Carl:
With reference to your communication, you have made some GOOD 
points!! The water mill site I was refering to was built in 1836 as 
the first community in a Texas County. I identified the site as a 
multicultural site due to the positive habitation by humans for 
20,000 yrs. The site was researched as a "Historical Site" to begin 
with. Some person in the future a lot younger than I can now revisit 
and look deeper for the Unknown prehistoric phase of the area.

Thanks for your input.
DTP



At 03:31 PM 7/18/2007, you wrote:
>A few random notes on the academic type question
>
>First, I refuse to address a thread titled "Hysterical Archaeology" The  term
>is has long been used as an insult in my neck of the woods.
>
>Robert Schuyler's Historical Anthropology is a much better estimation of
>what I think we should be doing. As far as what we study under the 
>historical
>archaeology umbrella I would say it is the archaeology of 
>Colonialism. Everyone
>it touched is a subject. I think we realized back in the 70s that there were
>a  lot of people in the colonies of all origins who were illiterate. Thus
>writing  has nothing to do with it.
>
>The reason I like to think of myself as an anthropologist is that it makes
>anything humans do (or use) fair game for study. We are not restricted to a
>particular set of resources, Thus it liberates us from disciplinary bounds..
>Calling it historical anthropology simply emphasizes the historical aspect
>
>Re: the CRM issue, One of the only things I really liked that Ian Hodder  did
>in the 1980s was his book :Archaeology as long term land use history"
>Actually I mainly like the title, because it describes what I have to do at
>virtually every site I excavate. Though not a CRM project, the 
>Johannes Kolb  site
>(38da75.com) is a perfect example. I was interested in a 1730s frontier
>settler. Unfortunately he settled on one of the only habitable 
>landforms in the
>area, because people were there 12000 years before him, and 200 
>years afterward.
>Nobody can be an expert in everything, but you do at least have to give each
>component the respect it deserves. It has always struck me as a shame when
>good  sites get dug by unqualified people, but then, the people reviewing the
>reports  usually aren't experts either. What's the solution?
>
>Re: the original question. Though I agree that historical archaeologists
>should be as good historians as they are archaeologists, I'd say 
>that putting
>one in a history department - unless its just a four or five person 
>department-
>would be a waste of the person and their hopes for tenure. As a non academic
>(from the outside) I see a lot of boundary drawing, and boundaries have to be
>  protected. If you want more soldiers you have to promote from within...
>
>time for a beer. You have one too, if you'd like...
>
>Carl Steen
>
>
>
>
>
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