Dear Listers,

As many of you may already know, last week’s annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology (SAA) was the scene of a great deal of controversy when an individual known to have committed Title IX violations was found to be in attendance. This resulted in an outcry both at the conference and through the discipline of archaeology, and has sparked a heated conversation among archaeologists about how we are serving survivors, allies, and advocates alike.

Marybeth Tomka and I are the co-chairs of SAA’s Curation Interest Group, and as such we cannot, nor would we attempt to, speak on behalf of SAA or its leaders. However, we are able to reach out to the public, to our colleagues, and to all of you on this listserv, and ask you to lend us your voices for our newsletter.

It is apparent every day that the #metoo movement is not, and never has been, a fad, a phase, or a trend. It’s deeply embedded in our cultural climate and we need to find ways to have productive conversations so we can inspire and stimulate change, not just in “our” discipline of archaeology, but in all of our disciplines. Our Interest Group is dedicated to the curation of archaeological materials, sharing Best Practices, and starting a conversation among people who need help but don’t know where to find it. We are run on a day-to-day basis by archaeologists who have experience in museums and repositories, or with curation and collections management, but we are designed to help everyone who does not have that professional experience navigate the sometimes-choppy waters of preservation.

We are reaching out to you today because we want to include your voices in our May newsletter. What use are our Best Practices for collections if our Best Practices for people are flawed? Coming from museum and repository backgrounds ourselves, Marybeth and I suspect that there are many of us out there whose voices have been silenced, either out of fear for our jobs, fear for our reputations, or fear for ourselves. We want to make sure that as the larger conversation on harassment unfolds that two things happen: first, that museum and repository professionals are included and their voices heard; second, that we not forget that the change #metoo calls for applies to far more than sexual harassment or assault alone. We are marginalized in the workplace every day: we are categorized by color, by gender, by religion, by class, and always in opposition to some arbitrary “norm.” Like humans, harassment is not one-dimensional.

Join Marybeth and myself as we reach out to museum and repository professionals across disciplines, beyond archaeology, and gather as many stories as we can to share in our May newsletter. Help us become a force for change in a meaningful way, and please share widely. We are directing this at museum and repository individuals because of the charge of our Interest Group, but everyone’s story is important and we would never marginalize or exclude anyone who was brave enough to share theirs.

Some guidelines so that we can include as many voices as possible:

  *   If feasible, we would appreciate submissions of 150 words or less. We know that this is not always possible, and we encourage you to include as much or as little information as you would like.
  *   Please do not send us someone else’s experience, in their words or otherwise. Privacy is important, and not everyone is ready or willing to share their story.
  *   Please do not include specific names or institutions in your submission. States are fine, or pseudonyms, but we are not able to publish anything that is more specific due to the guidelines our IG must adhere to, and we want to make sure your voice is heard.
  *   Please include your name and your email address (if sending anonymously) for the sole purpose of us contacting you if we need to make an edit or ask a question in reference to the previous two bullet points. We will NEVER post your name, unless you explicitly ask it of us.
  *   Please let us know if you wish to be listed as “anonymous”; as first-initial, last name (like “A. Warhol”; by city and state, (like “Huntington, NY”); or with some other signature.

Marybeth and I can be reached via our respective emails at:

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We will accept submissions until April 25th, 2019, to allow us time to format before the newsletter is sent out on May 1st.

Please share widely to allow us to reach as many as possible, and thank you!

Sincerely,

Jenna Domeischel and Marybeth Tomka
Co-chairs of the SAA Curation Interest Group



Jenna Domeischel, RPA
Blackwater Draw Museum Curator
Eastern New Mexico University
(575) 562-2103
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www.bwdarchaeology.com

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