Affiliation

When you type in “archaeology” or “archeology” in Google search, you find a plethora of web sites and pages (25 million and counting) but who actually produces these? Which groups within the larger archaeological community produce online content? Do they overlap? Do they work together? Are they interlinked?

Actually, a lot of these search results point to non-academic sources. Using for instance Clusty, a clustered metasearch site using primarily Microsoft’s Live and Ask.com search engines, the top domain clusters for “arch(a)eology” (out of 311 results) are:

• .com 32%;
• .org 23%;
• .edu 19%;
• .uk 12%;
• .gov 4%.

Of course, the .uk top domain is further subdivided into subdomains such as .co, .org, .ac, etc. Reallocating those results to their respective equivalent top domains however does not significantly alter the clustering pattern: .com 36% (commercial), .org 26% (non-profit), .edu 24% (academic) and .gov 5% (government). Note that professional organizations such as the Society for American Archaeology and the Archaeological Institute of America have non-profit domain names. The metasearch site Grokker uses the Yahoo! search engine and Wikipedia. A search for “arch(a)eology” yields 916 results which are grouped as follows:

• .org 55%;
• .com 17%;
• .edu 14%;
• .uk 4%;
• .gov 3%.

The non-profit sector is totally dominant in these results. The metasearch clusterings reflect the bias of the search engines used. Live.com gives preference to commercial sources while Yahoo! with its human-edited-directory background emphasizes non-profits. Let’s go back to the mother of all search engines, Google, and using the domain filter find how its results tally up:

• .com 38%;
• .org 10%;
• .uk 9%;
• .edu 8%;
• .gov 1%.

It is not really a surprise that Google prefers commercial sites too.

Specialization

Another way of looking at archaeologists at work online is according to “community” or specialization. There are societies and professional organizations catering to all these types of research of olden times. A community, which is a group of archaeologists with common research interests, can be based on the type of artifacts studied:

• archaeozoology:
  • e.g., International Council for Archaeozoology;
• archaeometallurgy:
  • e.g., ASM International, the Materials Information Society: formerly known as the American Society for Metals, mostly for metallurgists but also historians and archaeologists;
  • e.g., Historical Metallurgy Society: for UK historians and archaeologists;
• archaeobotany or palaeobotany:
  • e.g., International Organisation of Palaeobotany;
• lithic analysis:
  • e.g., Lithic Studies Society: UK;
• palynology or pollen anaysis:
  • e.g., International Federation of Palynological Societies;
• etc.

Other communities gather around a geographic area:

• Ancient Near Eastern archaeology:
  • e.g., American Schools of Oriental Research: US;
  • e.g., Japanese Society for West Asian Archaeology: Japan;
• Chinese archaeology:
  • e.g., Society for East Asian Archaeology: for archaeologists doing research on China, Korea & Japan;
• Dutch archaeology:
  • e.g., Nederlandse Vereniging van Archeologen;
• Connecticut archaeology:
  • e.g., Archaeological Society of Connecticut: US state;
• Scandinavian archaeology:
  • e.g., Scandinavian Society for Prehistoric Art;
• etc.

Still others are grouped in regard to time period:

• historical archaeology:
  • e.g., Society for Historical Archaeology: US;
• prehistoric archaeology:
  • e.g., Prehistoric Society: UK;
  • e.g., International Union for Prehistoric and Protohistoric Sciences;
• medieval archaeology:
  • e.g., Medieval Pottery Research Group;
• post-medieval archaeology:
  • e.g., Society for Post-Medieval Archaeology: UK;
• etc.

Furthermore, a combination of place and time (a culture or civilization) may define some archaeological researchers:

• Mesopotamian archaeology:
  • e.g., International Association for Assyriology: combines historians, linguists as well as archaeologists;
• Neolithic archaeology:
  • e.g., Neolithic Studies Group: Western Europe;
• Roman archaeology:
  • e.g., Association for Roman Archaeology: UK;
• Maya archaeology:
  • e.g., European Association of Mayanists: Europe, combines historians, linguists as well as archaeologists;
• etc.

A theme can cut across time periods and geography:

• maritime or nautical archaeology:
  • e.g., Nautical Archaeology Society: UK;
• subterranean archaeology:
  • e.g., Société Française d’Étude des Souterrains: France, combines speleologists, archaeologists and historians;
• disaster archaeology:
  • e.g., Society of Volcanic and Disaster Archaeology: Japan;
• etc.

Even methodology can lead to groupings:

• archaeometry:
  • e.g., Associazione Italiana di Archeometria: Italy;
• aerial archaeology:
  • e.g., Aerial Archaeology Research Group;
• environmental archaeology:
  • e.g., Association for Environmental Archaeology;
• physical sciences & archaeology:
  • e.g., Society for Archaeological Sciences;
• etc.

Finally, archaeologists identify with their employment status:

• CRM or cultural resource management (contract archaeology):
  • e.g., American Cultural Resources Association: combines archaeologists and cultural-heritage professionals
• academic & institutional archaeologists (universities, museums):
  • e.g., Society of Museum Archaeologists: UK
• government archaeologists:
  • e.g., National Association of State Archaeologists: US
• etc.

A good list of archaeological associations can be found on ArchNet.

* To be continued * — Part 2