In reading J. J. Carver’s excellent suggestions for how to better enable archaeology and large urban infrastructure projects to progress to mutual benefit, I found myself in enthusiastic agreement with his point that ‘professional working relationships are the most important challenge for archaeology in mega projects’ and that we must convince project directors, engineers, and...
In response to Carver’s lead article, I’d like to highlight an easily overlooked aspect of archaeology: underwater archaeology. I will offer some examples and experiences from Mexico, which will perhaps resonate in other cities and nations around the world with a rich underwater cultural heritage.
This is a very helpful and informative essay written by someone who is clearly very experienced with the complexity of urban archaeology. I would like to offer a perspective about these issues from New York City as although there are no projects that are truly analogous in both the scale and scope of the archaeology of the Crossrail Project, we do have similar projects from a...
This paper has been written as a response to J. J. Carver’s leading paper to reflect the differences of the system governing cultural heritage in Turkey. It will demonstrate features of particular importance in the management of archaeological sites in Turkey. Besides providing a conspectus on the matters related to the management of archaeological heritage at risk, the...
The Crossrail project represents perhaps the most ambitious urban archaeological project ever undertaken in a major urban area. Its director, J. J. Carver, has established a reputation for integrating the archaeological component of a complex undertaking with the maze of construction constraints that are imposed on such projects from a multiplicity of sources. Scheduling and co...
Ironically, when given the opportunity to respond to J. J. Carver’s thought-provoking article ‘The Challenges and Opportunities for Mega-Infrastructure Projects and Archaeology’ and thinking I had plenty of time in which to do so, I was suddenly thrust back into two, all-consuming major Sydney infrastructure projects, which currently sit in the category of ‘confidential’, meaning...
Interview conducted by Hana Koriech and Meredith Linn, 27th July 2013 at Columbia University in New York City.This summer we had the wonderful opportunity to sit down with three of the most celebrated New York City (NYC) archaeologists, Drs. Anne-Marie Cantwell, Nan Rothschild, and Diana diZerega Wall. Each is well-known for their exemplary teaching careers, outstanding...
The past two decades have seen a significant increase in archaeological investigations implicitly, or explicitly, encompassing folkloric material. Many such publications begin with a brief mention of the early historical connection between the two disciplines via antiquarianism, and the problems and possibilities of engaging with folklore in archaeological research. However, it...
This paper explores the use of cultural heritage in shaping public understandings of history, identity and justice; it focuses on misinterpretations and misrepresentations of damage to and destruction of archaeological sites and historic buildings in Cyprus. It examines: restoration and its impact on public understandings of history; scholarly conduct in the collection and...
Victorian London saw dramatic physical changes along the river Thames. Large enclosed Docks and Thames Embankments were constructed as the city struggled to cope with its ballooning population and prospering shipping industry. Whilst the Thames Embankments have been hailed as engineering triumphs, the fate of those whose livelihood relied on access to the river in central London...
Graphic illustration of Mortimer Wheeler during the war
Digital Public Archaeology is a very new label for a contemporary practice, and as such has been subject to a limited amount of theoretical scrutiny. The rapid pace of change within Internet technologies has significantly expanded potential for this ‘digital’ form of Public Archaeology practice. Internet technologies can be used to gather contributions of ‘crowd-sourced...
In this paper, I investigate the identity of Werethekau through a previously unpublished limestone block at the Petrie Museum (UC 16639). It is not recorded when or where this block was found; the context, a central and identifying feature for the archaeological discipline, is lost (Johnson 1999: 107). The Petrie Museum records do not include the method or date of acquisition. I...
Considering the successive iterations of the fence surrounding the London 2012 Olympic site in Stratford, east London, I demonstrate that during the five periods of enclosure considered, these boundaries have highlighted the London Games’ contested past, present, and future. An examination of the material and discursive constructions of each of these boundaries shows the Janus...
In this article I discuss an innovative museum strategy that aims to create a more evocative and engaging visitor experience. I argue that the inclusion of contemporary art, and specifically sculpture in exhibition design, activates visitor agency, empowering the public to take part in interpreting the human past. I explore the unique sensory engagement sculpture provides and the...
Pierre Lemonnier’s new book, the excitingly titled Mundane Objects, is mainly a contribution in the author’s long-standing engagement with the French anthropological tradition of technologie culturelle, of which he has become probably the most important active proponent. While this book is definitely in the tradition of Lemonnier’s work since the 1970’s, it presents important new...
In the same week Ruins in Reverse opened at the Tate Modern gallery in London, Jonathan Jones asked on his Guardian Blog whether archaeology might be ‘the new art’ (2013). He posed this question as a result of two recent exhibitions at The British Museum, namely Ice Age Art and Life and Death in Pompeii and Herculaneum, both of which sought to emphasise the aesthetic qualities of...
A study of the ‘archaeological imagination’ is an area of growing interest within archaeology and other fields (see, for example, Finn 2004; Wallace 2004; Schwyzer 2007), and Michael Shanks’s book is a timely addition to this important and inspiring subject. Building on his Experiencing the Past (1992) and other collaborative works, the author makes a foray into the worlds that...
For twenty years, ‘rescue’ archaeology and cultural resource management in England lived within the certain world of Planning Policy Guidance Note 16: Archaeology and Planning (the PPG) (DoE 1990). The PPG gave our profession clear locus and status within the business of development and planning.Those who wished to disturb archaeological remains in order to build were effectively...
The National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) delivers a concise set of policies which the development industry can view (with some satisfaction given its brevity) as being the basic standard principles by which their work must be conducted. The core of sensible planning is here – care for the economy, consideration of the environment, quality of design and, crucially for our...
The transition of planning policy for archaeology and the historic environment in England from Planning Policy Guidance note 16 (PPG 16) to the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) via Planning Policy Statement 5 (PPS5) is an important one. It mirrors in some ways the development of the commercial branch of archaeology, and of its professional institute, the Institute for...
In early 2010, the rumours circulating shortly before the final publication of PPS5 that all planning policy was likely to be combined into a single document caused a degree of nervousness among heritage organisations. The previous government decided to go ahead and publish PPS5 rather than cancel its publication and consider heritage issues afresh alongside all other planning...
This helpful addition to the literature and thinking around planning and archaeology comes at an exciting time, as the Localism Act, streamlining of non-planning consents, economic recession and political change all converge. It is striking, in the review of archaeology and planning policy over some thirty years, what a revolution we have experienced in that time. When PPGs 16...
The National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) continues to divide opinion. This is especially the case in relation to heritage and the historic environment. On the one hand, the historic environment is given its own section in the document, and there is strong rhetoric around the importance of conserving unique heritage assets. On the other, aspects of the NPPF are a source of...