Well, Dan, I do agree that the courses I took were designed to prepare me
for my position. Ultimately, experience is often the best teacher, and I had
loads and loads of that prior to entering the academy. The person who was an
expert without the ability to recognize a vernacular residence, for
instance, would be better off someplace else.

Yes, our own mistakes have been our worst enemy, which means we have to work
doubly hard to correct the impression given by the careless or the
unfortunate...especially if it is our own error!

Laura W

-----Original Message-----
From: Daniel H. Weiskotten [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Wednesday, March 17, 2004 8:52 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: archaeologists and history


At 06:59 AM 3/17/2004 -0600, you wrote:
>If I know nothing of geoarcheology should I
>make statements in a report about the soils and sediments without
consulting
>an authority

I don't really think that it is a necessity to consult the so called
"experts" but it does seem to have become a necessity and the result of our
own screw ups.

I have seen lots of "expert" technical submissions that were useless
because they hadn't a clue what the archaeological needs were and how to
tie it to the archaeological context.  In some cases it was the fault of
the Project overseer who simply sent material off for a particular analysis
without any notion that it needed to be tailored to archaeological
design.  "Why did we just spend 2,000 bucks to find out the silt sand ratio
of alluvial deposits?"

I've got a good solid, but far from expert, background in geology,
dendrology, soil science, hydrology, biology, you name it and I took all
that course work and did all those internships so I could do archaeology
better.  Only problem is I come to find that it would be farmed out to
"experts" who didn't know what we wanted.

One of the best and most observant rural architectural historians I ever
worked with was told that since he didn't have a degree in architectural
history he could no longer do the building surveys as he had been doing
nicely for years.  We ended up hiring someone who had  the degree but
didn't seem to know the term "vernacular" or what an English Threshing Barn
was.

That is worthless, dangerous and reckless.

         Dan W.