past personality

Latest on the excavations of Binchester Roman town – [Link] David Petts has posted an x-ray made by Jenny Jones of one of the artifacts found this summer – [Link] It didn’t look like much when it was found. It turns out to be a stylus – for writing on wax tablets. Evidence for literacy…

Science is Culture

My conversation, back in 2007, with artist Lynn Hershman Leeson about artifacts, memory, art, forensics, archaeology appears today in a new collection – “Science is Culture: Conversations at the New Intersection of Science and Society” [Link] Seed magazine brings together a unique gathering of prominent scientists, artists, novelists, philosophers + other thinkers who are tearing…

VINOVIVM

Update – a revised version now appears at – https://mshanks.com/2011/01/archaeological-research-at-the-edge-of-empire/ We are starting to plan for our excavations next summer of Binchester Roman town in the north of England. Here is a short news item about this last summer, released yesterday. July 2010 was the second archaeological field season for the Binchester Project. We are…

Archaeology in risk society

Chris Witmore and I have a paper in “Unquiet Pasts” – the new book from Ashgate edited by Stephanie Koerner and Ian Russell – [Link] It is my latest presentation of the argument for a living past, a transitive past, tied now to a call for attention to matters of common and pressing human concern….

Design, RES and RESPUBLICA

In Tokyo for EPIC – Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference. 6th edition. [Link] Some summary points from my keynote. How could I not respond to Kenya Hara’s wonderful opening keynote and his emphasis on the dialectic of making and its deep connection with human being? [Link] The range of research techniques and methods that I…