Reproducibility in the Field: Transparency, Version Control and Collaboration on the Project Panormos Survey

Cited by 17 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 30 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Indeed, there is a longstanding tradition in archaeology of publishing catalogues, lists and maps showing the data used for analyses. Empirical reproducibility has always been prominent in archaeological research as we can see from the value placed on re-examining museum collections, re-excavating old sites, and reusing previously published data (Strupler & Wilkinson 2017).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tool-Driven Revolutions in Archaeological Science

Schmidt

Marwick

2020

Journal of Computer Applications in Archaeology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

IntroductionIn this paper we investigate recent developments which are facilitating computational archaeology's return to fundamental principles of the scientific method. We ask whether this might be the beginning of a broader change in the field. Revolutions or paradigm-shifts in archaeology have been proposed to occur following major theoretical statements (Clark 1993;Härke 2002), but there is an argument among philosophers of science whether revolutions in science are idea-driven or tool-driven (Dyson 2000;Galison 1997). This argument motivated us to explore how the disciplines of ecology and archaeology have started to embrace tools that improve the reproducibility of research. We focus on one set of tools for this change, based on writing data analysis scripts in free and open source programming languages, exemplified by R, and the practice of sharing of these scripts. We focus on R because our prior observations indicate it is by far the most common scripting language used by ecologists and archaeologists. Bibliometric evidence shows a strong increase in the use of R among ecologists and the beginning of a similar development in archaeology. We evaluate how approaches to improving reproducibility and transparency in archaeology are mediated and transformed by digital approaches and propose these might reflect a tool-driven change in archaeology. Acknowledging that this is not a simple process, we offer an R-based tool to ease the task of creating a compen-dium which enables other researchers to reproduce the published results.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tool-Driven Revolutions in Archaeological Science

Schmidt

Marwick

2020

Journal of Computer Applications in Archaeology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Indeed, there is a longstanding tradition in archaeology of publishing catalogues, lists and maps showing the data used for analyses. Empirical reproducibility has always been prominent in archaeological research as we can see from the value placed on reexamining museum collections, re-excavating old sites, and reusing previously published data (Strupler et al 2017).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These sciences also show a trend of increased emphasis on reproducibility, with journals changing their data and code availability policies to require code and data to be peer reviewed and available alongside articles (Stodden et al 2013). Also in archaeology, funding agencies are increasingly showing interest in open science methods and transparency (Strupler et al 2017).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tool-driven Revolutions in Archaeological Science

Schmidt¹,

Marwick²

2019

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

There is an argument in philosophy of science that revolutions in science are either ideas-driven or tool-driven. We explore this debate in light of recent efforts by many scientific disciplines to embrace methods to improve the reproducibility of their research. One of the most profound changes driven by this concern for reproducibility and transparency is from analysing data using tools dependent on pointing-and-clicking with a mouse in commercial software, to a new set of tools based on writing scripts in free and open source programming languages. We present bibliometric evidence for this change in the sciences generally and in archaeology in particular to test if the adoption of these new tools may be considered a revolution or some other process. We identify a citation effect for papers that use code. We discuss how computational approaches to improving reproducibility and transparency in archaeology are mediated and transformed by the use of code.

show abstract

“…Project-based archaeological data are likely managed on a combination of personal computers, portable external data storage devices and, where available, allocated data storage in the scholar's institution. Archaeologists are increasingly interested in sharing research documentation and workflows (Marwick 2018) as well as research data on Web-platforms such as GitHub (Strupler and Wilkinson 2017), efforts that are sustained with dedicated institutional resources.…”

Section: Database Management and Data Practices In Canadian Archaeologymentioning

confidence: 99%

What We See, What We Don’t See: Data Governance, Archaeological Spatial Databases and the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in an Age of Big Data

Gupta

Blair

Nicholas

2020

Journal of Field Archaeology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Archaeological spatial databases have the potential to enable deep insights into human history. These compilations of data are at the interface of data management and data visualization. Yet issues of data governance such as the nature, management, quality, ownership, security, and accessibility of archaeological spatial databases are under examined in archaeology, a situation that can affect data intensive methods and "big" data approaches. Data governance including laws and policies associated with data have bearing on archaeological practices which, in turn, can impact map visualizations and subsequent decision-making. With the growth of the geospatial web and Web 2.0 technologies, there are increasing opportunities for archaeologists and the general public to collect and engage with digital archaeological data. In Canada, greater numbers of specialists from different sectors (research and education, government, private companies) now accumulate, store, and process digital archaeological data. We draw from the OCAP® (ownership, control, access, possession) principles to shed light on data governance in archaeology, with a focus on archaeological spatial databases in Canadian archaeology. In this context, we draw attention to the rights of Indigenous peoples, the legal and policy issues associated with archaeological spatial databases, and a need for greater engagement with Indigenous data governance principles.

show abstract

Reproducibility in the Field: Transparency, Version Control and Collaboration on the Project Panormos Survey

Cited by 17 publications

References 30 publications

Tool-Driven Revolutions in Archaeological Science

Tool-Driven Revolutions in Archaeological Science

Tool-driven Revolutions in Archaeological Science

What We See, What We Don’t See: Data Governance, Archaeological Spatial Databases and the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in an Age of Big Data

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About