By Chiara Zuanni (University of Manchester) Last month I had the opportunity to participate in the annual conference of the DGUF (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Ur- und Frühgeschichte e.V. – German Association for Pre- and Protohistory). This year’s theme focused on public archaeology and aimed to explore the possibilities and consequences of public involvement with the past. During the two days which comprised the academic programme, many different aspects of community archaeology, citizen science, and archaeological communication projects were explored. On Friday, Sylvia Crumbach unpacked the relationship between re-enactment groups and textile archaeologists: she argued that while both develop a great expertise in ancient clothing, it remains to be understood how museum reconstruction and images affect re-enactment costumes, and vice versa. The controversies raised by public approaches to archaeological work were highlighted in the afternoon, by two papers discussing metal detec...
by Daniel García Raso , Independent Researcher The past has always been a great source of inspiration for different cultural and artistic genres such as cinema, literature, television and, of course, video games. We can always find mistakes or inaccuracies from a strictly heuristic point of view (after all, the number of works that accurately reflect the past can be counted on the fingers of one hand). In video games, Prehistory and History have been the starting point for numerous titles and, unlike other games in which the past has been used as context, it has occasionally been represented in a more than acceptable way (for example, in the Age of Empires series or in the saga Assasin's Creed ). However, most titles present a stereotypical portrayal of Prehistory where, to begin with, even dinosaurs appear! A work like Far Cry Primal , by the French producer Ubisoft, was necessary. The game puts us in the skin of Takkar, a member of the Wenja tribe, who i...
Just a couple of lines to welcome you to this new research journal devoted to Public Archaeology . “AP: Online Journal in Public Archaeology” is a brand new peer-reviewed journal devoted exclusively to Public Archaeology. Edited by JAS Arqueología S.L., it will be freely distributed online in order to ensure full access to the discussion and spread of a growing stream that is starting to settle into everyday archaeological practice, as it should. The definition of Public Archaeology is still too broad to even talk about a consensus on it. This call for papers is not going to be a place to discuss about that, but the aim of the journal is to be able to delve into every issue related to the field. The limit of the definition is slightly clear. Archaeology is generally understood as the study of past societies from their remains, and Public Archaeology is the study of the relations between this Archaeology and Society in every aspect of daily life (social, economic and po...
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