Synergies of Success: Stories of Avocational/Professional Archeology in Arizona

Summary

The history of archaeology is replete with stories about the synergies that have come from relationships between professional and avocational archaeologists whose cooperation repeatedly has produced significant contributions to knowledge. Recalling some of those stories today is a valuable reminder of how such success is crafted, and perhaps a guide to how it again can be realized. Frank Hamilton Cushing, Erich Schmidt, Byron Cummings, Emil Walter Haury and my own experience provide five such stories from the history of archaeology in Arizona. All benefited from the cooperation of “citizen archaeologists” who provided patronage, access to sites, financial and moral support, field-student excitement, loyalty and labor, or outright collaboration to realize a wide variety of scientific goals. These brief case studies illustrate the diversity of the aesthetics and goals that motivate and inform what it means to conduct what has been regarded as “professional” archaeology.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)   •
• Collaborations and Competition between Professionals and Nonprofessionals in the Production of Archaeological Knowledge in the Americas

Keywords

Spatial Coverage