A paper yesterday by Mitch Allen (Left Coast Press) in an excellent late-evening session on “Accessible Archaeology” struck a distinct chord. He was advocating the increased use of narrative in archaeological writing – or, perhaps more accurately, the increased use of narrative in writing by archaeologists – something that was the theme of my presentation at the York Heritage Research Seminars in February (“Discussion, Dialogue, Debate: Examining the role of narrative in the visualisation of archaeology).
Mitch’s argument was that narrative seems an obvious language for archaeologists, but that without training, they do it very badly. He pointed out that it is a literary tool that has a long and honourable history in archaeological writing. By coincidence, I’d picked up a copy earlier in the day of Max Mallowan‘s memoirs – exactly the kind of narrative archaeological writing that Mitch had held up as an example: informative, aimed at a general audience but yet full of detail and specialist information, and – yes – accessible.
This was exactly the point I made in my seminar presentation: that narrative is a vernacular language, and that in the context of public archaeology or community-based archaeological practice, finding a ‘common language’ is key to establishing sustainable lines of communication and engagement. Comics and other similar narrative graphic formats share this vernacular heritage, making them ideally suited to use in outreach and community involvement. They are, if you like, “literacy-blind”. As such, they don’t just “overcome” the issue of varied literacy in audiences – they can “work with” ordinary or everyday literacy across age, class, gender and other social and cultural divisions. After all, in community-based archaeology, “narrative” – in the form of oral histories, stories and personal experiences – often form a significant contribution by communities to the knowledge generated from the archaeological project.
Whether in comics, fiction or public speaking, I see narrative as offering those working in community-based archaeology a “shared voice”. Let’s not forget that archaeologists such as Mortimer Wheeler and Max Mallowan were among some of the earliest advocates of what we would now recognise as “public archaeology” – and putting their work into a narrative context was what made it accessible.
Couldn’t agree more with this, John! I can feel a PhD proposal in it somewhere.
… or better yet, a manuscript to Mitch! He finished his paper with an appeal to archaeologists to take a creative writing course and get stuck in!
I think that folks are a great deal less antagonistic than they were even in the recent past about comic books in the U.S. After all, as you know, they are a major educational tool in much of the world. When I was in India, comics were a great way to teach young Hindus about their own religion. Or, older scholars ,for that matter. Are you aware of Professor Munakata’s adventure at the British Museum? That’s a fun book. Wish I had seen the exhibit: http://www.britishmuseum.org/whats_on/past_exhibitions/2009/manga.aspx
Absolutely – in fact, in Europe generally, the use of comics as a didactic resource is pretty common. I can’t help thinking that the timing is right now, too, for them to start percolating “upwards” into more formal, academic publications. People like Joe Sacco have demonstrated that comics have a definite place in journalism – and some would argue that comics journalism is addressing some of the same communication issues that arise in archaeology and the sciences generally. And yes: the Professor Munakata book is good fun!
Certainly your graphic approach is an effective way to get the archaeology message across. Your poster was very visually arresting and I thought a highly effective way of engaging multiple audiences about the past. Even the single photography you have in this post captures the imagination.
Thanks very much – very glad you liked the poster. And yes: I think engaging multiple audiences at the same time is one of the key things that comics could offer archaeology.