Arkdis workshop on Digital Agendas at Linnaeus University

During the 3 and 4 of June 2014 the Arkdis research group met in Växjö, Sweden, to discuss how digital agendas at different levels affect the digitization process of archaeology. Invited presenters during the workshop were Annelie Ekelin, Linnaeus University, Annelie Krell, Region Skåne, Karl Magnus Lenntorp, Region Skåne, Maria Casagrande, Skånes Hembygdsförbund, and Björn Magnusson Staaf, Lund University. The presentations held were on topics such as digital agendas on a European, national and regional/local level, on how digital approaches are supported by regional authorities and on how the support is realized in different projects and presentations. One thing that was elucidated during the workshop was that agendas affect the outcomes in both predicted and unpredicted ways. As a result of this workshop our research group is now preparing for a written debate on the topic of digital agendas and archaeology/cultural heritage.

Archiving archaeology: Preliminary observations from a stakeholder study

The question of archiving, preserving and providing access to the outcomes of archaeological investigations has received more and more interest during the past decade. Considerable investments have been made in creating technologies, infrastructures and standards for digitalisation, preservation and dissemination of archaeological heritage. In contrast to the technical and infrastructural work, there is very little in-depth empirical research on the consequences, opportunities and implications of digitalisation to archaeological work, the emergence of archaeological knowledge and how it is used by diverse stakeholder groups of archaeological archives.

To gather empirical evidence, I conducted a study of the Swedish stakeholders of archaeological archiving has been conducted under the auspices of the ARKDIS project. A preliminary analysis of the interview records (N=16) of professionals working with archaeological archiving show that there are multiple technical, legislative, conceptual and structural problems that complicate the building, management and use of archaeological archives. The interviewees were chosen on the basis of a combination of selective sampling and snowballing (letting informants to indicate new possible informants).

Perhaps the most pressing problem discussed by all interviewees was the complexity of how  archaeological archiving is organised in Sweden. Archaeological heritage management and fieldwork involves a large number of actors and especially when it come to the management of digital information and primary research data, the responsibilities between different actors including the National Heritage Board, county administrative boards, archaeology contractors and the national and regional museums are not clearly defined. In practice, many actors keep large archives of data and documents and are waiting for someone to tell them what to do with them. A simpler process with clearer responsibilities would undoubtedly make a significant contribution to improving the general situation.

The complexity of the process has another consequence. At the moment, many actors are forced to work in relative silos. It is difficult to know what other stakeholders are doing with the produced documentation and what would be their actual information needs. From this perspective, it would be important to take carefully into account the needs of contractors, different types of researchers, research data curators, regional and national heritage administrators, archivists, finds managers and other stakeholders in the society when revising and developing the archiving and information process in Swedish archaeology. It seems that a shared and more tangible idea of the products and outcomes of archaeological operations and information  together with a clearer idea of customerships (i.e. who needs the information we are producing and how we can provide more meaningful information for other stakeholders) and supply-chain management (the process of producing, managing and using archaeological information in the society) could form a basis for a more robust and meaningful information production, management and archiving process.

In developing this understanding, it seems also relevant to put a special emphasis on how the different institutions and actors are working in practice with the production and management of archaeological information. A certain abstract consensus of the importance of documenting and preserving archaeological information and its significance aspects was shared by all informants, but when the discussion shifted to the everyday practicalities of working with archiving archaeology, the abstract consensus tended to turn to a broad range of not always entirely compatible practices. A finds administrator put specific emphasis on the management of finds, contractor to the practicalities of field work and an archivists on the details of the administrative process in ways that do not necessarily end up in a consistent corpus of records.

These highly preliminary first observations of the interview data will be complemented in the near future and reported in formal and more detailed publications in the near future. Slides and an abstract of a presentation held at the CAA 2014 conference can be found on the web.

What is going on in digital archaeology?

Isto and Daniel are at the moment at the annual Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods conference (CAA 2014) in Paris. The conference gathered this time around 400 archaeologists and archaeology interested researchers and practitioners from other disciplines to discuss on-going practical work and some glimpses of the state-of-the-art of digital, computational and informational aspects of archaeology. In addition to the long-time favourite topics of the conference, GIS and 3D, this year there was a rather notable presence of the papers relating to the historical and theoretical issues of archaeological computing (commemorating the work of late Jean-Claude Gardin) and another track on agent-based modelling. Open and linked data were also present both in the titles and the contents of many papers.

Isto presented a stakeholder analysis of archaeological archiving in Sweden titled Process and appropriation in the digitalisation of archaeological archives and archiving practices. The abstract of the presentation is below:

In contrast to the considerable investments in creating technologies, infrastructures and standards for digitalisation, preservation and dissemination of archaeological heritage, there is still only little indepth research on the consequences, opportunities and implications of digitalisation to archaeological work, the emergence of archaeological knowledge and how it is used by diverse stakeholder groups from ordinary citizens to researchers, museum professionals, landowners and property developers. Apart from the excavating or prospecting archaeologist with a personal experience of a particular site, the principal source of information for other stakeholders is the 'archaeological archive'. There are on-going national and international (e.g. ARCHES-project and the archives workgroup of European Archaeologiae Consilium) initiatives to standardise archiving practices in archaeology and a relative long albeit somewhat slender line of theoretical and practice oriented research on the topic (e.g., Merriman and Swain, 1999; Swain, 2006; Brown, 2011; Lucas, 2010). What is lacking, but would support the practical work and to contextualise earlier theoretical openings, is a broader empirical understanding of the everyday premises of how archaeological archives are managed in practice and how archiving is and is not related to the development of archaeological information systems, databases and archaeological information management practices.

The presentation reports of a Swedish interview study that explicates and maps the work practices and perspectives of the primary stakeholders of archaeological archives. The analysis of the interview records show that there are multiple technical, legislative, conceptual and structural problems that complicate the building, management and use of archaeological archives. Privatisation of archaeological fieldwork, the diversity of involved actors, and often diverging practical and statutory requiments and responsibilities of preserving different types of materials. Further, the digitisation and growth of the amount documentation material has brought demands for effective means of capturing and preserving new forms of data, but also a need to reconsider the concepts of “archaeological archive” and ”archaeological data”, and their functions in archaeology and the society as a whole. The analysis shows that the different actors appropriate (as e.g., in Ramiller and Chiasson, 2008; Twidale et al., 2008) rather than share or even translate the ideas of archaeological information process, archaeological data and archives from a widely different premises to fit their urgent priorities. The findings have several both theoretical and practical implication to the mapping of the digitalising archaeological information processes from the perspectives of different stakeholder groups, standardisation and documentation of current practices and clearer definition of responsibilities, explicit allocation of budgets for archival tasks and the explicit acknowledgement of the diversity of how archaeological information is produced, archived and used.

ARKDIS in Birmingham

The last visit of the ARKDIS tour in the UK was hosted at Digital Humanities Hub at the University of Birmingham by Vince Gaffney and Henry Chapman. We spent the day by learning of each others' work at a mini-conference where both ARKDIS and Birmingham researchers presented their recent and on-going work. We had several common interests from the methodological issues of GIS and landscape archaeology to 3D modelling and management of archaeological data. The presentations also showed clearly that the state-of-the-art of digital methods in archaeology is about combining solid theory and solid research questions.

ICP, CDH and ADS

ARKDIS in York

The ARKDIS tour has continued from Manchester to York. In Manchester, at the Institute for Cultural Practices, University of Manchester we were hosted by Dr. Kostas Arvanitis together with his colleagues. We had an opportunity to hear about each others research at a morning seminar. Kostas Arvanitis told about his highly interesting and theoretically ambitious work on museums and everyday life in the context of several different projects. Professor Stuart Campbell gave an overview of virtual worlds of archaeology (an excellent concept for describing the emerging virtual/digital context of archaeological research) and data archiving efforts in a series of field projects in the Middle East.

Campbell Price gave a brief but very informative overview of blogging at the Manchester Museum in his role as a curator for Egypt and the Sudan. Doctoral student Chiara Zuanni described her very promising study of visitors' and staff views of the permanent exhibition of archaeology at the Manchester Museum. Already the early results demonstrated clearly a number of conceptual and perceptual differences. Finally, Professor Sian Jones gave a talk of her work on ACCORD project on promoting community engagement in heritage using hands-on 3D modelling as a way of involving the public in interpreting artefacts.

In York, ARDKIS met Gareth Beale from the Centre for Digital Heritage (a collaborative initiative between York, Uppsala, Aarhus and Leiden described already earlier in this blog), and Holly Wright, professor Julian Richards and Katie Green from the Archaeology Data Service who gave us an informative overview of the activities of the institution and the state-of-the-art of archaeological data archiving in the UK.

ARKDIS in the UK

ARKDIS project is touring this week in the UK visiting colleagues and sites in Manchester, York and Birmingham areas. The trip started from the Manchester Museum where were kindly hosted by Bryan Sitch and Campbell Price with a tour to the Archaeology and Egyptian galleries spiced with very insightful reflections on the process of creating the current exhibitions and work for increasing both digital and non-digital engagement with the collections using a broad range of different approaches. The fundamental questions were and still are how to communicate with the public, how make the interactions 'natural' and engage the visitors beyond superficial admiration of objects.

Public access to results of federally funded research - an American perspective on a transnational issue

What do researchers, activists and politicians mean when  advocating for "open access" or "public access" to research data and publications? Which are the information policy arguments behind the advocacy and which implications follow higher demands on openness and access to research results and data?

Friday 14th of March Clifford Lynch (ph.D, adj. prof.) held a seminar at UC Berkeley School of Information on public access of results of federally funded research. Archaeology, being one of the areas receiving substantial funding from federal government and furthermore often being conducted by, or within a context of, government departments is directly affected by the policy development on "openness".

In his talk Lynch pointed to several of the complexities in and due to the current policy development, such as the lack of sufficiently developed storage solutions and data management plans - a lot of actors wants openness and access, but not as many wants to set up sufficient management systems. Moreover as is clear within archaeology, the information policy and related practices are international challenges circumscribed by national policy and administrative constraints.

Further reading by Clifford Lynch on the challenges in the curation of scholarly data.