Under-Representation in Contemporary Archaeology
many forms: it can relate to gender and ethnic diversity, but it can also refer to different types of archaeology, such as academic versus contract, general versus specialist, or to types of research theme, such as ‘big issues’ versus more detailed studies. Issues of under-representation, in various guises, have taxed me through my career in archaeology. That career began as a female, prehistoric ceramics specialist working in UK Contract Archaeology, followed by various university teaching and/or research posts. With a knowledge of both commercial and academic archaeological employment contexts and traditions of enquiry, it seems to me that UK frameworks of archaeological employment, study and research remain retrograde in failing to evenly support the working lives of all archaeologists in equal ways. The spectrums of expertise and research frameworks that archaeology can potentially encompass are not all equally facilitated. Quite simply some approaches, styles of archaeology and skills tend to be more highly valued than others. Dominant modes of research and interpretative frameworks, be they choices of individuals, or relating to projects or institutional traditions, have some role in influencing what is traditionally supported by academic, grant-giving and professional structures. It is important to assess the extent to which such structures have differentially privileged specific forms of research and career trajectories. There has been a tendency to create binary oppositions such as between what might be characterised as focused, ‘big issue’ research that speedily accretes a clear trajectory and perhaps a career of diverse, albeit possibly complimentary pathways, which moves at a more patchy pace. Differing approaches should not be in competition with each other. Questioning prevailing assumptions and maintaining multiple perspectives should both sustain more diverse and nuanced career trajectories and be more accommodating of personal circumstances, diversity of skills, and different ways of ‘doing things’. Likewise, the co-existence of multiple interpretative strands and work traditions maximises the skills and situations of all contributors to archaeology and leads to a richer understanding of the human pasts that they are engaged in understanding. I would hope that these statements are self-evident, but such an ethos necessitates more than just ‘letting things be’. It requires alertness to what and who is underrepresented in the working structures, foci and interpretative frameworks of contemporary archaeology. It aims for a greater richness and diversity in practicing archaeology and in accommodating what archaeology can do. This is the basis of what is briefly touched upon below using only some selected areas of concern. I Forum
Gender and medieval archaeology: storming the castle
Abstract Despite more than three decades of feminist critique, archaeological scholarship remains predominantly focused on the exploration of patriarchal narratives and is, therefore, complicit in reinforcing structural inequalities. Questions must be asked of how the construction of archaeological knowledge affects representation and impacts upon our ‘archaeologies’. This article explores the relative absence of gendered approaches within archaeology through the lens of later medieval archaeology, with a micro-focus on castle studies in Britain and Ireland. Are there reasons for the silence in relation to gender in the archaeology of the later Middle Ages, and what lessons are there for bringing about a more inclusive archaeology?
Broadcasting Freedom: Radio, War, and the Politics of Race, 1938-1948
The World War II era represented the golden age of radio as a broadcast medium in the United States; it also witnessed a rise in African-American activism against racial segregation and discrimination, especially as they were practised by the federal government itself. In this study, the author links these cultural and political forces by showing how African-American activists, public officials, intellectuals, and artists sought to access and use radio to influence a national debate about racial inequality. Drawing on a body of national public affairs programming about African-Americans and race relations, the author uses these radio shows to demonstrate the emergence of a new national discourse about race and ethnicity, racial hatred and injustice, and the contribution of racial and immigrant populations to the development of the United States. These programmes, Savage contends, challenged the nation to reconcile its professed egalitarian ideals with its unjust treatment of black Americans and other minorities. This examination of radio's treatment of race as a national political issue also provides important evidence that the campaigns for racial justice in the 1940s served as an essential, and still overlooked, precursor to the civil rights campaigns of the 1950s and 1960s, Savage argues. The next battleground would be in the South, and on television.