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Newsletter of the Association for Environmental Archaeology Latest edition: Newsletter 87 February 2005 ISSN 1363-6553 Editorial |
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Edited by Wendy Carruthers and Vanessa Straker Copy dates for Items for the Newsletter may be submitted by e-mail or on disk. Newsletter: 20th of the following months - January / April / July / October. Short typed manuscripts can be sent to Wendy Carruthers. (e-mail addresses: wendy.carruthers@virgin.net; vanessa.straker@english-heritage.org.uk AEA Membership Secretary;Jane Richardson, Archaeological Services WYAS, PO Box 30, Nepshaw Lane South, Morley, Leeds LS27 0UG, Tel: 0113 3837509; e-mail: membership@envarch.net
As this is the first Newsletter of 2005 we wish you all a Happy New Year! To make the Membership Secretary’s life easier, it would be helpful if you could please check that you paid the correct subscription in January (see item below). We would also like to draw your attention to the information about the Spring Conference in Winchester (page 3) and urge people to send in their registration forms as soon as possible, as it is now only a few weeks away. In order to make the Newsletter a useful source of information about environmental archaeological events, we would be grateful if members could please forward information about conferences, meetings, jobs etc. to one of the Newsletter editors.
SUBSCRIPTIONS INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE POSTERS AVAILABLE ONLINE We are pleased to announce that French, German, Dutch and Spanish translations of the Association’s A3 publicity poster will shortly be available on our website as pdf files (www.envarch.net/aea/poster.html), alongside the English version. We would be extremely grateful if members could help publicise the AEA by downloading and printing out the appropriate poster for distribution. Any offers for additional translations would be warmly welcomed. NEW CO-ORDINATING EDITOR OF ENVIRONMENTAL ARCHAEOLOGY: THE JOURNAL OF HUMAN PALAEOECOLOGY AND A CALL FOR PAPERS 2005 will see publication of the tenth volume of Environmental Archaeology, the AEA’s journal, which superceded Circaea (1983-1996). EA attracts a wide diversity of papers from studies of specific types of data, through to regional landscapes and, since 2003, has been published bi-annually. Professor Glynis Jones, University of Sheffield, has been the Co-ordinating Editor of the journal since its launch, but will be retiring after completing the tenth volume this year. The new Co-ordinating Editor is Dr Ingrid Mainland, University of Bradford. She is currently looking for articles for Environmental Archaeology 11, and all new submissions should be sent directly to her. As you are probably aware, the remit of the journal is to publish a wide range of papers in all fields of environmental archaeology, from methodology to synthesis and theory. These may take the form of substantial research articles (up to 6000 words in length) or shorter reports. Papers may include, for instance, new techniques, philosophical discussions, current controversies and suggestions for new research, as well as conventional research papers. Review papers are welcome as long as they are sufficiently critical and succinct. Comments and replies to papers published in the journal (up to 2000 words) will be included as will book reviews and review articles on important new books or collections of books on related topics. Contributions from members of the AEA are particularly welcome. Dr Ingrid Mainland Please see the website for further information about the journal, including the ‘guidelines for authors’: www.envarch.net/publications/envarch/index.html UPDATE ON JOURNAL SUBSCRIPTION OFFERS DURING 2005
For more information of what is on offer and how to obtain your discount, go to: www.envarch.net/offers/index.html CIRCAEA ON THE WEB 2005 AEA ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING
AEA SPRING CONFERENCE 2005 Environmental Archaeology in Landscape Archaeology To be held at the West Downs Campus, University College Winchester (formerly King Alfred's College, Winchester) on 31st March 2005
AEA AUTUMN CONFERENCE 2005
INTERNATIONAL WETLAND CONFERENCE,
4TH INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF ETHNOBOTANY
Call for Papers THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF FOOD: CULTURE AND IDENTITY Food is an important part of culture and identity. Archaeologists, zooarchaeologists, archaeobotanists and other specialists are fully aware of the scope of their researches and the various sub-disciplines of archaeology have now moved beyond the lists of taxa or daunting type-series. This colloquium session invites specialists of various fields to discuss what bioarchaeological remains and/or material culture can reveal on the role of food in cultural and social identity and on the relation between human and their environment in the past. Any queries can be addressed to the session organiser at the address below. The AIA attracts principally specialists of the Classical periods and Antiquity but participants working on other periods are also most welcomed to submit a paper. Title, abstract (max. 250 words), contact information, professional affiliation and the amount of time requested (10, 15 or 20 minutes) must be submitted by 11 March 2005 to the session organiser. Please note that this year, the AIA will accept paper given in English or French. Information on the AIA, the annual meeting and travel funds is available online at: Manon Savard
UK ACCREDITATION OF PROFESSIONAL ARCHAEOLOGISTS AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL SPECIALISTS In recent months the Management Committees of the Association for Environmental Archaeology (AEA) and the British Association for Biological Anthropology and Osteoarchaeology (BABAO) have been looking closely at the subject of Accreditation of Professional Archaeologists and Archaeological Specialists in the UK. This has been in response to two main stimuli:
Our activities so far have involved several meetings with representatives of the Institute of Field Archaeologists (IFA) and of English Heritage’s Department of Policy and Communication. Members of the latter are currently involved in producing a paper of recommendations on the subject to be presented and discussed later in the year. These recommendations if accepted will be applied to archaeological work funded and or managed via the national agencies. It is expected that there will be a knock-on effect reaching the commercial sector. The likely mechanisms for accreditation are either to set up a new accreditation body or to adapt and use existing procedures operated by the IFA. There are plans for an initial accreditation process involving peer review and according to a number of appropriate professional categories. Accreditation will then be reviewed at regular intervals (probably 5 years), when applicants will be required to demonstrate that they have maintained and developed their professional expertise. Discussions were held with the IFA as they are presently the main body involved in accreditation in the UK and, as already mentioned, seem likely to play a central role in one form or another in future accreditation processes. The AEA & BABAO do not see themselves as able to be responsible for accreditation and all the associated legal implications. Following on from discussions with the IFA the management committees of the AEA and BABAO and the IFA Council have agreed to carry out a pilot exercise to look at accreditation more closely. In particular we will be examining accreditation categories and the special requirements associated with these. An attempt will also be made to look at costing the exercise – how much money would be needed to set up the accreditation process and what it is likely to cost to become accredited and maintain accreditation? Which accreditation categories are appropriate and practical – generalists (e.g. project managers, environmental officers etc.) and specialists (e.g. human osteologists, archaeozoologists, etc.)? On which criteria should accreditation be based? How should it be carried out – how can it be made quick, easy and unbureaucratic while maintaining its effectiveness? Both organisations have already declared their willingness to provide a pool of specialists willing to be involved in the peer review process. The next step in the pilot exercise is to consult BABAO and AEA members. What are your views on the subject of accreditation? We are interested in responses both from UK and non-UK members. Experiences from similar exercises in other countries can be invaluable in identifying the problems and pitfalls and also in pinpointing how the process can be made as effective as possible for the least investment of time, money and bureaucracy. We look forward to your responses.
The opportunity for collaborative links between the AEA and BABAO (British Association for Biological Anthropology and Osteoarchaeology) was very much welcomed by the BABAO Committee and membership. We are now represented on each other’s committees, and collaborating on issues of common interest – currently, a lot of our attention is focused on mechanisms of accreditation for professionals in the commercial sector (as described elsewhere in this issue). We have agreed to encourage intellectual exchange by organizing thematic sessions on topics of overlapping interest at our annual conferences (this year, at the BABAO meeting in London; next year, at the AEA meeting in Exeter), and by offering membership rates for these meetings to members of the partner organization. We hope that these opportunities will be welcomed, and that we will see further initiatives explored in the future. It may be helpful at this point if I introduce the BABAO to the AEA membership. Interest in human osteology in the UK has grown enormously in the last decade, reflecting not just the intellectual consolidation of the field within British academic archaeology, but also an increasing demand for trained forensic anthropologists. In the media, there is also much more frequent use of osteological expertise by makers of historical documentaries. The British Association for Biological Anthropology and Osteoarchaeology (BABAO) was established in 1999 with the intent of drawing together expertise and interest in all areas of analysis of human remains. It seeks to promote the study of human remains in the interests of bioarchaeology, comparative anatomy, palaeontology and biological, forensic and medical anthropology. BABAO provides a forum for the exchange of ideas and information on all aspects of the analysis and interpretation of human remains. In accordance with one of its aims, as described in its constitution, to “improve standards in all aspects of the study of the biological remains of past and present peoples”, BABAO has prepared and published (jointly with English Heritage) Human Bones from Archaeological Sites: Guidelines for Producing Assessment Documents and Analytical Reports (English Heritage, 2002), and Guidelines to the Standards for Recording Human Remains (published jointly with the Institute of Field Archaeologists; IFA, 2003). BABAO is currently sponsoring a bid from its membership to procure funding for the development of a database collating information about available skeletal material within British curatorial institutions. This will include such data as the number of individuals within each sample, provenance information including date, where the sample is held, when it was excavated, etc. Membership of the organisation is open to all those interested in these areas of study. It has an active membership of about 200, and includes representatives from the UK and elsewhere involved in the excavation and analysis of human remains, in tertiary and post-graduate education, and in the curation of human remains, whether based in universities, archaeological units, museums or other organisations. The Association issues an annual Newsletter, maintains an unmoderated email discussion list, and holds an annual conference (the next one will be at the Museum of London on 3-4 September 2005). Conference proceedings may be published, and have so far led to two edited volumes (a third is now in preparation). Membership is renewable annually on 1st January, and currently costs £15 (waged) or £10 (unwaged/students). Further details are available on the Association’s web site (www.babao.org.uk). We look forward to working with the AEA, and hope to welcome members to our meetings in future! James Steele
NEW RESEARCH ON BURNT- MOUNDS AND RELATED TROUGHS: CALL FOR MATERIAL At Exeter we are undertaking a 2-year Leverhulme funded multiproxy investigation (beginning April 2005) into the palaeoentomology and geochemistry of burnt mounds and associated troughs. The primary objective of the project is to investigate site function and context through analysis of beetle and fly remains and trace elements. Most burnt mounds in Britain and Ireland are of Bronze Age date and are found in streamside or riverside locations. They have been interpreted as cooking pits, saunas, sites for textile processing and even eel stores. Despite many excavations in England, Scotland and Wales few have been discovered with significant faunal or botanical evidence that could contribute to a greater understanding of their function. Recent commercial work in Ireland has provided several sites with high palaeoenvironmental potential and these will provide the primary data source of the project. However, we would be very interested to hear of any sites of this type which are currently being excavated, have been excavated in the past and environmental samples kept, or are to be excavated in the next year or so. If you know of such sites please contact: Tony Brown a.g.brown@exeter.ac.uk or Steve Davis S.R.Davies@exeter.ac.uk
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