Anita's comment brings to mind a story that a friend related
some years ago:
 
Bob has always been something of a "picker",
growing up in the midwest and hunting "arrowheads" since he was
a child.  He has little formal schooling, but is passionately
interested in the early European settlement of the region.
Consequently, he spends a good deal of time researching primary
sources, walking fields looking for sites, and yes,
occasionally picking up surface finds.
 
One summer he was camping and canoeing with his family near the
site of an early French village, and noticed a group of folks
with shovels and rakes and "implements of destruction" [to
quote Arlo Guthrie] in a field.  They were digging.
 
Now, Bob had walked those fields many times, and asked the young
archaeologist what they were looking for.  "We're looking for
evidence of past human activity", she replied down her nose.
"Any particular humans?" Bob politely inquired.  "There were
French people living here a long time ago," she answered.  Bob
told her that he had walked over much of the area along the
banks of the river, and wondered why they were digging in this
particular spot.  Still acting aloof, the archaeologist replied
that the dark colored soil meant that people had lived on this
spot.  He looked closely at the ground.  "You mean this dark
stuff?", bending down to pick up a piece of burned feed sack,
"this is where the farmer burns trash in the fall."  With an
irritated look on her face, the "professional" looked up and
informed Bob (a farmer himself) that it took years of training
to understand the complex stories that the soil holds, and
excused herself.
 
Bob called after her that he had found bits of glass, pipe
stems and nails in the woods along the river, and that in a few
places you could still see the mounds of stone from collapsed
chimneys.  She walked back quickly and snapped, "Pot-hunting
is illegal on state land and you could be arrested!...Archaeology
is a delicate science, and when you pick up things
that you haven't been trained to interpret, you destroy the
archaeological record.  Now please let us get on with our work
and don't pick up artifacts."
 
The crew spent the summer (financed largely by state funds,
although Bob could never get anyone in the state capital to
reveal how much) surveying one of the few fields in the area
that had no significant cultural remains.
 
Bob has tried to get access to archaeological collections held
"in trust" by public agencies...only to find the material
misplaced, uncataloged, or available only by appointment (for
which you much pay an access fee).  Bob has waited for the
publication of research conducted at public expense...only to
find that the "professional" has moved on to new projects.
 
Bob is understandably somewhat contemptuous of archaeologists.
 
We could learn a great deal from people like Bob.
 
Can Graduate schools do a better job of preparing students for
dealing with people who haven't been cloistered away for years?
 
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