Or maybe we should do the environmentally correct thing (since we do this
PURELY out of love and DON"T have children to raise [how's that for bringing
threads together?]) and fill up our local recycling containers with the
pounds and pounds of glass that we have collected over the years! Boy, talk
about "reliving history" the next time you have a Coke!
And frankly, I'd love to meet an amateur archaeologist (or anyone) who wants
18 pounds of window pane fragment! Except perhaps that character that Dan
Ackroyd used to play on SNL . . . Stangway, Treadway, something like that.
You all know the one, he used to bag up broken glass and sell it as a
children's toy!
It's Monday in the West and I clearly MUST have gotten up on the wrong side
of the bed today!
mas
----- Original Message -----
From: "Larry Porter" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, November 24, 2003 7:40 AM
Subject: Re: culling, de-accessioning, ignoring
> How 'bout we just sell it all on e-bay, divide up the money and retire!
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Kris Oswald" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Monday, November 24, 2003 6:14 AM
> Subject: Re: culling, de-accessioning, ignoring
>
>
> Another thought would be to provide amature archaeologist's with
> materials..to inhance their collections for the purpose of continuing
> education and training not only for themselves but for the other people
> that they have connections to...historical societies...local
> museums...etc
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Suzanne M. Gurenlian [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: Friday, November 21, 2003 11:30 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: culling, de-accessioning, ignoring
>
>
> Ned,
>
> Has anyone ever thought of providing 'culled' artifacts to local high
> school collections? How about junior colleges? This may pique the
> interest of some youngster. It could be a recruitment tool for our
> field. It may inspire one to join in the pursuit of historical
> archaeology if they don't have to travel to a museum to see such a
> prized possession!
>
> Any thoughts on this?
>
> Sister Mary
> --
> It is within the boundaries of love that you discover life. Enjoy it!
>
>
> Quoting Ned Heite <[log in to unmask]>:
>
> > In theory, most of us would like to save everything. There would be no
>
> > landfills. We would simply number and shelve everything. Okay, I
> > exaggerate. But the fact is that somewhere in the deepest reptilian
> > part of our brains, we have this urge to keep stuff.
> >
> > Those of us with archaeological credentials can legitimately satisfy
> > the primal urge to gather busted bits of bisque. We can do it in the
> > name of science and justify our collecting under the rubric of the
> > public good. Sometimes we call it sampling, but usually we really want
>
> > to keep it all.
> >
> > Some of us, like the Collier brothers, go overboard. We fill our
> > abodes with STUFF, and then we go to work and fill our labs with
> > STUFF, which we eventually transfer to repositories, which are bulging
>
> > with STUFF.
> >
> > Lots of really creative arguments have been fashioned to justify the
> > primal urge to curate endless STUFF for endless eternity. Here are
> > three of the more common ones:
> >
> > 1. We need to keep all those environmental samples because some future
>
> > researcher may devise techniques to better analyse them.
> >
> > 2. Culling a collection might mean disposal of the wrong thing.
> >
> > 3. Saving only a sample will introduce a bias into the collection in
> > favor of whatever system was used to create the sample.
> >
> > The excuses go on, but the fact remains that we, as a profession, are
> > reluctant to come to grips with the reality of artifact storage and
> > curation on a really broad scale. In some parts of the country,
> > artifacts are examined in the field and not returned to the lab. In
> > some states, the official repository doesn't want to see debitage.
> > Some curators have developed an ability to completely overlook
> > anything large or inconvenient to store.
> >
> > To date, many curators and field archaeologists have devised methods
> > for reducing collection bulk, but the problem keeps growing. Let me
> > suggest that we are looking in the wrong places for a solution.
> >
> > To my way of thinking, the time has come to re-define the whole
> > universe of archaeological data collection. We have failed to contain
> > the problem of mushrooming complexity of physical and intellectual
> > control.
> >
> > The first thing we need to do is recognize that much of our attitude
> > toward curation has its roots in the era when most archaeologists
> > worked for museums, bringing in collections from the far corners of
> > the earth. The whole purpose of archaeology was to gather museum
> > objects.
> >
> > And so today museums continue to absorb expanding numbers of CRM
> > collections "in perpetuity," all the while complaining about space
> > problems. As the museums get bogged down, the collections become less
> > useful, thereby cancelling the original excuse for stashing
> > everything in museums in the first place.
> >
> > Maybe it's time to divorce the practice of archaeology from the
> > accumulation of museum objects, especially when the objects will never
>
> > be placed on display. How can this be done? Not simple, but essential
>
> > to survival in a world of tight budgets and tighter museum spaces.
> >
> > Can we apply a usefulness test? Useful to whom?
> > Can we charge for curation? Has this worked?
> > Can we select samples with more rigor?
> > Can we omit any artifact that is a standard product, well documented?
> > Can we accept for curation only those artifacts that contribute to a
> > site's eligibility for the National Register?
> >
> > These are questions without answers, but the answers definitely must
> > be forthcoming, or our whole system will collapse.
> >
> >
> > --
> >
> > [log in to unmask]
> >
> >
> > All aboard for a special session on ironmaking
> > at the Middle Atlantic Archaeological Conference,
> > Atlantic Sands Hotel, Rehoboth Beach, Delaware,
> > March 14, 2004. This will be a Sunday session devoted entirely to the
>
> > archaeology of early ironmaking in America.
> >
> > Go to WWW.MAACMIDATLANTICARCHAEOLOGY.ORG
> >
> > See you there!
> >
>
>
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