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Showing posts from February, 2014

Points of You - Volume 4

The forum that could not wait for a year to happen. A very interesting reflection by Yannis Hamilakis , that will be our 'Points of You' for volume 4. What do you think? "Friends asked me to elaborate on my suggestion for an Occupy movement, not only for art museums and galleries but also archaeological museums, archaeological sites/projects and other culture/heritage institutions that rely on cheap, un-insured, non-unionised labour, or on sponsorship from corrupt corporations. We in archaeology, art and heritage domains have been for far too long, oblivious, tolerant, if not complicit to a regime of work and political economy which is not sustainable; they tell us about expansion, new markets, new wings for our museums, new museums elsewhere, mega-projects with hundreds of specialists which are going to last for a quarter of a century, and we think: great! Lots of jobs for us and others, more heritage, more culture, more archaeology, that’s good all round, r

Multivocality and Technology: Review of a lecture at the Irish Institute of Hellenic Studies at Athens (IIHSA)

Lately it seems that discussions about public archaeology bring forth unprecedented directions of thought in Greece. A few months ago, a new book series on public archaeology was launched, with its first published volume being about the way the past is being presented to children. Actually, a roundtable discussion about this volume is taking place today, 14 February, at the building of the Association of Greek Archaeologists.   The same venue will host a lecture on archaeological education programmes and public archaeology in Greece , on the 25 th of February. A couple of months ago I attended a lecture by Dr. Eleni Stefanou and Dr. Ioanna Antoniadou entitled Experiencing the Past through Ethnography and Heritage Trails: Designing an Interactive Tool for Cultural Tourism and Education . I was quite intrigued by the abstract (see it here in English)  and I thought it would be an interesting lecture on a promising project but, on my way there, I tried not to keep my hope

Audiences… A review of the CASPAR session at TAG-on-Sea 2013 (Bournemouth University)

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  I attended my first TAG ( Theoretical Archaeology Group ) in 2012 and one of the questions I had in my mind for three days was: “Where the hell is the theory?” I have the feeling that conferences are becoming more and more standardized and any thematic or geographic boundary has disappeared. Maybe those big theoretical debates of the past century are over, or maybe I was looking for hardcore theory - and that never existed. Last December, in Bournemouth’s TAG, I had the pleasure to attend a session organized by CASPAR ; Researching Audiences in Archaeology: Theory, Methods and Evidence Base . This is a topic I am quite interested in, and I was expecting some interesting data and ideas. Luckily, I was not disappointed. Ten papers discussed media coverage of archaeology, from traditional sources such as newspapers or TV to the latest trends in social media, especially Twitter and Facebook. It is clear that the Internet is a great new channel for communication with audiences,

What do you think about…? Our blog’s brand new Reviews section

Have you ever attended a conference, session, workshop, lecture, show, or even watched a movie or a theatre play, or read a comic you would like to share? Have you organized an event and you would like to tell us how it went? We are launching the Reviews section in order to provide a platform for relevant events that are not communicated widely, sometimes because we do not dare to write about them. (Actually, not us. We are reckless.) This new section will offer a platform to share and review a variety of events shortly after they take place and with a more fresh writing style, in contrast to the usual academic standard. We want to know what is going on out there and we want you to tell us. This is why we will be posting whatever we watch or attend to, but we also want you to share with us your own perspective on those events. If you have attended an event that we have already reviewed but you have a different opinion, let us know. If you are planning to attend an event and are