As a bit of lark David Pettegrew and I submitted the following abstract to the Journal of Field Archaeology for their 50th anniversary volume. According to the call for proposals, they’re looking for papers that consider “what inspires researchers to do their best work?” The longer I spend in the field of archaeology, the less I’m moved by inspiration and more by professional responsibility and a sense of obligation to the next generation of scholars (this, of course, remains a work in progress!). But I suppose we can call that inspiration even if we sort of side step the issue in this paper.
Readers of the blog will recognize both the project and our thinking here and David and I will likely write this paper even if it doesn’t land in pages of the JFA.
Title: Mobilizing the Archaeological Report for the Future Interpretive Community: Linked Open Data, Analysis, and Publication
Archaeologists conduct fieldwork with the goal of sharing results through final publications and reports. Whether completed to meet core professional expectations, to fulfill requirements of public funding, or simply to build careers, archaeologists do their best work when they have a sharp sense of outcome and purpose. Yet, as reporting has become an object of critical reflection on disciplinary practice (e.g. Hanscam and Witcher JFA 48 [2023] and JFA 11 [1981]), and has changed with new modes of publication and data sharing, archaeologists may question how to mobilize reporting for a richer and more inclusive future.
Our paper aims to address the seismic changes that archaeologists will face in publishing and reporting on their work. In the next half century, publication must streamline reporting and make the interpretive process more intentionally accessible to wider communities. Archaeologists will need to come to terms with the declining institutional market for traditional book length publications, the changing expectations of funders and professional organizations, and the growing range of digital technologies central to archaeological work and publication. They will also need to make their results more findable, accessible, interoperable, and usable for future interpreters.
We present a case study from the Eastern Korinthia Archaeological Survey (1997-2003), a diachronic intensive distributional survey project conducted in the periphery of Ancient Corinth, Greece. Our work to publish this project provides a practical perspective on the short-term potential of linked open-access books and datasets. We developed the book, Corinthian Countrysides, with low-cost, persistent, and sustainable practices to both build upon existing digital infrastructure and software and evoke traditional forms of publication. Linked to online datasets at Open Context, the book centers the potential for reuse, ongoing analysis, and interpretation decades beyond fieldwork. The process of publishing the book and datasets required care in the preparation, documentation, and linking of information, and prompted us to reconsider the relationship between fieldwork, study, analysis, interpretation, and final publication. In contrast to recent innovations in archaeological publishing that explore the bleeding edge of technology (e.g. Opitz in JFA 43 [2018]), our book offers a simpler alternative to reflexive archaeological publishing, and it takes a critical view of notions of finality in publication.
Our article will have three main sections:
The first part will offer an introduction to the Eastern Korinthia Archaeological Survey (EKAS) and The Digital Press at the University of North Dakota which frames our case study of digital publication as part of a conversation about the nature of intensive Mediterranean-style distributional archaeological survey, the presentation of survey data, and the iterative analysis and publication of the results of fieldwork.
The second part will present the various contexts and processes that David Pettegrew, the author, and William Caraher, the publisher, undertook to prepare the digital publication of the survey data, its metadata, and its analysis and interpretation. Data collection strategies, early efforts in study and presentation, and the changing landscape of digital technology all shaped the publication of the digital book and presentation of data.
The final section will situate our experience publishing EKAS within the future landscape of archaeological publishing. Instead of isolating digital technology as a kind of solution (or, conversely, a problem), this section will argue that digital-first processes, methods, and approaches offer a compelling trajectory for the future of archaeological publishing by deepening reflexive practices and building a more inclusive purpose of work through collaborative archaeological knowledge making.
The paper, in short, anticipates a future of archaeological publishing that sees greater integration between archaeologist, publisher, and a community of scholars committed to the ongoing production of archaeological knowledge through both data production and reuse.
Archaeology of the Mediterranean World 
I’m really looking forward to Corinthian Countrysides. I see the “slow archaeology” in that, and I was wondering if “reflexive” arch is the opposite of that? I did not always understand the term. Or do you mean like Opitz 2018, where the publication called for is self-reflexive, with all this data and reflection on data coming out together in a single, rapid digital stream?
Also, I like the “critical view of notions of finality” in publication. So, no more, “the final report!”
was also amazed at the turn around recently when i was looking at Journal of Archaeological Science (Reports), like you have a few days to review reviewers’ comments…so quick-hitting, wild