16th March 2011, 01:39 PM
kevin wooldridge Wrote:But in these troubled times, I subscribe wholeheartedly to the Niemoller Principle (First they came for the CBA and I didn't speak out.....when they came for me there was no-one left to speak out!!) so I don't think that we can stand by and allow archaeology to be diminished by allowing bodies such as CBA to fail due to apathy...
I agree. Strategic merging of organisations to make them more efficient and combine to form more effective agendas is one thing. To simply lose organisations which have a significant profile both within and outside of the discipline or to see them have their hands ties behind their backs, certainly doesn't help archaeology or archaeologists (professional or amateur).
I think that there are far to many bodies in archaeology doing similar or subtly different things and diluting the real positive influence that could be exerted. I would like to see the situation simplified into a few really effective and representative organisations, and not sure I can justifiably maintain the stance that the CBA should definitely be one of those. Perhaps that is the view the British Academy has taken as well.
However, I also feel it would be much more beneficial to all of us as archaeologists if such winding-down or reduction in scope (if it were to amount to that - the silence is deafening) originated from a wider, well informed discussion that never really seems to have come to fruition since the emergence and expansion of the 80s.