Whither Digital Archaeological Knowledge? The Challenge of Unstable Futures

Abstract

IntroductionThis position paper concerns the direction of computer applications and the digital more generally within the discipline of archaeology, and the manner in which they are adopted and then affect our practices. Digital technologies are integral to many facets of current practice in archaeology. However, there is little evidence of disciplinary-wide coordinated programmes but clear indications of haphazard application adoption, fractures, and silos. The objective here is to develop a framework within which meaningful progress can be made towards a common strategic goal with regards to how we adopt technology and create, develop, manage and share our disciplinary knowledge, competencies and capabilities in the age of the digital.Strategic thinking necessitates negotiation with the future, a task fraught with risk. We can think of probable futures in which we extrapolate some existing trend, such as the adoption rate of a specific technology, or envisage the next generation of technology coming over the horizon (Burton & Barnes 2017). However, there are generally several possible, very plausible, alternative futures, in which case we may think in terms of a collectively preferred future and set a strategy which seeks to favour that outcome. In the real world such predictions can be completely undermined by a wildcard event, something thought so improbable, or even undreamt of, but having a massive positive or negative impact. External factors such as economic instability, political change, and technical disruption can have profound repercussions for the practice of archaeology: our disciplinary structures, principles and norms, and how our collective knowledge, competencies and capabilities are deployed, developed, and maintained or lost. This paper seeks to lay the groundwork for an executable disciplinary knowledge strategy that is both flexible and robust enough to withstand constant disruption as we move forward into an unstable, erratic, and uncertain future. Contextualising the PresentIn seeking to ground any observations about future developments in digital archaeology, it becomes apparent that present perspectives of digital archaeologists fall somewhere between two extremes. At one end, there is a broadly utopian view of digital archaeology as a transformative development, epitomised by Djindjian's "ineluctable success" (2015), whereas on the other there is a more dystopian perspective that recognises the transformative aspect but questions whether archaeologists had much to do with it (e.g. Scollar 1999). Others prefer not to predict whether the impact will be positive or negative, but note they will undoubtedly have profound impact on practice and theory (Ucko 1992). Digital technology increasingly pervades all settings of archaeological practice and virtually every stage of knowledge production. Through the digital we create, develop, manage and share our disciplinary crown jewels. However, technology adoption and digital mediation has not been uniform across all settings or stages. This diver...

Current Digital Archaeology

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“…29-30). While this method has been the largely unstated approach of some practitioners (e.g., Ferraby 2017, Graham 2020b, Hacıgüzeller 2017, Morgan & Eve 2012, Reilly et al 2021, Watterson et al 2020, engagement with the robust literature supporting practice-based research would alleviate some of the conceptual crises as previously delineated within digital archaeology (Huggett et al 2018). Finally, a focus on these themes describes a digital archaeology that explores ways to prefigure a better future through our investigation of the past.…”

Digital Archaeology. Promises and Impasses

“…The present volume reviews promises and impasses of digital archaeology based on research and teaching experience at our faculty. As such, it is a small and biased contribution to the ongoing debate about digital scholarship in archaeology (e.g., Huggett et al 2018). The following chapters provide insights into the limitations of certain digital technologies and methods, but also productive and reflective ways of dealing with them.…”

Being Seen, Being Heard: Ownership of Archaeology and Digital Heritage

“…Digital heritage then, broadly refers to “information, creative expression, ideas and knowledge encoded for computer processing” that humans have created using various technologies and platforms, which they “want to share with others over time as well as across space” (UNESCO, 2019 ). Huggett et al ( 2018 , pp. 43–44) remark that the “subdiscipline” of digital archaeology suffers from “anxiety” and uncertainty about its place, significance and linkages with “external disciplines” and intellectual interests in the broader field of archaeology, anthropology and digital humanities (Morgan, 2022 , p. 214).…”