Archaeological Education

L’articolo descrive finalità e risultati delle indagini archeologiche condotte dall’Università di Udine ad Aquileia, sul sito delle c.d. ’Grandi Terme’, enorme edificio termale pubblico rimasto attivo dal IV alla fine del V secolo d.C. La prima parte chiarisce gli aspetti istituzionali e gli sviluppi della prima fase del progetto scientifico-didattico (2002-2014) e quelli del nuovo corso avviato dal 2016 con lo scavo in concessione dal Mibac e in collaborazione con la Fondazione Aquileia. La seconda parte riassume i principali contributi alla conoscenza dell’edificio derivanti dalle ricerche dell’Università di Udine e dalla rilettura degli scavi del ’900.
The archaeological excavations of the University of Udine at the Great Baths of Aquileia (2002-2018)
This paper describes aims and results of the archaeological investigations conducted by the University of Udine in Aquileia, on the site of the so called ’Great Baths’, a vast public thermal building remained active from the 4th to the end of the 5th century A.D. The first part explains the institutional aspects and developments of the first phase of the scientific-educational project (2002-2014) and those of the new course started in 2016 with the excavation concession from the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and in collaboration with the Aquileia Foundation. The second part summarises the main contributions to the knowledge of the building deriving from the research of the University of Udine and from the re-reading of the 20th century excavations.

Chapter: Reflecting on the past and future of curation in archaeology, this chapter summarizes some of the challenges, victories, and paths forward for curation, emphasizing education and community outreach as critical mechanisms of change.

Book: All archaeologists have responsibilities to support the collections they produce, yet budgeting for and managing collections over the length of a project and beyond is not part of most archaeologists' training. While this book highlights major challenges that archaeologists and curators face with regards to collections, it also stresses the values, uses, and benefits of collections. It also demonstrates the continued significance of archaeological collections to the profession, tribes, and the public and provides critical resources for archaeologists to carry out their responsibilities. Many lament that the archaeological record is finite and disappearing. In this context, collections are even more important to preserve for future use, and this book will help all stakeholders do so.

What happens when you are asked to run a learning programme for young people on a community archaeology project, at the very last minute and with minimal resources? This paper is an overview and critical review of the programme that we and some of our students coordinated for a group of local children in the village of Villanueva de Santo Adriano, Asturias, Spain. It describes the planning and delivery of the five-day programme of activities, some of them standard fare for archaeological education and others improvised or designed for this specific site and excavation project. The paper looks at the feedback and aftermath of the project, including a shocking episode of vandalism, and reflects on the lessons and outcomes of the project.

Because archaeology is an applied field that is best learned experientially, it is ideally suited to integrating community service learning (CSL) into its curriculum. And yet, as Nassaney has recently noted, archaeological pedagogy has changed little since the 1960s. The lack of pedagogical reform within the discipline has received significant criticism in the last decade. For example, Fagan has argued that it is no longer acceptable “for an archaeologist to be trained in purely academic and fieldwork skills” and Bender and Smith have called on professional archaeologists to reevaluate the college curriculum in which we train students to enter the profession.  Their volume offers numerous avenues for redirecting curricula, but despite archaeology’s natural fit, CSL is surprisingly not among them. Nassaney and Levine’s recent volume Archaeology and Community Service Learning seeks to remedy this oversight and provides numerous case studies detailing the benefits of integrating service learning in archaeological curricula.  This paper seeks to add to the emerging literature on this topic by illustrating the ways in which archaeology students can benefit from integrating not just CSL, but also library research and information literacy into the curriculum as well.

The teaching of and about archaeology is a subject of global interest. As a subject, archaeology has the potential to both engage the public in the study of the past and to also increase awareness of environmental and cultural heritage preservation. As a mode of teaching, archaeological thinking is an educational tool in itself, creating a learning environment which is instantly engaging (Bartoy 2012: 558) and introducing subject matter which is broadly relatable. Several educational tools and techniques are used in archaeology to enhance its educational role (Ducady et al. 2016), including teaching reasoning ability in combination with an understanding of, and respect for, cultural diversity and tolerance. Notwithstanding these significant benefits, archaeology remains underutilized within a global context within both secondary and tertiary teaching, with many archaeologists underestimating its educational role (Henson 2004).

Public outreach in archaeology can have a valuable impact on education, culture, society and even on the economy. However, it should not be relegated to the addendum of our research projects. Here we present two case studies that the authors have been actively involved in where outreach was a central part of the investigations. Following this, we outline a basic framework for conducting outreach in both the short- and long-term. While these are not perfect examples, they are intended to get archaeologists, as a community, thinking about the real and practical implications of conducting public outreach. Beyond the educational value, it is important to recognize the economic implication of our work to local communities. If we do not communicate the value of our research, then we have only ourselves to blame.

In 2017, the TWLCRM Initiative undertook a series of critical site preservation and presentation interventions to help ensure the temple remains safe, accessible, and comprehensible for years to come. ACOR also continued to work closely with the TWLCRM local team to grow the “Experience Petra” program, a first-of-its-kind, hands-on learning experience that has engaged hundreds of Jordanian school children as well as scores of foreign visitors in Jordan’s rich cultural heritage. The project has benefited from financial support from the U.S. Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation (AFCP) and the USAID Sustainable Cultural Heritage Through Engagement of Local Communities Project (SCHEP), as implemented by ACOR, and from the collaboration and support of the Department of Antiquities (DOA) of Jordan and the Petra Development and Tourism Region Authority (PDTRA).

Public outreach in archaeology can have a valuable impact on education, culture, society and even on the economy. However, it should not be relegated to the addendum of our research projects. Here we present two case studies that the authors have been actively involved in where outreach was a central part of the investigations. Following this, we outline a basic framework for conducting outreach in both the short- and long-term. While these are not perfect examples, they are intended to get archaeologists, as a community, thinking about the real and practical implications of conducting public outreach. Beyond the educational value, it is important to recognize the economic implication of our work to local communities. If we do not communicate the value of our research, then we have only ourselves to blame.

in Gli dei degli Altri. Culti non latini nella Lombardia romana. a cura di Filippo Maria Gambari e Cristina Miedico, Gravellona Toce 2016, pp. 13-24
L’interazione continua tra popoli e culture diverse è generalmente più evidente nelle aree costiere, ma anche le Alpi erano in antico assai più pervie di quanto riusciamo ad immaginare oggi e il Po con tutti i suoi affluenti, ha sempre portato nella Regio XI tutto ciò che viaggiava sul mare, merci e persone. Il patrimonio archeologico lombardo comprende reperti, opere e strumenti che appartengono a epoche e culture molto lontane nel tempo e nello spazio, che possono fornire argomenti inattesi sui temi dell’intercultura e rivelare elementi comuni nelle radici storiche di ciascuno di noi. Anche un piccolo Museo, sostenuto dall’Amministrazione comunale e grazie alla collaborazione della Soprintendenza, della Regione, e del Polo Museale può divenire un’istituzione culturale in grado di produrre ricerca e stimolare argomenti di riflessione, e può così condurre ad una reale crescita culturale e a favorire il benessere sociale della comunità in cui sorge.

Abstract Frequent interaction between different peoples and cultures diverse is generally more evident in coastal regions, but the Alps too were more permeable in ancient times than we might think today, and the Po and its tributaries brought sea traffic – people and goods – into the Regio XI. Lombardy’s archaeological heritage includes artworks, tools and other objects that belong to cultures widely separated in both time and space, and which offer unexpected evidence with regard to intercultural relations, revealing shared features in the historical roots of each one of us. Even a small museum, maintained by the local council and operating in collaboration with the Archaeology Superintendency, regional administration, and Museums Group may function as a cultural institution able to undertake research and stimulate debate, and thus create genuine cultural growth and contribute to the social well-being of the community that surrounds it.

Il Civico Museo Archeologico di Angera (Va), in stretta collaborazione con la Soprintendenza Archeologia della Lombardia, grazie al co-finanziamento di Regione Lombardia e con il patrocinio del Polo Museale della Lombardia, ha avviato per il triennio 2016-2018 un progetto di ricerca, promozione e valorizzazione culturale dal titolo Il Museo e gli Altri, Il percorso ha come oggetto appunto gli altri, nel tentativo di individuare, spiegare e mettere in luce gli innumerevoli segni della presenza di genti non native nel territorio lombardo già a partire da più di tre millenni or sono. Obiettivo delle ricerche scientifiche svolte nel 2016 raccolte in questo volume sono Gli Dei degli Altri, ossia i culti non latini presenti anticamente nell'area lombarda. Il volume è stato curato da Filippo Maria Gambari e da Cristina Miedico. Oltre ai loro, trovano spazio i contributi di Anna Consonni, Anna Volontè, Anna Maria Fedeli, Eliana Sedini e Francesco Muscolino.
136 pagine illustrate.
ISBN 978 88 908315 4 6

A teaching high school ICT scenario about the Athenian Agora and its uses in the past and the present

Οι μαθητές / τριες γνωρίζουν την Αγορά της κλασικής Αθήνας ως τοπίο, αλλά και ως χώρο στον οποίο συναιρούνται μηνύματα και συμβολισμοί της αθηναϊκής πολιτείας και της ιδεολογίας της. Οι ομάδες τους προσεγγίζουν, συνεπώς, τα μνημεία της σε μια πρώτη φάση ανάλογα με το τι συμβολίζουν και τα μηνύματα που μεταφέρουν σε δημόσιο πολιτικό, θρησκευτικό και οικονομικό επίπεδο. Στη δεύτερη φάση οι παραπάνω συμβολισμοί και μηνύματα συνδέονται με την ιστορική εξέλιξη της Αγοράς και μεταφέρονται στο σήμερα με τη διερεύνηση του τι μπορεί να σημαίνει η Αρχαία Αγορά της Αθήνας σήμερα. Το τελικό προϊόν της εργασίας των μαθητών/τριών - μια ψηφιακή παρουσίαση ή ένας οδηγός που θα αναρτηθεί στα κοινωνικά δίκτυα όπου έχουν πρόσβαση οι περισσότεροι νέοι σήμερα - μπορεί να είναι το αποτέλεσμα κάθε ομάδας ή ένα συνολικό πόνημα το οποίο μπορεί να συζητηθεί στην ολομέλεια της τάξης με χρήση του διαδραστικού πίνακα, όπου υπάρχει, για ανατροφοδότηση, σχόλια, επισημάνσεις, τροποποιήσεις, προσαρμογές και τελική σύνταξη ενός νέου ψηφιακού πόρου με βάση το έργο κάθε ομάδας.