A friend of mine recently asked if I could help him hire an employee to help with National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) compliance. He was interested in someone with technical writing experience but understood the intricacies of both biological and cultural resource assessments. Throughout the conversation, he insisted that the […]
(This is the second in a 3-part series on a workshop focused on the future of cultural resource management archaeology that was given as part of the University of Arizona’s School of Anthropology Centennial celebration. You can check out Part I here.) “The Golden Age of cultural resource management archaeology […]
The River Street Archaeology Project ended earlier this month. It was a bittersweet moment for me because: I was working in my home town I worked with friends, acquaintances, and family that I love dearly There were excellent volunteers I got to actually direct a field school, and The project […]
Cultural resource management companies don’t need archaeologists. They don’t. Think about it. Is archaeology the ONLY thing CRM archaeologists do for their companies? Do companies need employees that ONLY do archaeology? The answer is no. CRM archaeologists do a wide variety of different activities and tasks for their employers. They […]
I was recently informed that a CRM archaeology technical report isn’t true archaeology writing. It was a shocking revelation that came from somebody that has written dozens of cultural resources reports that instantly made me start thinking about the nature of our industry and the way we value our reports, […]
Small liberal arts colleges are starting to lose the battle against the “educational-industrial complex.” This month, two colleges in the eastern United States—Sweet Briar College and Tennessee Temple University—announced they will close their doors this year (2015). Insurmountable financial challenges and declining enrollment were cited as the reason for the […]
Last week, Fox News helped my dissertation research immensely. I learned about five books that I definitely need to read based on their coverage of a course at Arizona State University titled “U.S. Race Theory and the Problem of Whiteness.” The course is taught by Professor Lee Bebout who has […]
Feast or Famine is a frequently acknowledged part of being a CRM archaeologist. Because many of our companies are so poorly managed, they live and die by close-ended, temporary cultural resources contracts. The company goes into the toilet if the management is unable to land contracts. When the project flow […]
Recently, I published a blog post that tackled the issue of what I called the poverty mentality in archaeology. Most of the people that read that piece had no problem with it. Some of the readers, however, did not agree with my perspective and were not impressed by my message. […]
This last weekend, my family and I volunteered at another public archaeology event spearheaded by a prominent Arizona historical society. It was the final field session of the project I discussed in my post that discussed how to involve minorities in archaeology by introducing them to the science at an […]
