This is just a short post to let people know about my friend Dr. Michael Rivera's new adventure - The Arch & Anth Podcast! Michael is a biological anthropologist who studies human behaviour through skeletal remains. He's started the podcast - going out three times a week - because he's passionate about science communication, archaeology,... Continue Reading →
Blog
Skills Shortage! Or The Replicator’s Conceit
Experimental archaeology has run as a thread throughout my postgraduate studies, and I’ve conducted a number of different types of experiments on Pleistocene hunting weapons. Something that was clear early on in designing my experiments is that we have a present-day skills shortage in terms of how humans used early hunting spears. Once upon a... Continue Reading →
What’s in a name? Defining prehistoric weaponry
I have researched Palaeolithic weapons for almost 10 years and (miraculously) I still love writing and talking about them. I've written up some basics below on prehistoric weaponry, including some definitions, classifications, and a few archaeological 'firsts'. But I want to think very briefly first why we need these definitions and classifications. We use definitions... Continue Reading →
Tiwi throwing spears
For better or for worse (a bit of both I think), ethnographic research and ethnohistoric accounts have played an important role in how we have interpreted the archaeological signatures that people from the past have left behind. This is nowhere more true than the study of how recent hunter-gatherer groups have manufactured, curated, and used... Continue Reading →
Normalising ‘Doctor mummy’
A few years into my PhD I read a post by a researcher whose blog I enjoy. He was finishing his own doctorate, and in the post suggested that during a PhD a healthy work-life balance and successful relationships are nearly impossible. This bore little resemblance to my own experience, which involved undertaking a PhD... Continue Reading →
