Shakespeare, Street Harassment and the Etruscans

Yes, really.

I'm working on the first draft of my second book at the moment. It's great fun, almost a formalised extension of this blog. The big idea is to explore the relevance of Etruscan culture to the modern world, incorporating analyses of historical texts and archaeological materials. But, as I've blogged about before, it's written for a popular audience.

I'm chugging on through- nearly done with Chapter 7. This is my favourite part of the book so far, because it deals with some pet interests of mine- the lives of Etruscan women and the state of modern feminism.

In the course of writing it, though, I've gone down the rabbit hole of chasing a stereotype. Etruscan women were independent and lascivious- everyone knows that. It's a scholarly trope. But where does it come from?

Well, the obvious answer is Livy. But how does Livy wiggle his way into England? Of course, the educated elite might have been reading Ab Urbe Condita for themselves, but Etruscan women also feature in a rowdier format.

In Shakespeare's Rape of Lucrece, dedicated to Henry Wriothesley, 3rd Earl of Southampton, we have a prologue designed to clarify the poem. Here are the Etruscan women:

“The other ladies were all found dancing and revelling, or in several disports.”

It's only a sentence, but an interesting one. In the original text, Livy describes the same women as:

"passing their time in feasting and in luxury with their acquaintances."

Shakespeare, has chosen to go further. He deliberately implies that the Etruscan wives are misbehaving- and their misbehaviour has a sexual undertone. The word disport, while meaning unrestrained enjoyment, has a sinful implication here. In several disports? In Elizabethan bawdy talk, disport has a definite link with copulation and sexual play.

The sexual infidelity of Etruscan women is useful to Shakespeare- it sets up a direct contrast with the purity of his Lucrece. It is her chastity, and not her beauty, which first inflames the villainous Sextus Tarquinius, who will go on to rape her and bring down disaster on his family.

In Livy's account, I would argue that there remains an implication that the Etruscan women are responsible for the demise of the Tarquinii as a ruling dynasty. For Shakespeare, however, they are more sinister. It is their sexual availability, not their dedication to luxury, that causes Lucrece's death with its spiralling consequences. One of the poem's messages is that the availability of loose women damages all good women, and not just by repute.

It's a fascinating scenario- one of the first appearances of Etruscan women in the English language. To what extent it is responsible for the survival of the stereotype of Etruscan women, I don't know. But there are plenty of issues in here that impact our lives as women in the 21st century. Women's enjoyment of pleasure, especially sexual pleasure, is still considered problematic by our society. Look at the victim shaming of revenge porn, or the hooting tabloids and the sidebar of shame.

There is another aspect to this shaming behaviour too. A particular politician's recent statements on women-only carriages after the exposure of figures of the rate of sexual harassment on public transport emphasise our daily encounters with the Sextii Tarquinii of the Tube. The rationale of these abusers remains that some women (denigrated with terms like "slut" or "whore")  like their behaviour.

In Shakespeare and in the street, the equivalents of the Etruscan women- women taking pleasure - are still being blamed for attacks on other women.

When will they be absolved of responsibility for the acts of men?

Boobs and bad advice

If you have Twitter, you'll have spotted the latest firestorm over some questionable career advice. A post-doc's advisor can't keep his eyes from her boobs. She should put up and shut up, apparently. Cue rage.

Science, the journal that hosted the agony aunt column, has whisked it down from the internet and popped up a statement condemning such behaviour. I would rather have the original response back. When we condemn behaviour that is inappropriate and troubling in this manner, it is hidden away. We prefer that you never experience this, so when you do we won't give you practical support and guidance to deal with it. It's a different kind of putting up and shutting up, from an even weaker position- one of denial.

Anyway, this ugly little incident got me thinking about mentors. I have been very lucky to have several good ones. My intended PhD supervisor, who head hunted me into specialising in things Etruscan and fostered my frustration with the discipline. My actual PhD supervisor, who taught me how to think, how to write, how to turn failure to success, how to live beyond academe yet enjoy what it offers. My advisor, his practicality and fine tuned bullshit sensors keeping the project together. Field school director, supporting decisions on, or rather in, the ground, backed up by a senior staff who care for each other and good archaeology, not politics and positions. Colleague and project leader, vivacious, courageous, engendering respect wherever she goes. Internal and external examiners, tough but fair, demanding the best. My boss, the best man manager around.

And not one of them looked at my tits. I am one lucky pup. Thank you all.

That brings me to my advice for the Bothered who wrote to Science. You probably have a larger support network than you think. Use it, and get recording the inappropriate behaviour. Find a mentor who will support you in taking action once you've compiled the evidence. Then move against the ogler, not alone but as a team. And know that the online scientific community is totally with you.

***it's 4:45am and I have baby sick in my hair, so apologies if this makes no sense***

Some day my "prince" will come

If I say a prince to you, what do you think of?

This guy? (Image: Telegraph)

This guy? (Image: Disney)

This guy?

Male of royal blood, right? Prince Charming, Prince Edward, Prince Harry. The Oxford dictionary defines a prince by his relationships to other royals- the son or grandson of a monarch.



None of these chaps look much like the individual who was buried in a tomb in Lavau, France during the 5th century BC, whose grave goods have been all over my social media for the last week or so. It's an amazing burial, with some incredible artefacts. My eye was caught by a gorgeous vessel imported from Greece, which looks like it shows a scene featuring Dionysian revelry- aka the formalised and semi-ritual consumption of alcohol. The metalwork, including a bronze cauldron, is pretty fabulous too- and some of it looks very Etruscan. In short, it's right up my street.

But we've been here before. A tomb was discovered, the excavators got excited, got the press involved, described the burial as that of a prince. That was in Tarquinia, Italy, in September 2013. But guess what? The burial turned out to be that of a woman. Cue lots of equivocating and burying of the story. Plus, it would just be darn rude to mention Vix.


As far as I'm aware, there haven't been osteoarchaeological analyses done of the individual buried in the Lavau tomb as yet. The detailed discussion provided by the rescue archaeologists who have been working on the burial since October last year doesn't mention this, at least. So, first off, we don't know that this burial is male. Second, going back to the point I wanted old Charming and Harry to make, we definitely don't know that this individual, even if it is male, was part of a system of inherited power that we might correlate to a monarchy.

Yes, it's a very impressive set of goodies to be buried with. Somebody wanted to make a big impression when this person left the world. It's conspicuous consumption-tastic. But that doesn't make this burial that of a prince- it makes it the burial of a wealthy individual with serious long distance trading connections. But that doesn't make for a sexy sound bite.

So, once again, we're back in the same old frustrating place with the same assumptions underlying every news story reporting this amazing discovery, relentlessly snipping away the joy in the find with inappropriate language and the promotion of a very particular set of stereotypes being squashed onto the archaeology itself.

But at least you got to check out one of the world's most eligible bachelors, right?

Reopening old wounds

I read a fantastic article this morning- it was brave, it was bold, and it put forward solutions to problems rather than just moaning about them. You can read it here.

The author, Selina Todd, a historian from Oxford University, describes a conference from hell. Male scholars preen and groom each other, furiously stoking their egos while an alienated group of Other contributors are excluded, left to huddle by the remnants of the catering. I described a terrifyingly similar conference on this blog a year and a half ago, stoked by rage. I'm still angry, but mostly at myself. I did nothing. I snarked online, I wrote an article critiquing those views which will be coming out soon in a journal that none of the culprits will ever read. But I was too cowardly to risk my own prospects by calling out this appalling behaviour. Thinking about it now, there were a number of constructive things I could have done- I could have calmly and rationally emailed the organisers, pointing out the problems, and asking these to be rectified for future conferences (just one female chair- or oooh, big wow, two? some guidelines on appropriate language and behaviour during question sessions?). I could have been brave and asked difficult questions, and tried to puncture the self-satisfaction. All I did was give my paper and slink off to the refreshments.

So my favourite thing about the article is that Todd isn't just angry- she's productive. She puts forward a number of strategies that she, and the other members of the Oxford Women in the Humanities group are developing to try and encourage female scholars. One of these that particularly caught my eye was the idea of writing fellowships, a breathing space for early career scholars to give them a chance to get the publications that lead to a career. I was not in a position to get a research post when finishing my PhD- I simply didn't have the output, something I learnt the hard way through many wasted hours applying for positions overrun with much better applicants. That's not intended as a moan or a whine- that is the way things are, and I am the only person I have to blame for that situation.

 So, over the last year, I've worked my nuts off trying to both write and hold down a full time job. My first book is now out, and I've just about managed to co-author one article as part of a wonderful project, in addition to the critique mentioned above. It's still nowhere near enough- I'm working on a second book, a pair of articles, and trying to get ready for the arrival of our baby. The difference a writing fellowship would have made to someone like me is immeasurable in all sorts of ways. Just having the sense of belonging to an academic network, the access to online journals, let alone the time and space to write without feeling guilty about not doing something else, that would be enough. I will be fascinated to see what the holders of these new fellowships achieve- I am sure the result will be truly transformative research, and maybe, just maybe, a break from the circle of male love Todd describes and we've all witnessed. They might also be courageous enough to turn the tables at the next hell conference, into the bargain.

Christmas 2013: #mulledwines and Ian Hodder

Hello all, a Merry Christmas to you. I've blogged for work about some Christmas festivals in the past, if you fancy a read of that here for some classy blogging (ahem) about pagan Roman and Norse goddesses that got turned into witches and child-eating trolls (no, really) after the Christian takeover.

But what I really want to blog about is that one of the most irritating, senseless, sexist bullshit songs of the year has had a Christmas makeover... and is now almost utterly delightful.

Mulled Wines... by Greg James and Chris Smith, off of BBC Radio 1. If the link doesn't work (and I suspect it won't as it's being rubbish) click here to have a watch.

However, just so as you know, while the original song drove me nuts, one single lyric saved it for me- because it made it so funny I couldn't help gurgling like a happy toddler each time this overplayed piece of disgusting misogynistic nonsense came on the radio.

This redeeming line? "Try to domesticate ya, cos you're an animal, baby it's in your nature."

Okay, maybe this is one of the worst lines in the whole sorry business, as it reduces women to animals (huge rage, not ok, fury burning fury). UNTIL it made me think of Ian Hodder's Domus theory. The idea that Neolithic humans had to deliberately make a decision to make the wild world of animals and plants safe, domesticated and everyday. So everytime over the last year I've heard that piece of shit song, I have a terrifying mental picture of Hodder himself singing out to a recalcitrant aurochs and waving an improvised halter around... on top of a Catalhoyuk style house.

So yeah- that mental picture, and saving you from an impending hernia each time Blurred Lines gets played (even though it should have been put in a bin long ago), is my Christmas present to you.

In the meantime, #mulledwines. And Happy Christmas. See you in 2014.

Stone: Levels of Sexism?

As you can probably tell, based on previous posts (especially that one last weekend), I'm not someone who enjoys being patronised. People treating me poorly because of what's between my legs (and maybe those two things on my upper body) drives me up the wall. It's not just a selfish thing, I hope- I can rage and stomp and scream just from reading an absurd statement that denigrates all of us in possession of female minds or bodies (like the one this week by a Saudi cleric stating that women cause damage to themselves and their ovaries- clearly the most important body part- by driving and giving themselves a modicum of independence). As I wrote last week, it's even worse when this is happening closer to home- "Now we have to listen to the ladies." At an academic conference with a large number of female presenters. Worse: "we know women were only important for their dowries and their weaving skills." I'll let that settle for a moment.

Yet, sometimes, someone behaves in a way that's sexist and it doesn't irritate me. I don't know if this makes me a bad feminist, a traitor to the cause, or just two-faced. But I had an incident of this kind a couple of months ago that I have been meaning to share but I couldn't think of the right occasion or link to my professional life. You see, I love cricket. If you know me offline, (or even follow me on Twitter) then you've probably clocked this. And one of the highest echelons of cricket is to join the ranks of the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) who control the rules and dictate the spirit of the game. Those ranks are mostly male, mostly over 50, and mostly rather conservative. I was proposed as a member by a lovely family friend, who knew I would love to be involved in the organisation that lies at the heart of the game I love. Another kind family friend agreed to sponsor my application. What happened next was the interview.

I dolled up in a dress of my mother's that was too big for me yet suitably sensible and classic. I entered the hallowed soil that is Lord's cricket ground in London, chattered to the receptionist, eyed up the small museum. Then the interviewer arrived- an older gentleman in his sixties, I'd guess. His opening shot "Ah, you must be the archaeologist, I can tell by your figure." I can't decide if he would have made the same remark to a male- I reckon he probably would. Either way, it didn't send me into the stratosphere. "Come upstairs with me," he said, before turning to a handsome young man obviously waiting to be interviewed as well. "I bet you wish you could say that to her." Definitely not something to say about a bloke, although I'm sure it was intended as a compliment. I kept "charming smile number 1" fixed on my face and mentally raised my eyebrows and allowed the steam to begin seeping from my ears.

We went through the Long Room (google it if you don't know- one of the most famous spaces in any sporting venue in the world) where I gazed longingly at the pitch and even more longingly up the stairs to the changing rooms, although I knew they were empty of the tall, gorgeous fast bowlers my husband is jealous of. We went in and we sat down. He had held open every door. He pulled out the chair for me and stood until I was seated. He poured me water. And the conversation began.

It started with a question about whether I played cricket, as "the gels" were doing so very well these days. I don't- my record is getting all 3 of an ex's brothers (and him) out in two overs in a fiery garden game. We went on to whether my husband played, and whether I made teas- "hard to find enough ladies to help" (disapprovingly). Very quickly we were arguing- about whether or not Nick Compton, an England player at the time, should be dropped. I said not, he said yes. He looked tickled by this point and started to visibly relax, while by now I was letting his earlier remarks go and just enjoying chatting to a fellow fan. We went on to argue about the merits of various players, before turning to rugby. The half hour was over too quickly- the young man was shown through by an anxious receptionist, and was told "he can wait- I want to finish talking to this lovely young lady." The older gentleman signed me onto the waiting list with a flourish and a grin, and showed me out with all the over-politeness of my arrival. When I left, all the sexist indiscretions and relics of a bygone age that had peppered my time there had become funny, rather than rage inducing.

That makes me feel slightly bad, looking back on it. I'm not sure why I chose to let those remarks go, why it was funny rather than infuriating. Why did behaviour not a million miles away from this so upset me at the conference last week? I think I've worked it out. The gentleman who interviewed me at the MCC took time to listen to my opinions, weighed them and decided to respect me and my views, even if his opening lines were inappropriate attempts at charm. The highly respected miscreants of the conference did no such thing, snorting and chatting and sniggering through any female paper and refusing to even pretend to engage with the arguments made within them. Are there levels of sexism? Am I a bad feminist for feeling like this, having double standards? I hope not. Because I will always remember my MCC interview with fondness while I suspect that I will never again think of those individuals whose work I had previously respected with anything but straight up indignant fury.

Pots: Everyday Irritations and Extraordinary Discoveries (Rant Warning)

I went to a conference last weekend, and gave a paper. I was happy and excited to meet up with friends and colleagues- the organisers are delightful, and I was hoping to hear some of the most interesting research on Etruscan archaeology. Sadly what I heard, in a lot of papers, was the same old culture-history interpretations, with people equating pots with particular “cultures” and the presence of particular objects in funerary assemblages as obvious and unquestionable evidence of gender, ethnicity and all sorts of other complex categories. Fine, fine- so be it, Etruscology remains firmly imbued in the politics and ideas of the 1950s and 1960s and to some extent probably won’t change any time soon. As long as I can keep pushing for new ideas, developed in the sixty years of archaeological engagement with social theory and anthropology from then to now, I don’t mind people keeping to traditional views. I may disagree with them on a fairly fundamental level, but that’s my opinion developed from my history as a product of a highly theoretical university and a free-thinking doctoral supervisor. What I do mind is individuals talking over young scholars, patronising even senior female academics in a highly sexist manner and treating discussions as an opportunity to hold court.

While I was going mad with frustration and being too cowardly to comment on these negative behaviours, however, really exciting Etruscan archaeology was taking place in the field. On that very same Saturday of last week, an intact tomb from a necropolis at Tarquinia was uncovered. I cannot overstate how rare and incredible and amazing this is. So many of the tombs the Etruscans painstakingly created for their dead have been looted- the profession of the tombarolo, or tomb robber, can be lucrative and has a long heritage. Most Etruscan tombs were cleaned out over the intervening centuries, although some have been emptied tragically recently, with artefacts removed and human remains left strewn around in a mess. Yet this tomb was magically, miraculously intact. 

All the objects were inside, in situ around the skeleton as they had been placed 2,600 years ago in the 7^th century B.C.E. Lying on the funeral benches were the remains of an Etruscan person, accompanied by a large amount of pottery, some jewellery, a bronze vessel and an iron spearhead.

Now, this is all great. But that spearhead (I'm blaming YOU spearhead) seems to have caused some problems. Yes, this is a rich Etruscan burial- as intimated by the archaeologist in charge, Alessandro Mandolesi, who described the remains as those of an “upper class individual.” Yet all the media coverage has leapt to a conclusion I critiqued some months ago- how many times do I need to yell that this is not a “prince.”  Using that terminology is, as I have ranted before, an example of naïve, lazy attempts to put modern labels onto the past. I’ve said that before and it’s even more irritating when this happens in your own archaeological back yard. Yes, the burial was found near to a tomb known as the “Queen’s Tomb.” But the tomb is only known as such due to previous archaeological assumptions! Both the person buried in the “Queen’s Tomb” and the newly discovered “Prince,” even if DNA testing ties the two together, should not be considered royals, with all the modern day baggage that entails. 

Trying to tie that royal label into texts written centuries later (which is what has happened) only serves to exacerbate the situation. Yes, a King, supposedly from Tarquinia is recorded as having ruled over Rome in the 6^th century B.C. But that doesn’t mean this burial is connected to him, it doesn’t mean the individual is a relative of this figure (who may not even be entirely real) and it only provides a tiny shred of information about Etruscan social structures, interpreted through the eyes of Roman authors!

Even worse than these right royal assumptions is the individual is being described as a “warrior” prince. That’s the spearhead’s fault. Not a symbol of masculinity, not a token gesture to ancestral warrior identity, nope. That spearhead means that the individual buried in the grave a) must be male; b) must be royal and c) must be a warrior hero. All this from one object that could have a myriad of different meanings. I notice that the pots have been conveniently shoved to one side- he’s not a “banqueter prince” or a “glutton prince” or a “drunken prince.” No- our own cultural values that prioritise male aggression jump straight on that spearhead and use it to transform this extraordinary tomb into an example of the same tired interpretations that were driving me so crazy last weekend.

 I don’t want to be negative. I don’t want to be ungrateful for this discovery or the chance to attend that conference. But until we are honest about the limitations of these approaches and the mismatch between them and the rest of the archaeological community, all the intact tombs in the world are not going to bring Etruscan archaeology into step with our peers in other areas of research.

To be fair, at least (unlike the Poggio Civitate infant remains stories) all the media I’ve seen has actually got something right and called the discovery “Etruscan” and not “Roman.” There’s still time though.

Bones: Queens, Journalists and Shrieking

Image (c) Wessex Archaeology

There have been a couple of super exciting discoveries in British archaeology recently. One of the absolute best things about Twitter is that I find out about these a lot faster through my network of wonderful archaeology tweeps. One of the most annoying things about this is that I will be cheekily scrolling through my tweets, come across a link, read the article and give out a strangled shriek of rage. Well, irritation, but it still makes my other half look at me like I'm raving mad. You'd think he'd have realised by now. Why would I have such a silly reaction to these wonderful pieces of news? This week I want to talk about an otherwise great discovery that provoked that yowling groan, and why it made me make stupid noises and jump around ranting.

The first one was the discovery of a female burial at Windsor, and included in her grave were some wonderfully rich artefacts. Gold jewellery, a distinctive pot known as a beaker, amber buttons, lignite beads- you name it, this lady was rocking it. The archaeologists themselves were cagey at first- Wessex Archaeology described the Kingsmead Quarry burial as that of an "important woman." Gareth Chaffey, who directed the excavation, tried desperately to encourage reporters to think of the woman in context with her community- to think about the life she led, her potential importance in trade, suggesting she could have been a leader. You can read his remarks on the Wessex Archaeology Blog, and they were pretty damn sensible. Yet mainstream media, Discovery News, the Daily Mail (no, surprise me), and NBC news all went for the royal connection. "Windsor's Earliest Queen!" "The First Queen of Windsor." Cue the NEAAAAAAARRRGH.

There are two massive problems with describing the Kingsmead burial as royal. The first one is an issue of terminology. Queen, princess- these are terms that we have manufactured and specified over centuries of very distinctive monarchy. Queens and princesses belong in interpretations of medieval royal palaces, dynastic marriage and arguments over Tudor succession. They do not belong in prehistory. We have absolutely no way of knowing whether someone living in the Windsor area in around 2500 BCE would have had a conception of a queen. My money says that they wouldn't. It's a completely inappropriate act of ethnocentrism to smear such culturally laden language all over the past. This leads me to the second problem. The terming of a burial as royal suggests that the value this woman had to her community was closely connected to her family, to her lineage. Terming her a Queen makes her body the source of her power- the mother of an heir, the daughter of a King. It removes all sense of this woman as having earned her beautiful grave goods through hard graft, through her position in the community, through her knowledge and wisdom, through her trading nous. To call this woman a queen reduces her to a womb or a chattel, an object revered as the channel for male power. A pretty plaything, revelling in her amber buttons as much as a modern princess might in her designer shoes. Yes, queens can wield power for themselves- Victoria, Elizabeth. Yes, royal women are intelligent, canny and strong. But they do not get hold of power due to their skills. They inherit it from a man, and their primary role is to produce an heir. And it seems like the only way that mainstream archaeological media can conceive of a powerful female figure in the past is to squash her into a royal box. I know the Windsor connection must have been a powerful temptation in this case- but it's symptomatic of a far wider problem. Inappropriate terminology, sexist interpretation, all being peddled to an interested public who lap up the byline and bling, as the journalist gets away with repeating the same tired narratives which press the past into terms so specific to the present as to obscure all its delicious complexity. Apart from being supremely irritating, it's bloody boring.*

I don't know how the Kingsmead woman got hold of her gorgeous grave goods. I don't know who decided she needed them in death. Maybe she did inherit hereditary power. Maybe she was married to a rich, male leader who covered her in goodies. The feminista interpretation of her as powerful in her own right may be as wrong as the sexist idea of her as a queen. My point is that popular science journalism should be exposing this juxtaposition, talking about it, making it clear to the public that archaeological interpretation isn't about splashing modern terms and assumptions on the past. That's why archaeology is so exciting. The world of "Windsor's Earliest Queen" was unimaginably different from our own- you got a flavour of that in the excellent Wessex blog by Karen Nichols. Why is it so impossible for mainstream media to get that message across?

What do you think? Did the Kingsmead coverage drive you nuts? Do you think that the Wessex blog should have been used in the mainstream press rather than just manipulated for the interpretation that journalists wanted? Please let me know.

* In an aside, this isn't just a problem for the media. In my own work, I come up regularly against "Tombe Principesche" or "Princely tombs." It seems like the royal metaphor is still, in spite of critique, clinging on in all its biased glory.

Place: Sexual Harassment and Archaeology

Last week, a couple of quite cool things happened. The first one was that one of my favourite examples of internet feminism, Everyday Sexism, celebrated their first year of existence. They celebrated with a piece charting their development from initial idea to a project that has changed the lives of its founders and given a voice to thousands of men and women. You can read it here. The second thing was that a group of archaeologists on twitter got talking about sexist practice in our discipline, after reading this article by Kate Clancy on harassment and fieldwork. It got me thinking- I've been a member of staff at fabulous excavation for the past three years. We've had our fair share of dig romances- couples making up, breaking up, hooking up (disclaimer- my only dig romance was when my husband came to visit last year. Him bringing me a cold drink at lunchtime is the best part of this). They are almost always created from the intoxicating mixture of conditions that excavations present: intense, long, physical working days. High temperatures. Pheromones running riot as personal hygiene trickles away alongside inhibitions. Add to that the opportunity to drink alcohol for the first time for a lot of our students and you have a perfect storm of potential for unrequited affection and inappropriate behaviour. To my knowledge, a harassment situation hasn't happened. I know that if I hear anything I regard as offensive in my trench, I will stop the conversation and move the talk to another subject. If I was worried about someone's behaviour, I think the staff would get together, discuss it openly, and develop a strategy for preventing harassment both on site and off it. 

But what if that harassment was coming from a staff member? It's a very egalitarian dig, and I think that our director would happily get involved on behalf of anyone who felt uncomfortable (he's fab, and probably why the whole project is so great). But in another place? In another situation when the director wasn't supportive, wasn't interested or was themself in thrall to outside circumstances? What if an external funder was behaving inappropriately towards a member of staff? What price the security and happiness of junior staff or students when compared to losing funding, or losing local support? What if, as Kate Clancy documents, individuals don't feel safe to report abusive behaviour in fear of losing their jobs? There's a BAJR (British Archaeological Jobs Resource) feed all about sexual harassment in commercial archaeology- and during our conversation on Monday the point was made that research excavations should be encouraged to sign up to similar principles of equality as those enshrined in employment law which apply to commercial sites. The American Anthropologial Association issued a statement to that effect in response to Clancy's research.

I think that these well meaning statements are missing the point. Research fieldwork projects are already signed up to codes of conduct for ethical behaviour through their individual institutions. Having "procedures in place" is not the answer, because the problem, as Clancy identifies, is that the repellent activities of those who harass and abuse others in archaeology are carefully choreographed to take place in a fashion which does not damage the career prospects and personal life of the abuser. In her words "It's all about who's watching." Perhaps one of the reasons that the excavation I work at doesn't suffer from this type of behaviour is that there is usually somebody watching, and that somebody is a person who cares about equality, personal safety and not behaving like a total ars*hole. Without calling out individual perpetrators, all the guidelines in the world won't hold them to account. In addition to projects where sexist bias and harassment is a concrete reality, there is one HUGE sphere in which nobody is watching. In which you can do what you like to who you like and probably get away with abuse. That's the digital world. Offensive emails. Creepy Twitter trolling. Abusive comments on a blog. All these can be anonymised. Nobody's watching, except the victim. It makes me think of my only brush with harassment, and wonder if it might have escalated quickly into something much worse in today's digital world.

During PhD induction, I sat next to another new student in one of the induction workshops. I was late, I just sat down. In the group worked that followed, I was already getting uncomfortable with this individual. He kept asking me increasingly personal questions, edging closer and closer in spite of my completely unsubtle piss-off glares and dismissive replies. When he asked me if I was single, I told him I was engaged. He asked me if I thought my now husband really loved me... then tried to stroke my hand and asked for my number. I gave him a fake one, a death stare, and a telling off. It didn't stop him following me around campus for the remainder of the week, until I brought husband to a social event for new PhDs. I was freaked out, frightened and effing furious. The only thing that stopped one man misbehaving was the sight of another, bigger man. My wishes were completely ignored in this situation- if I'd been single, would he have seen me as fair game? Would the stalking have developed from unwanted seating arrangements to following me home? Why was my lack of interest only valid when caused by my being another man's possession? In a world where you can find someone online the instant you know their name, what could have happened next in that situation, if it took place now? Facebook messages? Emails? Tweets? Finding this blog and posting horrible comments that I would have to read as moderator? Sexually explicit trolling? Sexist abuse of my work? What if the individual had been another archaeologist- someone I had to see at departmental events, knowing they were behind such a campaign of bad behaviour, or at least suspecting it? Would I have had the confidence to take such abuse to a senior figure in the university, or go to the police? Would I directly reply to such messages, or would that be giving the individual the response they crave? I don't know.

The third cool thing I did last week was attend a meeting for a new project I'm proud to be working on, that is looking to address some of these issues. Set up by the amazing Dr Sara Perry from York University, the Gender and Digital Culture project is looking to examine the use of digital culture by different groups, explore online experiences both positive and negative, and explore both the potential for the promotion of equality and potential for abuse in digital contexts- and not just in archaeology. I'll probably be writing more about the project in the future, but I really hope that we can develop some ideas to ensure that, even online, there won't be a place where harassment and sexist abuse can happen without repercussions.

What about you? Have you experienced anything like this, online or offline? You can comment anonymously here, of course. 

** Ironically, I had a massive "sexist pig" moment the day before our meeting. Went to bank to make a transfer to send money for images to the Italian Soprintendenza. Bank MANAGER (it said so on his name badge) asked me, in a voice I'd use to my 9 month old second cousin, "Do we need to change our name today?" I must have looked shocked, and said "What?" I had no idea what he meant. He replied "Weeelll, I saw your ring, so we need to change your name, don't we?" Because a married woman can't be in the bank except to transfer financial control to her husband. And any woman in the bank needs to be treated like the itty bitty kittykins with cotton wool for a brain that she is. God help the women who work with this individual.

Let me through that perspex screen and I'll....