Digital Scholarship: Archaeology
Essential Skills and Tools
Dissemination
Archaeologists explore human behaviors of the past, but these individuals inform our present. Consider how your work could impact modern communities, and whether individuals with cultural ties to your research could benefit from hearing about your work. If you are collaborating with a community or creating a longstanding project that could pass through many hands, pay careful attention to the type of platform you choose. Critical questions to consider are cost and required skill level. This page reviews a variety of platform options. For archaeologists, a platform like StoryMaps could be particularly helpful because it integrates mapping features.
Text Analysis
- Archaeological history is fraught with cultural insensitivity and racism. Our methods and theories improve daily, and our vocabularies shift in turn. Unpack the impact of word choices. Use analytical tools to measure the occurrence of key words and phrases, as well as authors’ tone.
- The discipline’s historiography is similarly compelling when we engage with what topics scholars are publishing about. JSTOR and Scopus have embedded visualization tools and you can use them to model what archaeologists are publishing about over time. Visualize how different ideas and doctrines spread through time or space. Use this for your publications, or for your classroom.
Spatial Analysis
- GIS (Geographic Information Systems) is critical for this discipline. Learn how to record locations of people, places, and objects and analyze spatial relationships.
3D
- Preserve objects and biological remains; carry out your hands-on analyses. Learn how to 3D print artifacts and bones.
- Virtual reality simulations and interactive 3D spaces can help us envision what ancient landscapes were like.
Data Management and Visualizations
- Data management is critical. Think about all of the lists archaeologists make – names, dates, objects, places, etc. Learn how to effectively store these in a spreadsheet and how you can format your entries to support future analyses.
- Coding can be hugely useful. Python and R are great options for archaeologists. Programming languages can speed up the process of editing datasets, creating graphs and visualizations, as well as customizing GIS tools. Choosing which language is best for your needs can be overwhelming; generally speaking, Python and R are where archaeologists begin. Contact the Data Services team to find out which coding language is best for your needs, and find out about upcoming free workshops.
Digital Archaeologists at Brandeis
Digital Archaeology Training Resources
The Open Digital Archaeology Textbook This open-access digital archaeology textbook will cover key skills and resources, plus hands-on tutorials.
Programming Historian These digital tutorials are largely geared towards historians, but they can be easily transferred to archaeological projects. Learn how to code in Python, scrape Twitter datasets, GIS, and more.
Digital Archaeology Publications
This Zotero library is regularly updated with publications discussing digital scholarship's impact on Archaeology.
This page was last updated on August 20, 2024. If you would like to contribute to this page, please contact Dr. Natalie Susmann.