Bob Muckle
bobmuckle.bsky.social
Bob Muckle
@bobmuckle.bsky.social
Archaeologist. Broad experiences and interests in archaeology. Currently focussed on arch of recent and contemporary times. Written several books, incl textbooks. Series editor for Teaching Archaeology (U of Toronto Press). Now also trying to write fiction
New comedy series, ‘Dig’, featuring fictional archaeologists being planned.
So it's not enough that Mike Schur, Amy Poehler, and JJ Philbin are teaming up to do a new show, but it's called DIG and it's based on *archaeological excavation in Greece*?!?

If I ignore literally everything else in the world but this, I am now extremely happy.
Amy Poehler, Mike Schur Reunite for Peacock Comedy ‘Dig’
The ‘Parks and Recreation’ star and co-creator will both be writers and EPs on the series along with J.J. Philbin.
www.hollywoodreporter.com
May 7, 2025 at 10:47 PM
Was giving a presentation on some of my recent and ongoing archaeological work at a conference today and unexpectedly came across this promotional poster for my forthcoming book ‘Once Upon This Land: Archaeology in British Columbia and the Stories it Tells’.
May 3, 2025 at 8:04 PM
Earlier today I received word that I will be receiving emeritus status from Capilano University at the June convocation. I’m thrilled.
April 11, 2025 at 9:19 PM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
Men walked on the Moon - but women made the guidance computers that got them there and back. At the landing sites and command module crash sites the computers are evidence of a unique women's lunar heritage. 🧪🏺
The Apollo core rope memory and women's heritage on the Moon
Between 1969 and 1972 there were six Apollo human spaceflight missions to the Moon, each leaving a complex site behind. A common joke now is...
zoharesque.blogspot.com
April 2, 2025 at 11:36 PM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
Don't forget to human today.

Make stuff. Do stuff. Go see something interesting. Move around. Eat.

I sometimes get busy and forget to human.
March 28, 2025 at 12:35 PM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
the draft programme is available (and looks amazing!) and registration is open for the 2025 bc studies conference, which is being held at the university of british columbia from may 1-4.
#bchist #cdnhist #bcpoli #bced
blogs.ubc.ca/bcsconferenc...
BC Studies Conference 2025 – Diamond Point, Interconnected (2021). Used with permission of the artist.
Diamond Point, Interconnected (2021). Used with permission of the artist.
blogs.ubc.ca
March 3, 2025 at 7:51 PM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
I'm delighted to see archaeology accepting the jigsaw pieces we won't find. The ephemeral, the perishable....they've got their own story too, as you know I've written of....
We never talk about the wood age, in contrast to the stone age or iron age. The truth is, we have always been in the wood age and still are, but wood leaves very few artifacts for us to see.
The word technology brings to mind silicon wafers or carbon fibers. But for most of human existence people relied on organic materials for most of their technology. In a handful of places natural conditions have preserved wooden artifacts from pre-human ancestors.

johnhawks.net/weblog/four-...
March 3, 2025 at 8:21 PM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
The TAG 2025 website is up and running, which means we are open for session proposals! Check it out here: tag2025.hosted.york.ac.uk
tag2025.hosted.york.ac.uk - Washington, DC
tag2025.hosted.york.ac.uk
tag2025.hosted.york.ac.uk
February 27, 2025 at 3:01 PM
My latest book: ‘Once upon This Land: Archaeology in British Columbia and the Stories it Tells’ is available for pre-order. www.ubcpress.ca/once-upon-th...
Once upon This Land
Once upon This Land - Archaeology in British Columbia and the Stories It Tells; Once upon This Land is a much-needed overview of archaeology in British Columbia that introduces readers to the fascinat...
www.ubcpress.ca
February 25, 2025 at 8:22 PM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
Hello Archaeologists!
Welcome to the official BlueSky page for the Theoretical Archaeology Group (TAG) 2025 conference!

Watch this space for our website and Call for Sessions!

Find us on:
Facebook at TAG 2025 at York
X at @TAG2025_York
Instagram @tag2025_york
#tag25 #tagyork #tag2025york
February 18, 2025 at 11:45 AM
Archaeology of contemporary times
So we finally had a chance, with the help of a homeowner, to sample soils from two burned structures in Pacific Palisades. This will form the basis for our tracking of the effect of both the fire and the clean-up on soil toxicity. Depressing scenes, to be sure.
February 9, 2025 at 11:17 PM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
Write every day for 1 hour. If you miss a writing day add 1 hour to the next. It’s incredible! Tomorrow I’m writing for 7 years.
February 8, 2025 at 6:02 PM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
It may be a bit "inside baseball," but I'm wildly excited about the promise of palaeoproteomics -- not quite as much info as DNA, but can give us info from millions of years ago. This new paper out today shows they were able to figure out biological sex of an A. africanus specimen (2-3.5myo). 🏺🧪
In a 1st, ancient proteins reveal sex of human relative from 3.5 million years ago
Researchers have extracted ancient proteins from australopithecine fossils and determined whether they were male or female — a first for human evolution studies.
www.livescience.com
February 7, 2025 at 8:51 PM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
I wrote an article for The Conversation about generative AI visualisation in #archaeology, will discuss it further in a thread tomorrow. 🏺

theconversation.com/how-ai-image...
How AI imagery could be used to develop fake archaeology
Even before the use of AI, it was widely accepted within archaeology that visualisations of the past are highly fraught and should be treated with caution.
theconversation.com
February 4, 2025 at 6:59 PM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
This week's blog post is a little different.

On:
Capturing the embodied experience of archaeology in games
Games as lists
Archaeological stratigraphy as a spatial list
Vocabulary lists and queer identity
Erasure
Perpetuity

florencesmithnicholls.com/2025/02/04/o...
On the pleasure of lists in: archaeology; video games
“Lara Croft is seen as the monstrous offspring of science: an idealized, eternally young female automaton, a malleable, well-trained techno-puppet created by and for the male gaze.” So says Anne-Ma…
florencesmithnicholls.com
February 4, 2025 at 5:16 PM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
The juxtaposition of a mammoth reduced to the barest line, with the most human of symbols in blood-red ochre.
Yes, there is probably something to decode, but first it's important to share the awe that human art can persist for such spans of time.
That we can still encounter it.
Chauvet ~32,000
🏺🦣
February 3, 2025 at 8:39 AM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
Cover reveal! Check out this beautiful cover for our edited volume coming out later this year from Berghahn Books. Very excited about this.
January 24, 2025 at 2:28 PM
Today I registered for the 2025 Honolulu marathon. I started recreational running in 2022, and nobody is likely to be more surprised than me that I like it. I’m slow, but I get there.
January 8, 2025 at 12:18 AM
Reviewing the copyeditor’s comments and suggestion on my latest book ms. I almost always find myself in awe of copyeditors, and this is no exception. The ms is for ‘Once Upon This Land: Archaeology in British Columbia and the Stories it Tells.’
December 4, 2024 at 6:57 PM
Reposted by Bob Muckle
Colin Renfrew has passed away. A hugely influential figure in archaeology throughout the 20th and early 21st centuries.
Here are a few photos of him from about 15years ago, when I was working on his Keros Project.
November 24, 2024 at 8:42 PM
Foundation of an oforu (Japanese bathhouse) from early 20th c Japanese settlement in Canada. Very cool site. No historical documents mention it. Very little arch visibility on surface. Excavations revealed evidence of about a 14 small houses, a garden, and a shrine. Sudden abandonment.
November 23, 2024 at 3:11 AM
Tools of my trade. My personal trowels.
November 21, 2024 at 6:25 PM
November 20, 2024 at 1:07 AM
Taphonomy of a face mask, part of my arch of Covid project
November 20, 2024 at 12:58 AM
an archaeologist’s journey from Ancient Greece to outer space
It seems like a good time to re-introduce myself in a little archaeology thread. 🏺 I started in the Mediterranean, working on interaction between Greeks and other groups, especially in Sicily. I used Greek pottery to understand how people defined their identity. But then I got interested in space.
November 20, 2024 at 12:41 AM