19th July 2011, 09:26 AM
Marcus Brody Wrote:This is very true. It often seems to be the case that the local society, which previously may have undertaken rescue excavations of this type, are unaware that professional contractors have been on site in advance of developments 'on their patch'. To an extent, this could be addressed by contractors taking the time to contact the relevant local society, just to let them know that some work is taking place.
It some times seems though they want to have their cake, eat it, and then eat someone elses' cake! Surely volunteers and community projects have the choice to target sites for more research orientated reasons, or do they feel a bit fobbed off now when once they were doing the very work now undertaken by professionals (although there can't be many still left from those days)? The lack of understanding is quite mind boggling, but this also extends to assumptions such as that all professional archaeologists are paid by the local council/EH/a university and so their jobs are not particularly threatened by volunteer labour (although these days that doesn't mean anything).