21st March 2011, 01:01 PM
kevin wooldridge Wrote:I am not saying that any of those suggestions should not be part of a wide based campaign - but every aspect of those three suggestions screams 'Hobby, hobby, hobby'.....and surely what we need is to put across that archaeology is more than just a hobby; for many of us it is a profession, a university study option, a research field.
The vast majority of working archaeologists embrace hobbyists - sure, but the spending cuts are more likely to affect our abilities to work professionally within archaeology rather than our abilities to follow the subject as a hobby. But of course, this also affects the pursuit of archaeology as a hobby, though the closure of museums and archives, the withdrawal of educational resources, the lack of development of archaeology as an academic discipline, less books, less magazines, less articles, less specialisms, less access for hobbyists to verify their interest etc etc
they reach our core constituency - many of whom sit on councils, send off letters to elected members and generally make a fuss
in advertising the perilous state of our industry - dont we need to first reach and persuade the audience who has the most empathy - there are far more hobbyist than there are professionals