Bending the Trajectory of Field School Teaching and Learning through Active and Advocacy Archaeology

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Good job of including your first-hand experiences in archaeological fieldwork.

Equity in archaeology has been ignored since the inception of archaeology in the Americas. I would have liked to see a deeper discussion on equity and holistic knowledge, which are missing in archaeological educational programs and field schools.

Fieldwork training begins in the classroom, where diverse voices continue to be erased and silenced. Though some archaeologists carry out community archaeology and the field is slowly changing, we have a long way to go to create safe and equitable spaces in archaeological training and field schools in North America.

A discussion on the history of racism in archaeology and archaeological fieldwork would have added important insights regarding ongoing exclusion and harassment in field schools.

To know where we are now, and how to change the future,  we need to know where we came from; in archaeology in the Americas, we came from a racist Eurocentric field that is now very slowly being drug towards a future place where all humans, regardless of their gender or identity,  and their nonhuman relations are seen and treated as equals.

Leveling the management hierarchy in archaeological field schools would certainly improve the field and work to create safer inclusive spaces. It would be great for students to have an understanding of how this might work, and adding examples would be great if they exist.

Author Response

First, we want to thank you for taking time to review the co-authored manuscript entitled, “Bending the Trajectory of Field School Teaching and Learning through Active and Advocacy Archaeology”. Specifically, we want to thank Reviewers #1 for their thoughtful comments that have helped us to make the paper stronger and gave us some important insights to think about for future research. The main critiques and suggestions for Reviewer #1 was that (1) a discussion of racism in archaeology would have been a valuable addition and (2) adding more about equitable knowledge would strengthen the paper. Regarding racism in archaeology, this is an incredibly important issue that needs to be discussed more in archaeological practice, and we thank the reviewer for bringing this to light. We believe that this topic is so critical that it needs to have its own space to fully articulate its significance and influence in archaeological history and current archaeological practice. Also, our NSF funded research into sexual harassment and assault does not incorporate the lived experiences of racism in field-based learning. Many other archaeologists are currently conducting funded research to help understand this more holistically. Thus, we do not feel that we have the capacity to incorporate this discussion in this manuscript. Second, Reviewer #2 stated that a deeper discussion on equity and holistic knowledge could also make the paper stronger but does not state that this needs to be incorporated into the current manuscript. We would argue that the deep dive into advocacy and active anthropology in archaeology field-based learning combined with years of qualitative research to develop the most equitable and most supportive field school environments for students is quite holistic and something that has not been done before in our region. Most of our discussion is constructed around equitable best practices, especially regarding our own voices and experiences of becoming professional archaeologists. Furthermore, readers will observe in the manuscript that most of the quite lengthy cited/referenced research is also concerned with equity and holistic knowledge in anthropology and archaeology. These were so insightful and we thank Reviewer #1 for their comments and support of our work. 

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper by S. P. Lambert and C. E. Colaninno aims to review some of the authors' research dealing with sexual harassment and assault at archaeological field schools, and the creation of safer and more inclusive learning spaces. The authors suggest that field directors must situate themselves as active and advocacy anthropologists in order to advance field school teaching and learning.

In the Introduction, the authors give an introductory perspective on the topics being reviewed, commenting on the importance of field schools as critical moments in students’ decision-making regarding their future careers. The authors then state that they i) will discuss recent research regarding field schools held in the USA, ii) review a framework for action and advocacy anthropology, iii) and reflect on their own experiences as archaeologists and how they shaped their approaches to archaeological pedagogy and field school operation (lines 47.64). This is followed by Recent Harassment and Assault Field-Based Research in Southeastern United States, where recent approaches to this topic are summed up and a succinct updated perspective is given. The section Becoming Active Advocates in Archaeological Practice deals with active advocacy and is divided into several sub-sections on what is advocacy and active anthropology, activism in archaeology, and the paper of active advocates in the field. In Undoing Traditional Fieldwork – How Our Experiences Reshaped our Archaeological Practice an interesting discussion on these topics is presented, including the personal experience of the authors. Finally, the Conclusions succinctly focus on the main ideas discussed in the paper and some suggestions from the authors are given.

This review manuscript is sound. No figures are presented, but two tables that sum up needed information are included, being informative, adapted to the paper content and well-prepared. The bibliography is well-elaborated and includes updated references that complement, sustain and enrich the discussion, allowing the author to easily find more information on the subject. This paper was submitted to Humans for its special issue on Recent Reflections on the Sociology of Archaeology where topics such as the ones discussed by Lambert and Colaninno clearly fit. This is a thought-provoking manuscript dealing with critical topics and presenting important suggestions. Considering all of this, I suggest that the paper is accepted for publication. During proofreading, please check the separation of bullet points from Table 1, the second bullet point from Table 2 (“contribute t their”), the sentence in line 159, and the numbering in lines 271-272.

As an archaeologist and field director in a country where these discussions are still not common, I must say that it was a pleasure to read this manuscript. Please continue with this important line of research and discussion that benefits us all. Many thanks.

Author Response

First, we want to thank you for taking time to review the co-authored manuscript entitled, “Bending the Trajectory of Field School Teaching and Learning through Active and Advocacy Archaeology”. Specifically, we want to thank Reviewers #1 for their thoughtful comments that have helped us to make the paper stronger and gave us some important insights to think about for future research. The main critiques and suggestions for Reviewer #1 was minor comments regarding table formatting and a few spelling errors. These have been fixed, and we thank you for seeing these errors. Reviewer #2 stated, “As an archaeologist and field director in a country where these discussions are still not common, I must say that it was a pleasure to read this manuscript.” This statement speaks of not only the importance of our research and many others, but also the significance of publishing this kind of research in Humans open access journal so that it is accessible to people in other areas of the world. These were so insightful and we thank Reviewer #1 for their comments and support of our work.