Upcoming Seminars

Barbara Little has been a practicing archaeologist for over 30 years and has adopted an explicit focus on the public relevance of archaeology for nearly 20. Recently, she has focused on archaeologists’ civic engagement. She is the co-author of Archaeology, Heritage, and Civic Engagement: Working Toward the Public Good (2014) and co-editor of Archaeology as a Tool of Civic Engagement (2007). Her latest book, The Archaeology of Social Justice, is forthcoming from the University Press of Florida.

Civically-engaged archaeologists seek to serve the public interest—however difficult that interest is to define—and increasingly understand their work as contributing to struggles for social justice. Various archaeologies seek to change mainstream practice. Feminist, Indigenous, anti-racist, vindicationist, and Marxist archaeologists offer powerful models that share some goals and methods towards rehabilitating archaeology from its colonial and androcentric roots. This seminar will take stock of the relationship between archaeology and these struggles and explore how archaeology can further social justice.  

The Knowledge Series seminars are opportunities to learn from prominent archaeologists as they share their experiences and expertise.

Gerry Wait has over 30 years of experience as an archaeologist and heritage consultant. His real passion is in finding ways to make the past relevant to people and communities in building their future, with the belief that successful communities have firm roots in their past. Gerry is an expert in conservation and management planning, and has led Environmental and Social Impact Assessments (ESIAs) or IESC due diligence in the UK, USA, Romania, Ireland, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Burkino Faso, Niger, the Mauretania, Republic of Congo, Mongolia, Morocco, and Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Turkey, and Bulgaria, Albania, Greece, Uganda and Tanzania.

Gerry served as Chairman of the UK’s Institute for Archaeologists and a number of terms on the Board of CIfA, and is Co-Chair of the Committee on Professional Associations in Archaeology of the European Association of Archaeologists. Gerry has a B.A. in Anthropology, a M.A. in Anthropology and Archaeology, and a PhD in European Archaeology from the University of Oxford. He is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London, the International Association for Impact Assessment, and of many other professional and academic associations.

International Cultural Heritage Management (ICHM), like heritage management in any context, can seem romantic and simultaneously like a great deal of work. Above all, it can be immensely rewarding. This two-hour course will provide participants with an introduction to the ways in which ICHM is like and unlike domestic Cultural Heritage Management work in other contexts. The seminar will discuss ethics and standards and team-work/collaboration in cross-cultural contexts. Outputs, capacity building, and sectoral development will also be discussed. Participants will learn about available resources for finding best practices and sources for support and guidance and be pointed to the existence and use of standards and publications.

Participants will be better able to assemble and lead teams or contribute as team members by:

1. Learning how to work through ethical concerns arising from working internationally in different cultural contexts;
2. Identifying the basic issues of international team management – cultural differences, time keeping, team roles and management, and styles of communication;
3. Connecting the relationships between standards of performance, outputs (project, commercial and academic) and capacity building; and
4. Learning how to find resources and support/guidance.

Nicola Jones received a Masters in Journalism from UBC (2000), and then went on to work at New Scientist Magazine and Nature in London. At Nature, she served as a news and features reporter and editor; online news editor; and commentary editor. She has been working with SAPIENS since 2017, developing and editing many essays and opinion pieces by anthropologists for a general audience.

Learn how (and why) to write about your work for the public, from an expert editor. Nicola Jones has spent more than a decade editing essays by academics, originally for the science journal Nature, and more recently for the online anthropology magazine SAPIENS (www.sapiens.org). Nicola will walk you through the steps of how, when, and to whom to pitch an essay or opinion piece; how to frame an argument; and how to write in a compelling and persuasive way for the general public.

1. Discover different ways that writing for the public can help your career
2. Learn how to pitch an essay or opinion piece
3. Learn how to write compellingly and persuasively for the general public

Dr. Della Scott-Ireton is Associate Director for the Florida Public Archaeology Network (FPAN) and has spent her career developing public interpretation for submerged archaeological sites and engaging and training citizen scientists to participate in underwater archaeological research and preservation.

Sarah Miller is Director of the Northeast/East Central Regions for FPAN. She created the Cemetery Resource Protection Training (CRPT) program in 2011 that has since graduated 1,400 stewards from 81 trainings statewide, as well as Heritage Monitoring Scouts of Florida (HMS Florida) launched in 2016 that has so far resulted in 432 Scouts monitoring 864 sites in two years.

Della Scott-Ireton and Sarah Miller of the Florida Public Archaeology Network (FPAN) invite you to join them to discuss the development and implementation of archaeological site stewardship programs. Heritage managers increasingly rely on dedicated volunteers and concerned stakeholders to serve as citizen scientists in the field, assisting with non-disturbance monitoring and recording of sites threatened by looting, erosion, development, sea level rise, and climate change. FPAN has had success in creating and executing such programs, both on land and under water. Sarah and Della will discuss the impetus for FPAN’s programs, as well as development of training curricula, promotion and marketing, partnering with other agencies, dealing with data, and on-going strategies for attracting, training, and retaining participants. Sustainability is a factor to consider, therefore challenges and opportunities for sustaining these kinds of programs also will be addressed.

1. To provide information, resources, and support for those wanting to develop effective and sustainable site stewardship/monitoring programs.
2. To discuss pros and cons, benefits and pitfalls, challenges and solutions of non-disturbance citizen science programs.
3. To stimulate ideas and offer suggestions for new or similar programs in other areas.