entertaining, often hysterically so, or interesting, but they are of a different flavor altogether from my experiences. My stories involve hiking down a mountain hoping to escape a snowstorm, or being trailed by large animals in the wilderness, or a county coroner forcing me to use my Ford Escort as a transport for human remains*, or having to walk around with gas detection badges to let me know if death or injury via hydrogen sulfide is imminent. They are not inherently any more interesting than the stories that my friends have, but they are more unusual and therefore telling them once always results in my friends insisting that I tell them again when I am introduced to someone new.
The joy of discovery should also not be ignored. Most of my projects are relatively cut-and-dry. I go out to a place where some sort of construction project is proposed, I look for archaeological sites. If I find them, they are usually of standard types that I see routinely, and I record them. Sometimes I have to engage in small scale excavations to determine if a site is eligible for federal or state historic registers (they usually aren't). I then write a report and send it to the client, and my work is done. But sometimes things are a bit different. I have found weird and unexplained earthworks in the hills of eastern California; I have recorded sites covered in so much spectacular rock art that I spent weeks on end staring in amazement; I have excavated sites that were in the wrong location for the type of sites that they were, and contained the wrong kinds of materials for their region, meaning that something interesting was happening there that defies all of our models of prehistoric human behavior; and I have input data into a spreadsheet, run some statistical tests, and discovered that a set of data requires revision of my assumptions about the way that humans interact with their world. These are great moments, and they are not only intellectually rewarding, but I find myself in a state of physical euphoria when they occur.
There is, of course, a sense of mystery inherent in some of this work (though, it should be said, that this is a rather small portion of the work). Most of the time it is just a job, but every now and again, I get this feeling, like a chill running down the back of my neck. I'll be excavating a pit, and will pick up a spear point, and realize that I am the first human in two thousand years to see or touch it. On other occasions, I'll look at a landscape, and will see it not as it is now, but as it was centuries ago, and realize that even in a large crowd, I am the only person present who is seeing what I see. At times like this, I feel as if I am seeing something that is hidden, that has been locked away from humanity, but of which I now have the privilege of getting just a fleeting glimpse. It is maddening, but also thrilling, and while it doesn't happen very often, I always want more.
And finally I have to admit that a part (though an increasingly small part) of the reason that I stay in is the fact that I have invested so much time and energy into this career path - between time spent on the job and time, energy, and money spent getting the training and the Bachelor's and Master's degrees - that I am loathe to leave it. Several years back, when I had not yet grown accustomed to the crazy lifestyle that archaeology imposes on you, I was unhappy but stayed with the job because I didn't want all of that energy to have been spent for nought. Now, however, I find myself increasingly enjoying the job, and I am glad that I stayed with it.
*Seriously, this happened.
And yet I stay in this profession. I would even go so far as to say that, despite my occasional angst, I enjoy this profession. Why?
Well, a part of it is that it feels good to protect something for the sake of other people. It is a rare thing that I recommend protection of a site and then am able to do research-related work on it myself. Rarer still are the sites that I recommend protection for that I am able to visit for non-research or management purposes later. When I do recommend protection, I usually recommend the least impactful thing possible, which means that I recommend against archaeological investigation if at all possible, so I don't make any additional money off of the site, either. What this means is that the site is preserved for interested parties (Native Americans in the case of prehistoric and some historic sites, descendants or members of the interested public for other historic-era sites) and for research archaeologists, who will be armed with the tools and methodology to do a better job than the constraints of my job sometimes allow. The point is, I don't usually benefit from this, but I feel good knowing that someone else will.
Another significant reason that I stay is, for lack of a better way of putting it, I have been developing a sense of adventure. Now, archaeology is not an Indiana Jones-esque enterprise in which we risk life and limb on a regular basis (in fact, if our safety protocols have been well developed and executed, we should be in considerably less risk of harm than the average construction worker). However, we go places that most people don't, and we see things that most people can't on a regular basis. On any given work day, I am as likely to be in the field as in the office, and while much field work is enjoyable but unexciting, there are many days when I will be walking along a ridgeline looking down into the agricultural valleys of southern California, or I'll be hugging a cliff side in the Sierra Nevadas, or I'll be opening up a 1,000-year-old grave in the Napa Valley. Also, I am the only person I know who is not in the military who, in the course of a single week, has used as transportation all of the following: a helicopter, a 4-wheel drive truck, a boat (mutha'fucka'), and my ol' trusty hiking boots. I have been caught in freak snowstorms (twice), walked through Kern County's oil fields in 110+ degree temperatures (while carrying 30 pounds of equipment strapped to me), hiked for three hours carrying all of my camping and excavation equipment on my back, and stayed in 4-star casino hotels for meetings in which I would be accused of all manner of evil-doing by county planners. I have learned to speak diplomatically to armed ranchers who are worried about trespassers, to chase off packs of dogs using nothing but my voice, and how to deal calmly with the nut-jobs that one sometimes finds in isolated places. My job is often frustrating, sometimes unpleasant, but it is rarely boring. Considering that just a few years ago I considered spending a few days away from home an annoying disruption of my routine, I would say that the fact that I have come to appreciate, and even crave, these sorts of events indicates definite personal growth.
Related to the last point, another reason that I stay in archaeology is that I have the best work-related stories. Seriously. Most of my friends have work stories about what a tool their boss is or what wacky things their co-worker did with the photocopier, or more seriously, what they are doing to work their way through their employer's advancement process. These stories are entertaining, often hysterically so, or interesting, but they are of a different flavor altogether from my experiences. My stories involve hiking down a mountain hoping to escape a snowstorm, or being trailed by large animals in the wilderness, or a county coroner forcing me to use my Ford Escort as a transport for human remains*, or having to walk around with gas detection badges to let me know if death or injury via hydrogen sulfide is imminent. They are not inherently any more interesting than the stories that my friends have, but they are more unusual and therefore telling them once always results in my friends insisting that I tell them again when I am introduced to someone new.
The joy of discovery should also not be ignored. Most of my projects are relatively cut-and-dry. I go out to a place where some sort of construction project is proposed, I look for archaeological sites. If I find them, they are usually of standard types that I see routinely, and I record them. Sometimes I have to engage in small scale excavations to determine if a site is eligible for federal or state historic registers (they usually aren't). I then write a report and send it to the client, and my work is done. But sometimes things are a bit different. I have found weird and unexplained earthworks in the hills of eastern California; I have recorded sites covered in so much spectacular rock art that I spent weeks on end staring in amazement; I have excavated sites that were in the wrong location for the type of sites that they were, and contained the wrong kinds of materials for their region, meaning that something interesting was happening there that defies all of our models of prehistoric human behavior; and I have input data into a spreadsheet, run some statistical tests, and discovered that a set of data requires revision of my assumptions about the way that humans interact with their world. These are great moments, and they are not only intellectually rewarding, but I find myself in a state of physical euphoria when they occur.
There is, of course, a sense of mystery inherent in some of this work (though, it should be said, that this is a rather small portion of the work). Most of the time it is just a job, but every now and again, I get this feeling, like a chill running down the back of my neck. I'll be excavating a pit, and will pick up a spear point, and realize that I am the first human in two thousand years to see or touch it. On other occasions, I'll look at a landscape, and will see it not as it is now, but as it was centuries ago, and realize that even in a large crowd, I am the only person present who is seeing what I see. At times like this, I feel as if I am seeing something that is hidden, that has been locked away from humanity, but of which I now have the privilege of getting just a fleeting glimpse. It is maddening, but also thrilling, and while it doesn't happen very often, I always want more.
And finally I have to admit that a part (though an increasingly small part) of the reason that I stay in is the fact that I have invested so much time and energy into this career path - between time spent on the job and time, energy, and money spent getting the training and the Bachelor's and Master's degrees - that I am loathe to leave it. Several years back, when I had not yet grown accustomed to the crazy lifestyle that archaeology imposes on you, I was unhappy but stayed with the job because I didn't want all of that energy to have been spent for nought. Now, however, I find myself increasingly enjoying the job, and I am glad that I stayed with it.
*Seriously, this happened.
Friday, December 10, 2010
Peer Review
If you follow the various science-vs-pseudo-science arguments, you will likely have heard someone bring up "peer review", the process by which research papers or other documents are reviewed by experts in the field in order to see if they pass muster and essentially make sense. Peer review is often held up as one of the most important institutions in the sciences and in research fields in general (including history, literary criticism, etc.), and so, as I am currently going through the peer review process for a paper that I have submitted for publication, I thought it might be worth describing and de-mystifiying the process a bit.
To start with, I submitted my paper to the editors of the issue of the journal in which it will be published. They looked it over, determined that my basic arguments and ideas stood up to scrutiny and therefore were publishable, and returned it to me with comments that suggest that I read other books and papers relevant to the topic but not included in my references cited, and that I consider expanding the discussion of certain topics within the paper. For example, the paper discusses interaction between villages in prehistoric California, but only discusses the landscape in terms of geographic obstacles and pathways (valleys, mountains, etc.) and resources available (seeds in grassland, acorns in oak woodland, fish and shellfish at the coast, and so on). Implicit in the discussion was the matter of landscape as a social phenomenon (village territories, family land holdings, do coastal and inland people identify themselves differently?) but it was not explicitly addressed in my original paper, so it was requested that I address that more directly. Also, because of the work schedule that I have had over the last 18 months, there have been two books and a few articles that had escaped my attention but which addressed similar issues, so I was directed towards those and asked to include discussion of and references to them in the paper. They then suggested that I needed to explain why my conclusions were necessarily better or more likely than other possible conclusions derived from the same data, as well as qualify a few weaknesses in the data that weren't as clearly flagged in the original version of the paper, making my argument seem less robust but my paper far more honest (one of the most important services and editor can provide). The editors also commented on the clarity (or occasional lack thereof) of some of my writing, helping me to identify places where I know what I'm trying to get across, but it might be confusing to a reader.
So, with these recommendations in hand, I set about revising the paper. I incorporated their comments (or, in a couple of cases, added material to the paper in such a way as to explain why the type of criticism behind the comments didn't apply to the discussion at hand), gave it another go-over myself and altered some things that I thought needed to be changed but on which the editors did not comment, and handed it back over.
I then received another round of comments. These ones were less about the substance of the paper (as would be expected as this had already been discussed) and more about the clarity of the writing, ensuring that I was saying what I wanted to say and that the paper would be clear to readers unfamiliar with my topic. I incorporated these comments, and re-submitted the paper again. It was bundled up with the other papers for the issue and sent to the journal's main editor.
Okay, so I should explain the multiple layers of editors here. In this particular case, the two editors to whom I initially sent the paper have been trying to get a book published for a couple of years, and a group of archaeologists, myself among them, have been working on material to contribute to the book. When two different book deals failed to materialize, they spoke with the editors of a prominent archaeology journal who agreed to publish the material written for the book. So, now the book editors have become essentially guest editors for this issue of the journal. However, the journal's primary editor still has to do his duties. Also, it should be mentioned that these editors are not literary/journalistic editors - though many journals have such people on staff - they are respected archaeologists with strong research records who have the breadth and depth of knowledge necessary to provide useful criticism.
So, the journal's editor has received the papers. He is in the process of sending them out for external review. What this entails is that he will identify a few archaeologists who are knowledgeable about the geographic area, cultural group, or research topic of each paper, and send the papers to them to see what criticisms they have of them. I will then be sent these comments and will use them to create final revisions to the paper. After all of that is done, the paper will finally be published.
As you can see, the primary activity done by reviewers and editors in this process is criticism. Criticism, as both a concept and a word, gets abused alot in our society - people who are critical are considered undesirable company, critical comments are frowned upon, and we assume that professional critics (of film, literature, etc.) hate the medium that they criticize. But the truth is that criticism is important and valuable, and much of what people call criticism is not criticism at all but rather abuse. Criticism is not the automatic nay-saying or attacking of a subject, but it is rather the thoughtful consideration of a subject, an evaluation that takes into account both strengths and weaknesses, flaws and merits. Some objects, arguments, and ideas are so deeply flawed that there is little to no room for positive criticism, and a much smaller number are so virtuous that it is difficult to make negative criticisms, but most fall somewhere between these two extremes.
To a researcher, negative criticism, while sometimes hard to take, is vital. If I have made a flawed argument or am misunderstanding data, it is important that I know about that, and it is to my benefit that a fellow researcher point it out. It is also vital to a research discipline, as without critical assessment of data and arguments, an "anything goes" attitude develops in which the agenda or ideology of the author can easily take precedence over the reality of the subject being studied. In an environment that prohibits criticism, there is little possibility for advancing study as there is no clear criteria by which the validity of an idea or argument can be measured, and consistency and coherency of arguments, adherence to data, and clarity of thought decay. Criticism is a good thing, a vital thing, and a major force in advancing an area of research.
It is also important that criticism come from multiple experts. Any one expert will have their own view on a given subject, ideally motivated by their valid interpretation of evidence but potentially also motivated by external pressures (their employer, their ideological leanings, their religious beliefs, etc.). When one introduces multiple experts with different views and from different backgrounds, however, non-data driven views will be diluted and can be more easily parsed and dealt with by the author of the work being reviewed as well as the editor(s) of the publication. This doesn't always work, of course, but it works pretty well most of the time.
So, basically, being a responsible and legitimate researcher means leaving yourself open to criticism, and taking criticism into account. That is what the peer-review process is really all about. Research is not a feel-good sand box game in which we promote self-esteem, but a serious investigation of a subject. It can be, and usually is, alot of fun. But is can also be tough, and if you are not able to sustain a bruised ego or give up a cherished idea that doesn't stand up to scrutiny, then you are not cut out for research.
This is not to say that peer-review is a fool-proof enterprise that only ever benefits a field of study. It's a human activity, and as such is not perfect. Sometimes, bad* papers get through, and bad* arguments are not rooted out. But these are the exceptions, and most of the time peer review makes sure that published research is rigorous and well-supported**. Ultimately, this strong effort to adhere to reality as it can be observed rather than as we would like it to be is the difference between scholarship and pseudo-scholarship. And it is telling that the frequent complaint of pseudo-scholars is that they big bad "establishment" researchers criticized them.
*And note, I mean "bad" not as in "I don't like it" or "it makes me uncomfortable" but rather in that "it doesn't make any sense and takes liberties with observable reality."
**Which is different than saying that it is definitely right. All good research is based on information available at the time that it is produced, and new information may disprove existing ideas, no matter how well established, and many well-accepted ideas (stable-state universe, recent [within 2000 years] population of the Americas, and non-moving continents) have been overturned by new information...again, in contrast to pseudo-scholarship where no amount of data can change the minds of proponents (homeopathy, anyone?).
To start with, I submitted my paper to the editors of the issue of the journal in which it will be published. They looked it over, determined that my basic arguments and ideas stood up to scrutiny and therefore were publishable, and returned it to me with comments that suggest that I read other books and papers relevant to the topic but not included in my references cited, and that I consider expanding the discussion of certain topics within the paper. For example, the paper discusses interaction between villages in prehistoric California, but only discusses the landscape in terms of geographic obstacles and pathways (valleys, mountains, etc.) and resources available (seeds in grassland, acorns in oak woodland, fish and shellfish at the coast, and so on). Implicit in the discussion was the matter of landscape as a social phenomenon (village territories, family land holdings, do coastal and inland people identify themselves differently?) but it was not explicitly addressed in my original paper, so it was requested that I address that more directly. Also, because of the work schedule that I have had over the last 18 months, there have been two books and a few articles that had escaped my attention but which addressed similar issues, so I was directed towards those and asked to include discussion of and references to them in the paper. They then suggested that I needed to explain why my conclusions were necessarily better or more likely than other possible conclusions derived from the same data, as well as qualify a few weaknesses in the data that weren't as clearly flagged in the original version of the paper, making my argument seem less robust but my paper far more honest (one of the most important services and editor can provide). The editors also commented on the clarity (or occasional lack thereof) of some of my writing, helping me to identify places where I know what I'm trying to get across, but it might be confusing to a reader.
So, with these recommendations in hand, I set about revising the paper. I incorporated their comments (or, in a couple of cases, added material to the paper in such a way as to explain why the type of criticism behind the comments didn't apply to the discussion at hand), gave it another go-over myself and altered some things that I thought needed to be changed but on which the editors did not comment, and handed it back over.
I then received another round of comments. These ones were less about the substance of the paper (as would be expected as this had already been discussed) and more about the clarity of the writing, ensuring that I was saying what I wanted to say and that the paper would be clear to readers unfamiliar with my topic. I incorporated these comments, and re-submitted the paper again. It was bundled up with the other papers for the issue and sent to the journal's main editor.
Okay, so I should explain the multiple layers of editors here. In this particular case, the two editors to whom I initially sent the paper have been trying to get a book published for a couple of years, and a group of archaeologists, myself among them, have been working on material to contribute to the book. When two different book deals failed to materialize, they spoke with the editors of a prominent archaeology journal who agreed to publish the material written for the book. So, now the book editors have become essentially guest editors for this issue of the journal. However, the journal's primary editor still has to do his duties. Also, it should be mentioned that these editors are not literary/journalistic editors - though many journals have such people on staff - they are respected archaeologists with strong research records who have the breadth and depth of knowledge necessary to provide useful criticism.
So, the journal's editor has received the papers. He is in the process of sending them out for external review. What this entails is that he will identify a few archaeologists who are knowledgeable about the geographic area, cultural group, or research topic of each paper, and send the papers to them to see what criticisms they have of them. I will then be sent these comments and will use them to create final revisions to the paper. After all of that is done, the paper will finally be published.
As you can see, the primary activity done by reviewers and editors in this process is criticism. Criticism, as both a concept and a word, gets abused alot in our society - people who are critical are considered undesirable company, critical comments are frowned upon, and we assume that professional critics (of film, literature, etc.) hate the medium that they criticize. But the truth is that criticism is important and valuable, and much of what people call criticism is not criticism at all but rather abuse. Criticism is not the automatic nay-saying or attacking of a subject, but it is rather the thoughtful consideration of a subject, an evaluation that takes into account both strengths and weaknesses, flaws and merits. Some objects, arguments, and ideas are so deeply flawed that there is little to no room for positive criticism, and a much smaller number are so virtuous that it is difficult to make negative criticisms, but most fall somewhere between these two extremes.
To a researcher, negative criticism, while sometimes hard to take, is vital. If I have made a flawed argument or am misunderstanding data, it is important that I know about that, and it is to my benefit that a fellow researcher point it out. It is also vital to a research discipline, as without critical assessment of data and arguments, an "anything goes" attitude develops in which the agenda or ideology of the author can easily take precedence over the reality of the subject being studied. In an environment that prohibits criticism, there is little possibility for advancing study as there is no clear criteria by which the validity of an idea or argument can be measured, and consistency and coherency of arguments, adherence to data, and clarity of thought decay. Criticism is a good thing, a vital thing, and a major force in advancing an area of research.
It is also important that criticism come from multiple experts. Any one expert will have their own view on a given subject, ideally motivated by their valid interpretation of evidence but potentially also motivated by external pressures (their employer, their ideological leanings, their religious beliefs, etc.). When one introduces multiple experts with different views and from different backgrounds, however, non-data driven views will be diluted and can be more easily parsed and dealt with by the author of the work being reviewed as well as the editor(s) of the publication. This doesn't always work, of course, but it works pretty well most of the time.
So, basically, being a responsible and legitimate researcher means leaving yourself open to criticism, and taking criticism into account. That is what the peer-review process is really all about. Research is not a feel-good sand box game in which we promote self-esteem, but a serious investigation of a subject. It can be, and usually is, alot of fun. But is can also be tough, and if you are not able to sustain a bruised ego or give up a cherished idea that doesn't stand up to scrutiny, then you are not cut out for research.
This is not to say that peer-review is a fool-proof enterprise that only ever benefits a field of study. It's a human activity, and as such is not perfect. Sometimes, bad* papers get through, and bad* arguments are not rooted out. But these are the exceptions, and most of the time peer review makes sure that published research is rigorous and well-supported**. Ultimately, this strong effort to adhere to reality as it can be observed rather than as we would like it to be is the difference between scholarship and pseudo-scholarship. And it is telling that the frequent complaint of pseudo-scholars is that they big bad "establishment" researchers criticized them.
*And note, I mean "bad" not as in "I don't like it" or "it makes me uncomfortable" but rather in that "it doesn't make any sense and takes liberties with observable reality."
**Which is different than saying that it is definitely right. All good research is based on information available at the time that it is produced, and new information may disprove existing ideas, no matter how well established, and many well-accepted ideas (stable-state universe, recent [within 2000 years] population of the Americas, and non-moving continents) have been overturned by new information...again, in contrast to pseudo-scholarship where no amount of data can change the minds of proponents (homeopathy, anyone?).
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
"Forbidden" Archaeology
"What do you think about Forbidden Archaeology?"
Ugh. It's one of those questions that I get every now and again and that I always feel uneasy about. In this case, it was Thanksgiving evening, and I had stopped in Santa Cruz on my way back to Fresno to pick up a friend. The woman who owned the house and I were talking about her line of work - installing cubicles in federal office buildings - and she asked what I did for a living. I told her that I was an archaeologist, and the above question came out. She made a few comments about how believable she found the work of people such as Von Danniken and Graham Hancock.
It's common for specialists to dismiss people who buy into pseudo-scholarship as kooks or idiots, but this woman was clearly quite bright and I saw nothing to indicate that she was a kook. So why did she seem to think that the pseudo-archaeology that goes by the name "forbidden archaeology" or "alternative archaeology" was reasonable enough work that it was likely that a professional archaeologist would respect it? Well, I think that the answer to that question sits with the method of presentation of the pseudo-archaeologists and the narratives employed by them.
First off, the presentation. As I have described before, many of the pseudo-archaeologists are very good about mixing actual archaeological data, out-of-context archaeological data, and just plain ol' made-up-shit in such a way that a real archaeologist can get bogged down trying to piece through it. The problem is that the pseudo-archaeologist (or their acolytes) can spew nonsense at a very high rate because they have no regard for the actual data, and the archaeologist is at a rhetorical disadvantage because they are constrained by reality. When actual legitimate information is embedded in the matrix of bullshit, it becomes especially tricky because the pseudo-archaeologists can play the "do you deny fact X" game, where the archaeologist won't deny legitimate "fact X" and the pseudo-archaeologist therefore holds that the agreement on "fact X" means that "falsehoods A, B, and C" must also be true. The very clever pseudo-archaeologist will engage in quote mining - the use of out-of context quotes to make it appear as if archaeologists hold positions that they don't actually hold. This can make refuting specious claims even more complex for the archaeologist. It's the intellectual equivalent of a magician doing something showy with one hand so that you don't notice what he is doing with the other.
Also, while they tend to heap scorn upon academic research (as will be discussed below) the pseudo-archaeologists will nonetheless do everything that they can to ape the style (while ignoring the methods) of the academic researcher. Their books tend to be filled with footnotes, have dense references cited sections, and maps, charts, tables, and illustrations designed to be either eye-catching or to mimic those found in professional archaeological publications. The problem, of course, is that while these things mimic the work of professional archaeologists, they lack both the methodology (there is little qualification of information or attempts at disconfirmation) and often the content (information that is presented is often made to look more complicated than it really is - or sometimes less complicated if that suits the agenda of the author - and sometimes is just plain made-up). The references are often to people who didn't actually say what is being attributed to them, or to outdated sources*, and often just to other pseudo-archaeologists who simply made shit up. Although I have never followed a path of references through to find it, I suspect that there are at least a few that are completely circular (nut A references nut B who reference nut C who reference nut A).
One place where they pseudo-archaeologists excel well past the actual archaeologists, though, is in visual presentation. Watch the various allegedly educational cable channels, which show pseudo-archaeological "documentaries" routinely. They are well paced, well-scripted, entertaining, and quite thrilling to watch. Part of this is that, unburdened by the complexities of reality, they don't have to engage in the cautious qualification and investigation of real archaeology. However, another part of it is that many pseudo-archaeologists and pseudo-archaeology enthusiasts are extremely showy and media savvy people, the sorts who could give P. T. Barnum a run for his money. While the content of their shows may be absurd and without merit, the production qualities and the way in which they are structured are quite impressive.
And this brings us to the narratives employed by pseudo-archaeologists. There are many narratives used, but I'll deal with the three most common here. The first is specifically about the past being studied, while the other two are about archaeologists themselves. These are not mutually exclusive, and it's common for a pseudo-archaeologist to use all three.
The first common narrative is that of alleged human mystical (sometimes expressed as "super-technological") potential. While many people, including most archaeologists, see the true past of the human race as both fascinating and inspiring - the story of how humanity both learned to adapt wonderfully to the full range of environments on Earth, in a way that no other animal ever has (and was sometimes smacked down by nature when reaching too far) - pseudo-archaeologists have been able to claim, based on superficial similarities, that the story told in the archaeological record is one of humans as down-and-out grunts stuck within their environments. The pseudo-archaeologists, on the other hand, provide stories of golden ages of high human technology and/or magic. These stories are fun when they are presented as fantasy (I, personally, have always enjoyed the story in which Doctor Who visits Atlantis, even if other fans tend to trash it), but they lack any shred of actual scientific credibility. But this lack of credibility doesn't matter - in making a false contrast between a "man the brute" narrative (which it is claimed, falsely, that real archaeologists cling to, based on the fact that the real archaeological narrative doesn't rely on magic) and "man the magical wonder", guess which one is going to seem more appealing.
Another common narrative is the "they don't want to have to re-write history" narrative. This is both a complete inversion of reality, and a rather amazingly compelling (though false) narrative. The basic idea is that, if archaeologists accepted these "radical new concepts" then it would be bad for them because it would mean that they lose their positions as "arbiters of truth", and this is usually expressed in economic or social terms (loss of income, loss of positions, loss of esteem). The truth is, of course, quite different: those archaeologists who have provided compelling evidence that some fundamental aspect of the archaeological record is wrong have consistently been rewarded with book deals, job offers, the admiration of colleagues, public speaking deals (including television appearances), and so on. Every archaeologist wants to be the one who requires the re-writing of the history books because that is where success is found. The fact that the pseudo-archaeologist's work is derided and ignored is not due to their "radical views" but due to their complete and utter lack of evidence and credibility. However, since most folks don't realize just how much archaeologists want to shake things up (in large part because archaeologists are bad a communicating this to the public - a serious error on our part) this narrative gets alot of traction.
The third common narrative casts archaeologists as a sinister cabal out to hide, rather than simply conveniently ignore, "the truth." Unlike the previous narrative, this one usually casts the archaeologists as the tools of some higher power that wishes the past to be hidden or distorted for some strange purpose. The intent behind this runs tha gamut from archaeologists "hiding the past" to support business and government elites' policies (such as Glenn Beck's inane rambles about archaeology and anthropology supporting Manifest Destiny) to archaeologists "lying about history" to support the current social order (a common thread in the "ancient worldwide matriarchal goddess culture" line of thought) to archaeologists "hiding evidence" to push an atheistic/naturalistic worldview (a claim common in both creationist and New Age belief systems). This narrative slightly contradicts the previous one in that archaeologists are actively hiding "the truth" rather than just ignoring evidence out of laziness or convenience, but it is common to see pseudo-archaeologists switch between them depending on either their audience or the point that they want to make. The irony, however, is that the person using this last narrative is usually the one with an agenda to advance. The agenda may be good (women's rights, for example, is one that has used this narrative in the past - see books such as the Chalice and the Blade for an example of absurd pseudo-archaeology used to advance an essentially laudable social purpose), or the agenda may be bad, or it may be just plain silly, but it is an agenda nonetheless and the narrative is used to direct people's attention away from the fact that the person pushing it is the one distorting the past.
One of the more interesting things about noticing the use of both presentation and narratives to push pseudo-archaeology is that you also begin to notice their use in other forms of pseudo-scholarship. Quack medicine and pseudo-physics are two places where the is common, but you see it all over the place. These should always serve as red flags that someone might not be on the level when they are trying to convince you of a point.
*This is important. There is often good reason to cite old sources - I have books that are 80 years old that are still the best sources of information on particular narrow topics - but archaeology, like all research disciplines, moves forward every year. A well-researched article or book will reference old sources, but it should also reference many new sources. A reliance on out-dated information is a sure sign of pseudo-scholarship. Interestingly, the reliance on out-of-date (and often initially quack-tastic) data is one of the significant elements of the pseudo-medicine radio show "Dead Doctors Don't Lie" which originated in my previous home of Santa Cruz, California...one of the other significant elements is the use of a pyramid scheme...oh, sorry, I mean "Multi-Level Marketing Campaign" to hawk useless crap.
Ugh. It's one of those questions that I get every now and again and that I always feel uneasy about. In this case, it was Thanksgiving evening, and I had stopped in Santa Cruz on my way back to Fresno to pick up a friend. The woman who owned the house and I were talking about her line of work - installing cubicles in federal office buildings - and she asked what I did for a living. I told her that I was an archaeologist, and the above question came out. She made a few comments about how believable she found the work of people such as Von Danniken and Graham Hancock.
It's common for specialists to dismiss people who buy into pseudo-scholarship as kooks or idiots, but this woman was clearly quite bright and I saw nothing to indicate that she was a kook. So why did she seem to think that the pseudo-archaeology that goes by the name "forbidden archaeology" or "alternative archaeology" was reasonable enough work that it was likely that a professional archaeologist would respect it? Well, I think that the answer to that question sits with the method of presentation of the pseudo-archaeologists and the narratives employed by them.
First off, the presentation. As I have described before, many of the pseudo-archaeologists are very good about mixing actual archaeological data, out-of-context archaeological data, and just plain ol' made-up-shit in such a way that a real archaeologist can get bogged down trying to piece through it. The problem is that the pseudo-archaeologist (or their acolytes) can spew nonsense at a very high rate because they have no regard for the actual data, and the archaeologist is at a rhetorical disadvantage because they are constrained by reality. When actual legitimate information is embedded in the matrix of bullshit, it becomes especially tricky because the pseudo-archaeologists can play the "do you deny fact X" game, where the archaeologist won't deny legitimate "fact X" and the pseudo-archaeologist therefore holds that the agreement on "fact X" means that "falsehoods A, B, and C" must also be true. The very clever pseudo-archaeologist will engage in quote mining - the use of out-of context quotes to make it appear as if archaeologists hold positions that they don't actually hold. This can make refuting specious claims even more complex for the archaeologist. It's the intellectual equivalent of a magician doing something showy with one hand so that you don't notice what he is doing with the other.
Also, while they tend to heap scorn upon academic research (as will be discussed below) the pseudo-archaeologists will nonetheless do everything that they can to ape the style (while ignoring the methods) of the academic researcher. Their books tend to be filled with footnotes, have dense references cited sections, and maps, charts, tables, and illustrations designed to be either eye-catching or to mimic those found in professional archaeological publications. The problem, of course, is that while these things mimic the work of professional archaeologists, they lack both the methodology (there is little qualification of information or attempts at disconfirmation) and often the content (information that is presented is often made to look more complicated than it really is - or sometimes less complicated if that suits the agenda of the author - and sometimes is just plain made-up). The references are often to people who didn't actually say what is being attributed to them, or to outdated sources*, and often just to other pseudo-archaeologists who simply made shit up. Although I have never followed a path of references through to find it, I suspect that there are at least a few that are completely circular (nut A references nut B who reference nut C who reference nut A).
One place where they pseudo-archaeologists excel well past the actual archaeologists, though, is in visual presentation. Watch the various allegedly educational cable channels, which show pseudo-archaeological "documentaries" routinely. They are well paced, well-scripted, entertaining, and quite thrilling to watch. Part of this is that, unburdened by the complexities of reality, they don't have to engage in the cautious qualification and investigation of real archaeology. However, another part of it is that many pseudo-archaeologists and pseudo-archaeology enthusiasts are extremely showy and media savvy people, the sorts who could give P. T. Barnum a run for his money. While the content of their shows may be absurd and without merit, the production qualities and the way in which they are structured are quite impressive.
And this brings us to the narratives employed by pseudo-archaeologists. There are many narratives used, but I'll deal with the three most common here. The first is specifically about the past being studied, while the other two are about archaeologists themselves. These are not mutually exclusive, and it's common for a pseudo-archaeologist to use all three.
The first common narrative is that of alleged human mystical (sometimes expressed as "super-technological") potential. While many people, including most archaeologists, see the true past of the human race as both fascinating and inspiring - the story of how humanity both learned to adapt wonderfully to the full range of environments on Earth, in a way that no other animal ever has (and was sometimes smacked down by nature when reaching too far) - pseudo-archaeologists have been able to claim, based on superficial similarities, that the story told in the archaeological record is one of humans as down-and-out grunts stuck within their environments. The pseudo-archaeologists, on the other hand, provide stories of golden ages of high human technology and/or magic. These stories are fun when they are presented as fantasy (I, personally, have always enjoyed the story in which Doctor Who visits Atlantis, even if other fans tend to trash it), but they lack any shred of actual scientific credibility. But this lack of credibility doesn't matter - in making a false contrast between a "man the brute" narrative (which it is claimed, falsely, that real archaeologists cling to, based on the fact that the real archaeological narrative doesn't rely on magic) and "man the magical wonder", guess which one is going to seem more appealing.
Another common narrative is the "they don't want to have to re-write history" narrative. This is both a complete inversion of reality, and a rather amazingly compelling (though false) narrative. The basic idea is that, if archaeologists accepted these "radical new concepts" then it would be bad for them because it would mean that they lose their positions as "arbiters of truth", and this is usually expressed in economic or social terms (loss of income, loss of positions, loss of esteem). The truth is, of course, quite different: those archaeologists who have provided compelling evidence that some fundamental aspect of the archaeological record is wrong have consistently been rewarded with book deals, job offers, the admiration of colleagues, public speaking deals (including television appearances), and so on. Every archaeologist wants to be the one who requires the re-writing of the history books because that is where success is found. The fact that the pseudo-archaeologist's work is derided and ignored is not due to their "radical views" but due to their complete and utter lack of evidence and credibility. However, since most folks don't realize just how much archaeologists want to shake things up (in large part because archaeologists are bad a communicating this to the public - a serious error on our part) this narrative gets alot of traction.
The third common narrative casts archaeologists as a sinister cabal out to hide, rather than simply conveniently ignore, "the truth." Unlike the previous narrative, this one usually casts the archaeologists as the tools of some higher power that wishes the past to be hidden or distorted for some strange purpose. The intent behind this runs tha gamut from archaeologists "hiding the past" to support business and government elites' policies (such as Glenn Beck's inane rambles about archaeology and anthropology supporting Manifest Destiny) to archaeologists "lying about history" to support the current social order (a common thread in the "ancient worldwide matriarchal goddess culture" line of thought) to archaeologists "hiding evidence" to push an atheistic/naturalistic worldview (a claim common in both creationist and New Age belief systems). This narrative slightly contradicts the previous one in that archaeologists are actively hiding "the truth" rather than just ignoring evidence out of laziness or convenience, but it is common to see pseudo-archaeologists switch between them depending on either their audience or the point that they want to make. The irony, however, is that the person using this last narrative is usually the one with an agenda to advance. The agenda may be good (women's rights, for example, is one that has used this narrative in the past - see books such as the Chalice and the Blade for an example of absurd pseudo-archaeology used to advance an essentially laudable social purpose), or the agenda may be bad, or it may be just plain silly, but it is an agenda nonetheless and the narrative is used to direct people's attention away from the fact that the person pushing it is the one distorting the past.
One of the more interesting things about noticing the use of both presentation and narratives to push pseudo-archaeology is that you also begin to notice their use in other forms of pseudo-scholarship. Quack medicine and pseudo-physics are two places where the is common, but you see it all over the place. These should always serve as red flags that someone might not be on the level when they are trying to convince you of a point.
*This is important. There is often good reason to cite old sources - I have books that are 80 years old that are still the best sources of information on particular narrow topics - but archaeology, like all research disciplines, moves forward every year. A well-researched article or book will reference old sources, but it should also reference many new sources. A reliance on out-dated information is a sure sign of pseudo-scholarship. Interestingly, the reliance on out-of-date (and often initially quack-tastic) data is one of the significant elements of the pseudo-medicine radio show "Dead Doctors Don't Lie" which originated in my previous home of Santa Cruz, California...one of the other significant elements is the use of a pyramid scheme...oh, sorry, I mean "Multi-Level Marketing Campaign" to hawk useless crap.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Archaeological Inferiority Complex?
As noted, I have moved to Fresno. When I talk to people in my new town about what I do, most of them have the same basic reaction: "why would an archaeologist come to Fresno? There's nothing here!"
But, of course, they are wrong. Well before Europeans showed up in North America, the Yokut were living in the San Joaquin Valley. They left behind a rich material record. The remains of villages, hunting stands, plant gathering locations, and campsites riddle the land surrounding (and at some locations, within) Fresno. In fact, there is plenty here, and it is exciting to be an archaeologist in Fresno.
To be fair, though, it is understandable why many people think this way. Television shows and magazine articles about archaeology rarely focus on California at all, much less the San Joaquin Valley. What's more, the archaeological sites in this region are difficult to spot unless you have specialized knowledge of what to look for - a piece of flaked stone looks pretty clear to an archaeologist, but may look like just another rock to the untrained eye.
However, I think that I may have identified an interesting phenomenon. When I was living in Santa Barbara, I met many people who were surprised that an archaeologist would have anything to do there (of course, with the proximity of both four missions and a Presidio, people there were a bit more aware of the presence of Native Americans, and hence their sites, than folks in other parts of California); when having dinner with a friend in Los Angeles during a work assignment there, we found ourselves chatting with a few other people at the restaurant, and they were convinced that I was joking when I told them what I do for a living (they might have been more accepting if I had told them that I'm an aspiring actor/model who's just happened to fall into archaeology), and when they realized I wasn't joking they were shocked to hear that I actually had work to do in Los Angeles; Many a Santa Cruzan was confounded 'pon hearing that there were archaeological sites in the rather mountainous Santa Cruz County; I have had similar conversations in Wisconsin, Utah, Oregon, Washington, Indiana, Quebec, and several years back I visited a friend in Ohio, and her housemate was astounded to hear that there were archaeological sites in the area - despite the fact that there were numerous huge earthen mounds and walls in the area.
To sum it up, my experience has been that North Americans seem to be largely unaware of the archaeological record that surrounds them and, importantly, seem to have difficulty processing the fact that there is one when they are confronted with it.
Again, in many places the sites are hard to find or hard to recognize, but the fact that people seem so shocked to hear of their existence is, to my mind, rather remarkable. I think there may be a couple of reasons for this. The first, alluded to earlier, is that media attention on archaeology tends to ignore much of North America (aside from the Aztec sites in Mexico) because it's not as photogenic as sites containing temples and palaces, even though the archaeology of the U.S. and Canada is pretty damn cool.
The other reason, I suspect, is that many North Americans (again, excepting Mexico) seem to have a sense of archaeological inferiority. When I tell people about the sites that are around them, they frequently follow up by asking me why I am working here and not in Rome or Greece or Egypt or South America. Even when I explain my research interests and the fact that most archaeology involving palaces and temples puts me to sleep, they seem to feel that I work on "dirt archaeology" because I have settled and given up my aspirations, not because anyone could be genuinely interested in the subject.
Or perhaps I am wrong in my thinking on this. If so, I don't know how to account for the surprise that so many people seem to have in hearing that there is local archaeology and that people are interested in it.
But, of course, they are wrong. Well before Europeans showed up in North America, the Yokut were living in the San Joaquin Valley. They left behind a rich material record. The remains of villages, hunting stands, plant gathering locations, and campsites riddle the land surrounding (and at some locations, within) Fresno. In fact, there is plenty here, and it is exciting to be an archaeologist in Fresno.
To be fair, though, it is understandable why many people think this way. Television shows and magazine articles about archaeology rarely focus on California at all, much less the San Joaquin Valley. What's more, the archaeological sites in this region are difficult to spot unless you have specialized knowledge of what to look for - a piece of flaked stone looks pretty clear to an archaeologist, but may look like just another rock to the untrained eye.
However, I think that I may have identified an interesting phenomenon. When I was living in Santa Barbara, I met many people who were surprised that an archaeologist would have anything to do there (of course, with the proximity of both four missions and a Presidio, people there were a bit more aware of the presence of Native Americans, and hence their sites, than folks in other parts of California); when having dinner with a friend in Los Angeles during a work assignment there, we found ourselves chatting with a few other people at the restaurant, and they were convinced that I was joking when I told them what I do for a living (they might have been more accepting if I had told them that I'm an aspiring actor/model who's just happened to fall into archaeology), and when they realized I wasn't joking they were shocked to hear that I actually had work to do in Los Angeles; Many a Santa Cruzan was confounded 'pon hearing that there were archaeological sites in the rather mountainous Santa Cruz County; I have had similar conversations in Wisconsin, Utah, Oregon, Washington, Indiana, Quebec, and several years back I visited a friend in Ohio, and her housemate was astounded to hear that there were archaeological sites in the area - despite the fact that there were numerous huge earthen mounds and walls in the area.
Subtle Jaspers, those mound-builders
To sum it up, my experience has been that North Americans seem to be largely unaware of the archaeological record that surrounds them and, importantly, seem to have difficulty processing the fact that there is one when they are confronted with it.
Again, in many places the sites are hard to find or hard to recognize, but the fact that people seem so shocked to hear of their existence is, to my mind, rather remarkable. I think there may be a couple of reasons for this. The first, alluded to earlier, is that media attention on archaeology tends to ignore much of North America (aside from the Aztec sites in Mexico) because it's not as photogenic as sites containing temples and palaces, even though the archaeology of the U.S. and Canada is pretty damn cool.
The other reason, I suspect, is that many North Americans (again, excepting Mexico) seem to have a sense of archaeological inferiority. When I tell people about the sites that are around them, they frequently follow up by asking me why I am working here and not in Rome or Greece or Egypt or South America. Even when I explain my research interests and the fact that most archaeology involving palaces and temples puts me to sleep, they seem to feel that I work on "dirt archaeology" because I have settled and given up my aspirations, not because anyone could be genuinely interested in the subject.
Or perhaps I am wrong in my thinking on this. If so, I don't know how to account for the surprise that so many people seem to have in hearing that there is local archaeology and that people are interested in it.
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Fresno, Race Riots, and Historical Blindness
Some years back, I was assigned a project that involved a new electrical substation in Fresno. I performed the appropriate archaeological surveys, and wrote the requisite report. There are a few standard report formats for cultural/historic resource surveys, and the one that is used is dependent on the agency to which the report will be submitted. This was going to the California Energy Commission, and the report format for that agency requires that there be a section describing the history of the area in which the survey took place.
In this particular case, I was writing about an area outside of town, and so it was relevant to discuss the history of the hinterlands of Fresno*. This meant discussing the groups of people who lived in the hinterlands historically, which in Fresno largely meant non-white people. To this end, it seemed relevant to include a section on race riots that occurred in Fresno in the 1890s.
I submitted the report to the client for review, and a few weeks later received in back with a few comments, one of which was that they wanted me to remove all references to the race riots. The stated reason was that they didn't wish to "fan the flames of racial tension" within the region.
I immediately thought the following:
1) It's a compliance report. The only people who are going to read it are the government regulators, researchers who are looking for archaeological data on the region, and people who - due either to an over-developed sense of civic responsibility or (more likely) out of a desire to derail the project - are looking to make sure that the developer performed all necessary environmental review. The first two types will either not care or be interested in the race riots, and the latter group are likely to count their omission as a sign that the cultural resources contractor (me) didn't do sufficient background research and therefore may use it as an opening for attacking the project. So, really, no harm would be done by including this information, and some harm may have been done through the exclusion of it.
2) Fanning the flames of racial tensions? Really? Don't get me wrong, Fresno is an ethnically diverse and large city (a population of around 1/2 a million, not including the surrounding towns and unincorporated areas), and like any large and ethnically diverse city there are racial tensions. I am not naive about this. However, these tensions get enflamed by politicians harping on them, by police officers engaging in racially charged activities, by economic and social inequalities...but not by compliance reports that are only read by a small number of individuals. Our clients were either woefully naive about how the review process goes, or else seemed to be astoundingly arrogant as to the importance of their project to the community (assuming that a wide variety of people would read the reports).
3) Although there are certainly people currently living in and around Fresno whose ancestors were involved in the riots, Fresno, like most cities in California, grew due to a post-WWII population and migration boom. Moreover, like many cities int he San Joaquin Valley, Fresno has a short civic memory, meaning that even those who are descended from people who were involved in the riots are unlikely to remember them. Moreover, these occurred in the 1890s, when race riots were not uncommon throughout the United States (a fact that should be known to anyone who managed to graduate high school), so to describe them for Fresno within a compliance report is not going to increase the racial tensions existing in an area even if a large swath of the populace were to read it.
To be fair, I think that the request to remove the references was due to naivete on the part of the client. They were a new company, and clearly had extensive business an engineering experience, but were novices to the environmental review process. They probably were not aware of just how few people would review the document, and were concerned that it would be widely distributed. But in the end the riots did happen. They are a matter of historical record. There is absolutely zero point in changing a historic review in order to pretend like they didn't occur. And it has bugged me ever since.
*Yeah, yeah, all of the Bay Area and L.A. people can insert their "Fresno is a hinterland" joke here.
In this particular case, I was writing about an area outside of town, and so it was relevant to discuss the history of the hinterlands of Fresno*. This meant discussing the groups of people who lived in the hinterlands historically, which in Fresno largely meant non-white people. To this end, it seemed relevant to include a section on race riots that occurred in Fresno in the 1890s.
I submitted the report to the client for review, and a few weeks later received in back with a few comments, one of which was that they wanted me to remove all references to the race riots. The stated reason was that they didn't wish to "fan the flames of racial tension" within the region.
I immediately thought the following:
1) It's a compliance report. The only people who are going to read it are the government regulators, researchers who are looking for archaeological data on the region, and people who - due either to an over-developed sense of civic responsibility or (more likely) out of a desire to derail the project - are looking to make sure that the developer performed all necessary environmental review. The first two types will either not care or be interested in the race riots, and the latter group are likely to count their omission as a sign that the cultural resources contractor (me) didn't do sufficient background research and therefore may use it as an opening for attacking the project. So, really, no harm would be done by including this information, and some harm may have been done through the exclusion of it.
2) Fanning the flames of racial tensions? Really? Don't get me wrong, Fresno is an ethnically diverse and large city (a population of around 1/2 a million, not including the surrounding towns and unincorporated areas), and like any large and ethnically diverse city there are racial tensions. I am not naive about this. However, these tensions get enflamed by politicians harping on them, by police officers engaging in racially charged activities, by economic and social inequalities...but not by compliance reports that are only read by a small number of individuals. Our clients were either woefully naive about how the review process goes, or else seemed to be astoundingly arrogant as to the importance of their project to the community (assuming that a wide variety of people would read the reports).
3) Although there are certainly people currently living in and around Fresno whose ancestors were involved in the riots, Fresno, like most cities in California, grew due to a post-WWII population and migration boom. Moreover, like many cities int he San Joaquin Valley, Fresno has a short civic memory, meaning that even those who are descended from people who were involved in the riots are unlikely to remember them. Moreover, these occurred in the 1890s, when race riots were not uncommon throughout the United States (a fact that should be known to anyone who managed to graduate high school), so to describe them for Fresno within a compliance report is not going to increase the racial tensions existing in an area even if a large swath of the populace were to read it.
To be fair, I think that the request to remove the references was due to naivete on the part of the client. They were a new company, and clearly had extensive business an engineering experience, but were novices to the environmental review process. They probably were not aware of just how few people would review the document, and were concerned that it would be widely distributed. But in the end the riots did happen. They are a matter of historical record. There is absolutely zero point in changing a historic review in order to pretend like they didn't occur. And it has bugged me ever since.
*Yeah, yeah, all of the Bay Area and L.A. people can insert their "Fresno is a hinterland" joke here.
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