Overview:

This paper will look at the use and potential of electronic publication and the usability of the markup language XML for the publication of field reports by commercial archaeological units. The field reports fall into the field of grey literature as they are produced as client reports by archaeological units as part of the planning process and do not receive official publication or widespread dissemination. It has been recognised, however, that the reports contain valuable information that would be useful for research purposes as well as for other commercial units and the public and that suitable means should be found in order to disseminate that information. The basis for the project is a case study undertaken by the author, who was part of the Department of Information Studies at the University of Sheffield, in conjunction with a small commercial unit, Archaeological Research and Consultancy at the University of Sheffield (ARCUS). Current publication practices within academic and commercial archaeology were reviewed and the ARCUS field reports were used in order to test the usability of XML for the markup and electronic publication of those reports.

Background:

The dissemination of archaeological information and data is still mainly undertaken in the format of the traditional paper-based excavation report. However, archaeological data is now increasingly being collected and stored in a digital format and the advent of the Internet has also raised the issues of electronic publication and dissemination of data and site reports via this medium. Electronic publication is taking place, but it is still few and far between and mainly restricted to academic research projects. In Britain, archaeological practice outside the university research environment is restricted to interventions undertaken as part of the planning process and is funded entirely by the “polluter pays” principle. This has emphasised a dilemma archaeological practice was increasingly faced with. On the one hand, it has become just a small part of the planning process and is governed by the same commercial principles as any other development contractor. On the other, the results it produces are still seen as “academic” and a basis for research. There is an innate duty or ethic within archaeology to disseminate results and to produce syntheses of material. However, the funds provided usually do not allow more than the implementation of an immediate mitigation strategy for development and the production of a minimal “developer’s report”. A recent survey of user needs concerning publication and dissemination of data within archaeology (“PUNS survey”, Jones et al 2001) undertaken by the Council of British Archaeology (CBA) identified that even though fieldwork reports are one of the most frequently consulted types of archaeological literature, grey reports have a limited audience beyond the commercial domain due to the difficulty in access and lack of awareness of that literature. It also stressed that many archaeologists are dissatisfied with this situation as they feel that information of relevance to their work is being produced of which they are unaware.

Proposed paper:

This paper addresses some of the problems of dissemination raised by the PUNS survey and also other issues inherent in the publication an dissemination of archaeological data like the provision of adequate metadata and the searchability of archaeological information on-line. It describes the use of XML and a modified version of the TEI lite DTD of the Oxford Text Encoding Initiative for the mark up of a sample of ARCUS excavation reports. It also looks at the possibility of incorporating controlled archaeological vocabulary into the DTD. It raises questions about current practices of electronic publication within archaeology and the availability and searchability of data provided by the discipline for research purposes.

Results:

It was found that the electronic publication of grey reports would be very useful for as it would allow a quicker response time and a rapid dissemination of information within the fast moving and changing environment of commercial archaeology. XML would be a useful and economic tool for the publication of field reports as it would allow users to selectively download separate sections of field reports which are of particular importance to them. Archaeology-specific elements would also allow a better context specific searchability of reports on the web. However, it is acknowledged that XML is still a technology in its infancy and also that it is beyond the financial capabilities of many small commercial units to implement a system of electronic publication. An important point that needs to be raised is that national archaeological institutions will have to accept electronic versions of field reports in order for them to be formally recognised and be able to be built into the financial framework of a commercial project design.

Relevance to ALLC-ACH themes:

The paper is of particular relevance to the themes of the ALLC-ACH conference as it addresses the issues of the development of new methodologies in one discipline that will have a considerable impact on others. The electronic publication of commercial field reports will provide indispensable information not only for other commercial units but also for academic research, thus helping to bring together two increasingly diverging fields. Archaeological data is also used by other disciplines within the Humanities and Sciences, like anthropology, sociology, earth sciences and others. Archaeological site reports also consist not only of text but of a wide variety of images and the electronic medium could provide increasing resources such as 3D reconstruction or even audio and video data. The quicker response time of the electronic medium and the increasing availability of primary archaeological data should also allow users to examine the assumptions upon which previous interpretations are presented and to facilitate the development of their own models, thus fundamentally changing the nature of discourse within archaeology and the humanities in general.