18th November 2013, 12:10 PM
Tool Wrote:This debate has been raging a while though, hasn't it: what role can those in the commercial sector take, if indeed they should take at all, to help convey that story and bring it alive to a wider audience. I still think this is the crux of so many problems that get mentioned in relation to the business of archaeology. Too much is kept in house, a secret for the select few. And then we wonder why politicians want to discount archaeology from the planning process, why the public don't notice when their heritage is being lost for good and why huge swathes of the population don't even know we exist. But is there an appetite to address this within the balance-sheet world of commercial archaeology?you might want to take a look at the ifa southport initiative. there is now widescale acceptance in the commercial sector that we must sort our house out. there does though remain a problem in that for the most part we will quote for the bare minimum if we want to win a tender. curators still do not require the kind of public involvement and outcomes that southport would realise.
If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers