TO HISTARCHers concerned with collections curation, and any archaeologists
who generate, process, manage or research collections (that's just about
everyone) : 

 

At the upcoming SHA meetings in Austin there will be a working Forum aimed
at introducing a new collections assessment framework, intended to address
the urgent needs of all of us who are faced with full repositories, lack of
financial support for ongoing curation, and/or difficult decisions about
future excavation assemblages. As a preliminary step, the team has reviewed
the current ethical environment in which we operate, and has produced a
background "position paper" which is posted on the SHA website (password not
needed) at  http://www.sha.org/research_resources/collections_management.cfm
This is intended to provide a summary of the stewardship issues behind
curation and suggest a more realistic interpretation of our
responsibilities; for your information, the site also lists a number of
links to other societies' Ethics statements, various organizations'
collections policies, and a small bibliography. Our aim is to work towards
the production of a series of "checklists" to be used with a range of
collections, based on a stable set of evaluation questions that can guide
archeologists towards responsible management decisions. We expect to discuss
and develop these tools further at the Forum, and based on your input will
continue to develop them over the coming months. We therefore welcome your
collaboration, and depend on your collective experience and expertise. There
is general agreement that we need a decision-making framework urgently, and
at least this is a start. 

 

Even if you are not attending the SHA meetings, we encourage you to read the
background paper on the website. We will be updating HISTARCHers
periodically in future and will share our ongoing results. Please feel free
to email the Forum co-chairs below for more information.

 

Regards,

 

Giovanna Vitelli ([log in to unmask])

Mark Warner ([log in to unmask])