Just Finished Listening to……
A few of you have expressed an interest (and a modicum of surprise) in my musical tastes. I thought it might help you understand not just my favourite music but what I listen to generally by listing what I listened to this weekend.
So here it is:
The Pretenders – Greatest Hits
Johnny Cash – Ring of Fire
Big Country – Greatest Hits
The Verve – This is Music: The Singles 92-98
Pink Floyd – Echoes: The Best Of
Blur – Midlife: A Beginners Guide to Blur
Various Artists – This is Emo
Bob Dylan – The Best Of
Meredith Brooks – Blurring the Edges
Herbie Hancock – Head Hunters
30 Seconds to Mars – A Beautiful Lie
Skunk Anansie – Paranoid & Sunburnt
Nirvana – Nevermind
That’s pretty much a standard (though reasonably random) set of CDs I’d normally listen to on any given weekend. Although I do have favourites I like to vary things and, from time to time, push out in new directions. I also pick up tunes from friends and family and incorporate them into my existing tastes. I might do this again in a month or so to see what I come up with. Maybe there’s a pattern in there somewhere……?
About Me
- CyberKitten
- I have a burning need to know stuff and I love asking awkward questions.
Monday, December 13, 2010
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Saturday, December 11, 2010
Be Under No Illusion, NATO is in No Shape to Make Progress in this Graveyard of Empires
by Patrick Cockburn for the Independent
Saturday, November 20, 2010
If Iraq was bad, Afghanistan is going to be worse. Nothing said or done at the Lisbon conference, which is largely an exercise in self-deception, is going to make this better and it may well make it worse.
It is not just that the war is going badly, but that NATO's need to show progress has produced a number of counter-productive quick fixes likely to deepen the violence. These dangerous initiatives include setting up local militias to fight the Taliban where government forces are weak. These are often guns-for-hire provided by local warlords who prey on ordinary Afghans. The US military has been making much of its strategy of assassinating mid-level Taliban commanders, but one study on the ground showed that many of these are men highly regarded in their communities. It concluded that killing them infuriated local people and led to many of them being recruited by the Taliban. The US commander in Afghanistan, General David Petraeus, will tell NATO leaders today of his plan to start handing over responsibility for security in some areas to the Afghan government in 2011. This sounds like wishful thinking on the part of General Petraeus and his selection of target dates is primarily to avoid accusations that NATO has no idea when or how it will get out. The Taliban currently controls or has influence in half of Afghanistan. While US reinforcements have been pouring into Helmand and Kandahar provinces, the Taliban have been expanding their enclaves in the north.
The whole idea of handing over security to the Afghan government is based on a rapid expansion of the Afghan army to 171,000 men and the police to 134,000. Not only are these new recruits likely to be poorly trained, but they will be drawn from the largely anti-Taliban Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara communities. The Pashtun, 42 per cent of Afghans and the community from which the Taliban is largely drawn, will feel ever more victimized. The differences between the insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan underline that the latter is more dangerous for foreign occupiers. In Iraq the anti-US guerrillas sprang from Sunni Arabs, a community to which less than one in five Iraqis belonged. The post-Saddam government in Baghdad was supported by the Kurds and the Shia, making up four-fifths of the population. Afghans are more xenophobic than Iraqis. "Suspicion of foreigners is part of every Afghan's DNA," said a Western diplomat in Kabul.
The NATO leaders in Lisbon may want to consider two other respects in which Afghanistan may prove a more dangerous country. The Afghan government is much feebler than its equivalent in Baghdad where there is a tradition of central control and $60bn in oil revenues. Militarily, what defeated the Soviet army in Afghanistan was not the warlike prowess of the Afghans but the 2,500km long border with Pakistan. So long as this remains open, and the insurgents have safe havens in Pakistan, NATO and the Afghan government are not going to win.
[What a bloody, bloody mess. Both nations and Empires have tried to control Afghanistan. They have all failed. This is, at least, our third attempt to influence events there. I have a feeling that it will fail this time too.]
by Patrick Cockburn for the Independent
Saturday, November 20, 2010
If Iraq was bad, Afghanistan is going to be worse. Nothing said or done at the Lisbon conference, which is largely an exercise in self-deception, is going to make this better and it may well make it worse.
It is not just that the war is going badly, but that NATO's need to show progress has produced a number of counter-productive quick fixes likely to deepen the violence. These dangerous initiatives include setting up local militias to fight the Taliban where government forces are weak. These are often guns-for-hire provided by local warlords who prey on ordinary Afghans. The US military has been making much of its strategy of assassinating mid-level Taliban commanders, but one study on the ground showed that many of these are men highly regarded in their communities. It concluded that killing them infuriated local people and led to many of them being recruited by the Taliban. The US commander in Afghanistan, General David Petraeus, will tell NATO leaders today of his plan to start handing over responsibility for security in some areas to the Afghan government in 2011. This sounds like wishful thinking on the part of General Petraeus and his selection of target dates is primarily to avoid accusations that NATO has no idea when or how it will get out. The Taliban currently controls or has influence in half of Afghanistan. While US reinforcements have been pouring into Helmand and Kandahar provinces, the Taliban have been expanding their enclaves in the north.
The whole idea of handing over security to the Afghan government is based on a rapid expansion of the Afghan army to 171,000 men and the police to 134,000. Not only are these new recruits likely to be poorly trained, but they will be drawn from the largely anti-Taliban Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara communities. The Pashtun, 42 per cent of Afghans and the community from which the Taliban is largely drawn, will feel ever more victimized. The differences between the insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan underline that the latter is more dangerous for foreign occupiers. In Iraq the anti-US guerrillas sprang from Sunni Arabs, a community to which less than one in five Iraqis belonged. The post-Saddam government in Baghdad was supported by the Kurds and the Shia, making up four-fifths of the population. Afghans are more xenophobic than Iraqis. "Suspicion of foreigners is part of every Afghan's DNA," said a Western diplomat in Kabul.
The NATO leaders in Lisbon may want to consider two other respects in which Afghanistan may prove a more dangerous country. The Afghan government is much feebler than its equivalent in Baghdad where there is a tradition of central control and $60bn in oil revenues. Militarily, what defeated the Soviet army in Afghanistan was not the warlike prowess of the Afghans but the 2,500km long border with Pakistan. So long as this remains open, and the insurgents have safe havens in Pakistan, NATO and the Afghan government are not going to win.
[What a bloody, bloody mess. Both nations and Empires have tried to control Afghanistan. They have all failed. This is, at least, our third attempt to influence events there. I have a feeling that it will fail this time too.]
Friday, December 10, 2010
Thursday, December 09, 2010
In the far future, long after Earth has been reconstructed after a global catastrophe, a new utopia has been created. It is a place where death is only a temporary inconvenience, where health and wealth are guaranteed and where everything you desire is available at the touch of a button. But it is also a place where leaders are immortal and everything worth striving for is readily available. In such a place what exactly is there for the young to challenge? Only one thing – the very system itself.
This was, on the face of it, an interesting idea. In a perfect world how exactly, or indeed why would you, rebel? The only thing worth rebelling against is perfection. This is a story of disaffected youth who use the technology at their disposal to cause trouble for their immortal and complacent parents. Led by the crown prince – who will never become king – they ‘escape’ from summer camp (on a created moon) and hi-jack a freighter in deep space. Apart from the act of rebellion itself, rather a minor act to be honest, there is little substance to the rest of the book. It brims with interesting background ideas (as well as a few interesting philosophical issues) but I couldn’t help wondering if there was any actual point to the story. It probably didn’t help that I couldn’t really bring myself to care all that much for what were basically spoilt, bored rich kids out to cause trouble for no other reason than to cause problems for their over protective parents. Some of the technology was interesting – as were the cultural and economical consequences of its use – but apart from that I thought this was pretty dull. Not recommended.
Wednesday, December 08, 2010
Tuesday, December 07, 2010
Monday, December 06, 2010
Thinking About: Being Different
I think that I’ve known I’m different from a very early age. It became pretty obvious that I don’t think like or think about things the way most other people do. People seem to be constantly amazed, confused and, to be honest sometimes horrified, by what comes out of my mouth. Back before I learnt restraint I’d just say the first thing that came into my head which surprisingly didn’t get me into much more trouble than it actually did. After a couple of tense exchanges though I have imposed some self censorship and, on the whole, think about the consequences before I open my mouth.
But speaking my (at least to others) incomprehensible mind is only part of it. People have found almost everything about me worthy of criticism – and not just random strangers either. If I was a weaker person the constant criticism I have received from both friends and family would have reduced me to being a nervous wreck. The main focus of the needling is, rather inevitably, the books I read – or even the fact that I read so much of anything. I have lost count of the number of times I have heard “always got his head in a book” whenever I’m mentioned in conversation. Of course the fact that I read SF and Fantasy novels has come in for particular criticism – probably because I enjoy them so much. They are however “escapist” so have an immediate black mark against them. But it’s not only books. I have been advised to change my friends, my hairstyle(s), my clothes, my job, my house, the city I live in and so it goes on. It seems that my life would only be complete if I was more like the person giving me their ‘advice’. Stubbornly, however, I remain me – regardless of the consequences.
The consequences of being slightly ‘odd’ or ‘different’ are generally the negative effects it has on relationships. I have few friends for instance, most of whom are in the ‘odd’ or ‘different’ category – birds of a feather and all that. But because so few people ‘get’ me the pool of potential partners is a small one indeed. This is one of the reasons why I’ve spent most of my post-pubescent life on my own. In my youth I couldn’t understand what was wrong with other people, why they couldn’t see the real me. I learnt, somewhat to my shock and surprise, that the ‘problem’ wasn’t with them but with me. Other people had little problem forming relationships both of the short and long term variety whereas I often didn’t get past the first awkward moment which, being me, came fairly early. There’s an Alanis Morrisette song where she says something along the lines “what I’d give for a kindred”. I know exactly how that feels. In the 40 or so years of looking I’ve yet to meet anyone quite like me – never mind a female version! I’ve known some people who shared some of my interests, I’ve met people as smart as or even smarter than me (indeed on my last MA course I met some frighteningly smart people). But I’ve never really met a kindred spirit, no one who ‘got’ me most of the time never mind all of the time.
I think that mostly I’m tolerated by what I call ‘normal’ people. I’ll do something or say something and either their eyes will glaze over or they’ll roll their eyes and mouth ‘typical’ under their breaths. Sometimes I’m amusing in this way and sometimes I impress people by seeing links, connections, between things that no one else saw. But mostly I’m ignored or, even worse, expected to ‘perform’ on command. At least that’s what it feels like. Don’t get me wrong though. People, generally, like me. Most people anyway. Some hate me – I kid you not. Maybe they see me as some kind of threat or something. It’s quite bizarre but I do have fun ripping them a new one whenever we clash. Being fairly bright, witty and fast on my mental feet I can normally reduce them to laughingstocks before they realise what has happened.
Of course one way out of all this is to pretend to be normal. I do that already to some extent in order to ‘fit in’ to society. Actually becoming completely normal though would take a great deal of time, energy and effort, little of which I am prepared to waste on what I see is a pre-doomed endeavour. Anyway, I like being me – despite the real downside to it all. I am a misfit and, as much as I can be, proud of the fact. If people have a problem with that I shall refer them to a favourite Bette Midler quote: Fuck ‘em if they can’t take a joke. Basically I’m not willing to compromise who I am to get what I want. Who I am is more important than that.
I think that I’ve known I’m different from a very early age. It became pretty obvious that I don’t think like or think about things the way most other people do. People seem to be constantly amazed, confused and, to be honest sometimes horrified, by what comes out of my mouth. Back before I learnt restraint I’d just say the first thing that came into my head which surprisingly didn’t get me into much more trouble than it actually did. After a couple of tense exchanges though I have imposed some self censorship and, on the whole, think about the consequences before I open my mouth.
But speaking my (at least to others) incomprehensible mind is only part of it. People have found almost everything about me worthy of criticism – and not just random strangers either. If I was a weaker person the constant criticism I have received from both friends and family would have reduced me to being a nervous wreck. The main focus of the needling is, rather inevitably, the books I read – or even the fact that I read so much of anything. I have lost count of the number of times I have heard “always got his head in a book” whenever I’m mentioned in conversation. Of course the fact that I read SF and Fantasy novels has come in for particular criticism – probably because I enjoy them so much. They are however “escapist” so have an immediate black mark against them. But it’s not only books. I have been advised to change my friends, my hairstyle(s), my clothes, my job, my house, the city I live in and so it goes on. It seems that my life would only be complete if I was more like the person giving me their ‘advice’. Stubbornly, however, I remain me – regardless of the consequences.
The consequences of being slightly ‘odd’ or ‘different’ are generally the negative effects it has on relationships. I have few friends for instance, most of whom are in the ‘odd’ or ‘different’ category – birds of a feather and all that. But because so few people ‘get’ me the pool of potential partners is a small one indeed. This is one of the reasons why I’ve spent most of my post-pubescent life on my own. In my youth I couldn’t understand what was wrong with other people, why they couldn’t see the real me. I learnt, somewhat to my shock and surprise, that the ‘problem’ wasn’t with them but with me. Other people had little problem forming relationships both of the short and long term variety whereas I often didn’t get past the first awkward moment which, being me, came fairly early. There’s an Alanis Morrisette song where she says something along the lines “what I’d give for a kindred”. I know exactly how that feels. In the 40 or so years of looking I’ve yet to meet anyone quite like me – never mind a female version! I’ve known some people who shared some of my interests, I’ve met people as smart as or even smarter than me (indeed on my last MA course I met some frighteningly smart people). But I’ve never really met a kindred spirit, no one who ‘got’ me most of the time never mind all of the time.
I think that mostly I’m tolerated by what I call ‘normal’ people. I’ll do something or say something and either their eyes will glaze over or they’ll roll their eyes and mouth ‘typical’ under their breaths. Sometimes I’m amusing in this way and sometimes I impress people by seeing links, connections, between things that no one else saw. But mostly I’m ignored or, even worse, expected to ‘perform’ on command. At least that’s what it feels like. Don’t get me wrong though. People, generally, like me. Most people anyway. Some hate me – I kid you not. Maybe they see me as some kind of threat or something. It’s quite bizarre but I do have fun ripping them a new one whenever we clash. Being fairly bright, witty and fast on my mental feet I can normally reduce them to laughingstocks before they realise what has happened.
Of course one way out of all this is to pretend to be normal. I do that already to some extent in order to ‘fit in’ to society. Actually becoming completely normal though would take a great deal of time, energy and effort, little of which I am prepared to waste on what I see is a pre-doomed endeavour. Anyway, I like being me – despite the real downside to it all. I am a misfit and, as much as I can be, proud of the fact. If people have a problem with that I shall refer them to a favourite Bette Midler quote: Fuck ‘em if they can’t take a joke. Basically I’m not willing to compromise who I am to get what I want. Who I am is more important than that.
Sunday, December 05, 2010
Saturday, December 04, 2010
Cyber Attack Forces Wikileaks to Change Web Address
From BBC News
Friday, December 3, 2010
Whistle-blowing website Wikileaks has been forced to change its web address after the company providing its domain name cut off service. EveryDNS.net said it had terminated services because Wikileaks.org had come under massive cyber attacks. But Wikileaks has already reappeared using a Swiss web address. Wikileaks has also used micro-blogging site Twitter to urge its fans to redistribute its "raw" net address so it can be viewed at any time. This numerical internet protocol (IP) address remains live and accessible even when web domains - the normal "www" addresses used to access most sites - are unavailable.
Experts say it is likely that Wikileaks has done deals with lots of web hosting companies, although many are likely to back away from dealing with the controversial site in the light of recent web attacks. There is also a published list of mirror sites, which Wikileaks hopes will provide constant access to the site. Some of these sites have simply copied Wikileaks' content and put it on a different web server, while others are using different domain names to point at the original content. The more of these sites there are, the more difficult it will be to shut Wikileaks down, security analyst Paul Mutton told the BBC. In France, the industry minister Eric Besson has called for a ban of Wikileaks on French servers. One of the mirror sites, Wikileaks.ch, is currently hosted on servers in France. In a post on Twitter, Wikileaks acknowledged that its domain had been "killed" by EveryDNS.net. It was not clear how long disruption to the wikileaks.org site would last. In a statement on its website, EveryDNS.net said it had issued a 24-hour termination notice to Wikileaks which ended at 0300 GMT on 2 December.
The net appears to be closing in on Wikileaks as more and more companies it relies on distance themselves from it. Shutting down the main .org site will cause problems but it is by no means the end. Its Twitter feed remains defiant, urging fans to log on via its IP address with the tweet "Free speech has number: http://88.80.13.160". In some ways, any attempts to cut off Wikileaks could be a case of too little, too late. The thousands of secret US diplomatic cables at the heart of the controversy are already with media outlets. A site as controversial and savvy as Wikileaks has plenty up its sleeve, like the mysterious encrypted file labelled 'insurance', which is believed to have been posted on Bit Torrent and is rumoured to contain all the leaks. It said the domain wikileaks.org had become the target of "multiple distributed denial of service (DDOS) attacks. These attacks have, and future attacks would, threaten the stability of the EveryDNS.net infrastructure, which enables access to almost 500,000 other websites," it said. "Any downtime of the wikileaks.org website has resulted from its failure to use another hosted DNS service provider," it added. Websites use web hosting firms such as EveryDNS.net to translate their raw IP addresses to a more memorable web address such as Wikileaks.org. But the IP address of a website will also direct users to the site.
One web expert explained that Wikileaks had managed to re-establish web access via a different address. "Users visiting the www.wikileaks.ch website appear to be directed via a Swedish website on to a server in France which is now hosting their main website," explained Sebastien Lahtinen, director of web hosting firm NetConnex. In a bizarre twist, the .ch address is actually hosted by EveryDNS, the firm which suspended Wikileak's .Wikileaks' address. "It seems a strange choice given that they pulled the plug on the .org address just a few hours ago," said Paul Mutton, a security analyst at internet services firm Netcraft. "It could be that Wikileaks is quite happy to play a cat and mouse game with them," he added. Using a Swiss domain could be Wikileaks anticipating the next line of attack - having its IP address de-registered, thinks Mr Mutton. "Moving to a non-US domain makes sense. Its previous domain was registered with a US company and as such has to work within US laws, with potential for the government to lean on it and get it suspended," said Mr Mutton. The Wikileaks situation is challenging the balance between free speech, commercial and technical pressures and the laws in different jurisdictions around the world. Wikileaks says its website has been under attack since it began publishing more than 250,000 classified US diplomatic cables. The memos, which discuss US diplomatic relations and military activities, have been causing controversy across the world. It turned to the online store Amazon to host its site but the company ended the agreement on Wednesday - a move welcomed by US officials. Amazon said that it had not removed Wikileaks because of a government inquiry. Instead it said that Wikileaks had failed to adhere to its terms of service. "It's clear that Wikileaks doesn't own or otherwise control all the rights to this classified content. Further it is not credible that the extraordinary volume of 250,000 classified documents that Wikileaks is publishing could have been carefully redacted in such a way as to ensure that they weren't putting innocent people in jeopardy," it said on its website.But freedom-of-speech campaigners remain defiant. "The first serious infowar is now engaged. The field of battle is Wikileaks. You are troops," tweeted John Perry Barlow, the founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
[It’s certainly difficult to keep a good website down. The Net sees censorship as damage and routes around it. Information wants to be free and it looks like DOS attacks aren’t enough to stop it spreading. The genie is most definitely out of the bottle here and I seriously doubt that anything the US or other governments try will shut things down permanently. This aspect of the affair is almost as interesting as the leaks themselves and almost as revealing as to the value some countries place on free speech and democracy.]
From BBC News
Friday, December 3, 2010
Whistle-blowing website Wikileaks has been forced to change its web address after the company providing its domain name cut off service. EveryDNS.net said it had terminated services because Wikileaks.org had come under massive cyber attacks. But Wikileaks has already reappeared using a Swiss web address. Wikileaks has also used micro-blogging site Twitter to urge its fans to redistribute its "raw" net address so it can be viewed at any time. This numerical internet protocol (IP) address remains live and accessible even when web domains - the normal "www" addresses used to access most sites - are unavailable.
Experts say it is likely that Wikileaks has done deals with lots of web hosting companies, although many are likely to back away from dealing with the controversial site in the light of recent web attacks. There is also a published list of mirror sites, which Wikileaks hopes will provide constant access to the site. Some of these sites have simply copied Wikileaks' content and put it on a different web server, while others are using different domain names to point at the original content. The more of these sites there are, the more difficult it will be to shut Wikileaks down, security analyst Paul Mutton told the BBC. In France, the industry minister Eric Besson has called for a ban of Wikileaks on French servers. One of the mirror sites, Wikileaks.ch, is currently hosted on servers in France. In a post on Twitter, Wikileaks acknowledged that its domain had been "killed" by EveryDNS.net. It was not clear how long disruption to the wikileaks.org site would last. In a statement on its website, EveryDNS.net said it had issued a 24-hour termination notice to Wikileaks which ended at 0300 GMT on 2 December.
The net appears to be closing in on Wikileaks as more and more companies it relies on distance themselves from it. Shutting down the main .org site will cause problems but it is by no means the end. Its Twitter feed remains defiant, urging fans to log on via its IP address with the tweet "Free speech has number: http://88.80.13.160". In some ways, any attempts to cut off Wikileaks could be a case of too little, too late. The thousands of secret US diplomatic cables at the heart of the controversy are already with media outlets. A site as controversial and savvy as Wikileaks has plenty up its sleeve, like the mysterious encrypted file labelled 'insurance', which is believed to have been posted on Bit Torrent and is rumoured to contain all the leaks. It said the domain wikileaks.org had become the target of "multiple distributed denial of service (DDOS) attacks. These attacks have, and future attacks would, threaten the stability of the EveryDNS.net infrastructure, which enables access to almost 500,000 other websites," it said. "Any downtime of the wikileaks.org website has resulted from its failure to use another hosted DNS service provider," it added. Websites use web hosting firms such as EveryDNS.net to translate their raw IP addresses to a more memorable web address such as Wikileaks.org. But the IP address of a website will also direct users to the site.
One web expert explained that Wikileaks had managed to re-establish web access via a different address. "Users visiting the www.wikileaks.ch website appear to be directed via a Swedish website on to a server in France which is now hosting their main website," explained Sebastien Lahtinen, director of web hosting firm NetConnex. In a bizarre twist, the .ch address is actually hosted by EveryDNS, the firm which suspended Wikileak's .Wikileaks' address. "It seems a strange choice given that they pulled the plug on the .org address just a few hours ago," said Paul Mutton, a security analyst at internet services firm Netcraft. "It could be that Wikileaks is quite happy to play a cat and mouse game with them," he added. Using a Swiss domain could be Wikileaks anticipating the next line of attack - having its IP address de-registered, thinks Mr Mutton. "Moving to a non-US domain makes sense. Its previous domain was registered with a US company and as such has to work within US laws, with potential for the government to lean on it and get it suspended," said Mr Mutton. The Wikileaks situation is challenging the balance between free speech, commercial and technical pressures and the laws in different jurisdictions around the world. Wikileaks says its website has been under attack since it began publishing more than 250,000 classified US diplomatic cables. The memos, which discuss US diplomatic relations and military activities, have been causing controversy across the world. It turned to the online store Amazon to host its site but the company ended the agreement on Wednesday - a move welcomed by US officials. Amazon said that it had not removed Wikileaks because of a government inquiry. Instead it said that Wikileaks had failed to adhere to its terms of service. "It's clear that Wikileaks doesn't own or otherwise control all the rights to this classified content. Further it is not credible that the extraordinary volume of 250,000 classified documents that Wikileaks is publishing could have been carefully redacted in such a way as to ensure that they weren't putting innocent people in jeopardy," it said on its website.But freedom-of-speech campaigners remain defiant. "The first serious infowar is now engaged. The field of battle is Wikileaks. You are troops," tweeted John Perry Barlow, the founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
[It’s certainly difficult to keep a good website down. The Net sees censorship as damage and routes around it. Information wants to be free and it looks like DOS attacks aren’t enough to stop it spreading. The genie is most definitely out of the bottle here and I seriously doubt that anything the US or other governments try will shut things down permanently. This aspect of the affair is almost as interesting as the leaks themselves and almost as revealing as to the value some countries place on free speech and democracy.]
Friday, December 03, 2010
Thursday, December 02, 2010
Just Finished Reading: Archaeology – a Very Short Introduction by Paul Bahn
Yet again I’m using the VSI series to broaden and deepen my understanding of a subject I have a passing knowledge of. Archaeology is, understandably, a huge topic. After all it covers all of human history and, indeed, pre-history.
What this small, and admittedly brief, volume attempt to cover were the highlights. Starting with its developments (in any systematic form) in the 19th Century, the author quickly moves onto the central question of accurately dating artefacts, the uses (and limitations) of new technology, a discussion regarding questions of how people lived in by-gone ages, the difficulty in reconstructing ways of thinking in ancient times (especially when only physical evidence is present), a brief tour of the idea of settlement and society, a discussion on how things change over time (and how this can be assessed), issues of gender and race bias (and how they can be addressed), how archaeology is presented to the public (a major reason for ‘doing’ archaeology in the first place) and finally a look towards the future of the past.
Told throughout in a light-hearted manner this was a fun and informative read. The author didn’t take himself too seriously and in so doing probably slipped through quite a lot of potentially ‘boring’ information in bite sized chunks. I think I found the sections on the difficulties – if not impossibilities – of attempts to discover how our ancestors thought most intriguing. Our knowledge of such things will forever remain imperfect at best (unless we eventually invent time travel) but such things are certainly worth the attempt – however unsatisfactory the result turns out to be. The other section I found almost as fascinating was how the attitudes of archaeologists have changed as more women and non-Anglo-American archaeologists have entered the field. Their attempts to address deficiencies in previous studies (either consciously or unconsciously sexist or racist) have provided new insights into whole ranges of questions. Despite being a mere 105 pages long this gives the casual reader much food for thought and many avenues to follow up. I for one will be doing such a follow up in the New Year. Recommended.
Yet again I’m using the VSI series to broaden and deepen my understanding of a subject I have a passing knowledge of. Archaeology is, understandably, a huge topic. After all it covers all of human history and, indeed, pre-history.
What this small, and admittedly brief, volume attempt to cover were the highlights. Starting with its developments (in any systematic form) in the 19th Century, the author quickly moves onto the central question of accurately dating artefacts, the uses (and limitations) of new technology, a discussion regarding questions of how people lived in by-gone ages, the difficulty in reconstructing ways of thinking in ancient times (especially when only physical evidence is present), a brief tour of the idea of settlement and society, a discussion on how things change over time (and how this can be assessed), issues of gender and race bias (and how they can be addressed), how archaeology is presented to the public (a major reason for ‘doing’ archaeology in the first place) and finally a look towards the future of the past.
Told throughout in a light-hearted manner this was a fun and informative read. The author didn’t take himself too seriously and in so doing probably slipped through quite a lot of potentially ‘boring’ information in bite sized chunks. I think I found the sections on the difficulties – if not impossibilities – of attempts to discover how our ancestors thought most intriguing. Our knowledge of such things will forever remain imperfect at best (unless we eventually invent time travel) but such things are certainly worth the attempt – however unsatisfactory the result turns out to be. The other section I found almost as fascinating was how the attitudes of archaeologists have changed as more women and non-Anglo-American archaeologists have entered the field. Their attempts to address deficiencies in previous studies (either consciously or unconsciously sexist or racist) have provided new insights into whole ranges of questions. Despite being a mere 105 pages long this gives the casual reader much food for thought and many avenues to follow up. I for one will be doing such a follow up in the New Year. Recommended.
Wednesday, December 01, 2010
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