Joshua Guerrero (York Master’s alum!) was kind enough to ask me to appear on his podcast, 15 Questions with an Archaeologist. The episode is out and he asked me questions such as:
If money were no object what type of archaeology would you do?
Please tell us about some of the most interesting sites you have ever worked on.
How do you feel about Indiana Jones?
To hear what I answered, check it out:
http://15questionswithanarcheologist.libsyn.com/dr-colleen-morgan-15-questions-with-an-archeologist
I received an incredible response from the last post, Archaeologists-Who-Happen-to-be-Mothers, not in the least in the form of the contributions of photos, videos, and thoughts about archaeology & motherhood. Many of the contributors acknowledged how difficult (if not impossible) it would be without a very supportive partner, flexible working schedules, and control over their working conditions in the field. I encourage you also to check out the comments on the last post, where you can see the diversity of experience in the personal stories coming through.
I consulted with Dr. Brenna Hassett of Team Trowelblazers and she recommended that we set up a Tumblr for submissions, simply:
There are several more submissions there, I urge you to check it out, and submit your own photos, either with children or doing fieldwork on your own. Alternately, you can still email me photos, stories, and videos at clmorgan at gmail.
The only caveat: we reserve the right to not post photos that are outside recommended Health & Safety procedures, such as unshored trenches over 1.2m, not wearing PPE around heavy machinery, and the like. Stay safe out there, women diggers!
Adela Breton was apparently “a nuisance” to the men who couldn’t quite figure out what to do with a 50-year-old single woman in Mexico in 1900. Happily, Trowelblazers worked up a short profile on this fantastic artist and scholar and followed up their profile with this tweet:
I don’t know about you, but when I’m writing something or have other heavy head-work to do, I like to browse through digital museum archives when I need to take a break. Maybe it’s just me. But it paid off big time.
The Breton Collection has 1301 entries, maybe 1/5 of these entries have images online. I can only imagine what else is in their storeroom, because the images that they have online are a glorious feast of archaeological visualization.
Adela Breton is probably one of the most gifted archaeological illustrators that I’ve ever seen.
You see, I was working on a co-authored piece with Holly Wright on analog vs. digital archaeological field illustration, and so going through this collection was even more exciting. Breton didn’t just draw loooovely watercolors of ruins though…her works covered several of the other visual outputs of archaeology.
This hachured plan of an archaeological site would be familiar to any landscape archaeologist, and I love imagining Breton tromping across this mountainside in her Victorian lady-boots, sketchbook in hand, gnawing a pencil, thinking about contours, the relative distances between buildings, and the direction of slope beneath her feet.
Breton painted artifacts with such grace that you feel like you can touch their smooth curves. Can you see the chip in the rim of the animal pot?
She also drew more pottery in ways that are more familiar to archaeological illustrators, not quite as painterly, a focus on hue and shape. I love that this painting appears to be on the back of stationery from the Palace Hotel.
In addition to the archaeological illustrations, Breton drew ethnographic sketches, geological formations, and…earthquakes?
Breton put pen to paper during a massive earthquake, even indicating north on the page! The first seismograph wouldn’t even make it to America until 1897. I flagged it up to Karen Holmberg & Elizabeth Angell, both of whom do exciting work on anthropology and natural disasters and can add much more nuance to the analysis of such an incredible visual artifact.
Thank you to Bristol Museums who have kept & digitized this glorious collection! Support your local (and digi-local) museums!
Back in 2009 David Cohen and I made a video for the Afghanistan exhibit at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco. This video was meant to accompany the mostly interpretation-free display of gold and human remains; we wanted to give faces to archaeologists and convey what it is that we do. The museum provided us a list of guiding questions and we filmed responses from UC Berkeley archaeologists. Anyway, I finally had a moment to upload some of the videos to Youtube, and here they are for your viewing/teaching pleasure.
The infamous …and I’m an archaeologist video.
What is the best thing about being an archaeologist?
What is the worst thing about being an archaeologist?
What do archaeologists do?
What are some common misconceptions about archaeology? (Show this to your friends and family who keep asking about dinosaurs and gold)
And my favorite: What type of artifacts do you find?
A short clip from a longer video that we’re making for the San Francisco Asian Art museum. It’s the first time I’ve shot in HD, and it’s producing some problems between Final Cut Pro versions, but I’m struggling along.
Colleen Morgan 