Cool - the list is awake! Just wanted to say that I thought Griggs, Mouer,
Abernathy et al.'s responses were great food for thought.
 
I should not go on speaking for the author of the New Orleans paper, who
is either not listening or thoroughly intimidated, but my point was that
they were NOT extrapolating.  The project the work was based on covered
23 privies, not one.
 
Now, the author may have selected one particularly rich or typical privy
to discuss in the conference paper and may have, as a result given a poor
impression.  As a narrative device, however, using one privy to illustrate a
point is probably a lot more interesting than listening to a statistical
analysis of 23 privies.  I suppose the trick is to hint enough in the
story-telling process that there is additional data to back up the story.
Then, those interesting in the long version can ask for the report
or written paper. 20 minutes isn't alot of time to be both entertaining and
convincing and certainly, some people are better at it than others.
Another option I guess would be for us all to throw in an obligatory CHI
Square into every talk to make sure the prehistorians in the audience
don't throw tomatoes.
 
-- Shannon Lee Dawdy
Greater New Orleans Archaeology Program
University of New Orleans