Jim Dixon
University of the West of England, Faculty of Creative Arts

A World Archaeological Congress is an odd thing. The sheer scale of the event is astounding. WAC 6 in Dublin (29 June – 4 July 2008) attracted something close to 2,000 participants from all over the world. The first time I went was in 2003 to Washington D.C. and that wasn’t much different in scale. Everything about a World Archaeological Congress appears impressive and much of it is. It’s great to meet other archaeologists from all over the world; people you would not meet under any other circumstances. I also like the idea of having a quite overtly political archaeology conference. Not to be forgotten is the WAC social calendar, always an impressively liquid jaunt through many of the host city’s most attractive and wine reception-friendly large and significant spaces, as well as its continuation in the cities’ less obviously significant, but definitely more binge-friendly corners. Still, a World Archaeological Congress is an odd thing. My experience of Dublin made it clear that perhaps the size of the conference, the root of all that is good about it, is also behind its failings.

I got the first inklings of potential problems some months before the conference began. A few people I know organised sessions and ran into a common problem; although having been given only two hours for their session by the WAC committee, they were later forced to include papers that they had previously rejected. The word from WAC on this was an encouragement to ‘experiment with different session formats’. Now, I have no problem with this. I like conference sessions that break down the usual paper-question-answer format. Most, however, didn’t and relied on… luck, I suppose, to try to fit sometimes more than ten papers into their two hour slots. The other problem ‘in advance’ was cost. Very expensive is WAC.
The conference proper started badly. ‘Archaeologists and anthropologists in the face of war’ organised by Tamima Mourad and John Allison (120 mins: 13 papers) was the reason. The obvious problem caused by cramming papers in raised its head immediately as the participants in the session seemingly hadn’t been informed that the fifteen minute slots they had expected were now reduced to seven. The first speakers, Jari and Tuula Okkonen refused to cut their paper down. The remainder essentially gave their introductions and conclusions. Still, some of the papers served to inform me about areas of which I know little. Rasmi Shoocongdej’s paper on southern Thailand was very interesting but the (thankful) highlight of the session was hearing about Britt Baillie’s work on Vukovar and the reconstruction of monuments that had been intentionally destroyed as justifications for the unwanted presence of certain ethnic groups.
After lunch I finally had some joy with a session called ‘Experience, modes of engagement, archaeology’ organised by Krysta Ryzewski, Matt Ratto and Michelle Charest. The session presented a great spread of different perspectives and ways of looking at both the world and at archaeology. For me, the most interesting was Sara Perry’s work on two-dimensional archaeological images and how they’re used by archaeologists. I have an interest in looking to complicate some of the more mundane actions of archaeologists and Perry’s paper was a great example.
A wine reception can usually cure a lingering sense of having maybe overspent on a dodgy conference, and Monday’s state reception at Royal Hospital Kilmainham hosted by the Minister of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government promised to be a memorable affair, certainly if the impressive venue was anything to go by. The reception was spread across two rooms and I was unlucky to be in the less busy of the pair when, without announcement, the doors between them were locked in preparation for the Minister’s speech. In the other room. With hindsight this is amusing. A couple of interesting papers, much free wine and some moreish chicken-based canapés aside, this first day was a disappointing one.

 Royal Hospital Kilmainham
I was up bright and early for day two, eager to forget the faltering start to the Congress. I began with Helen Wickstead’s session, ‘Site Specific: between archaeologists and artists’, part of the ‘Archaeologies of Art’ theme. The session brought together a number of artists working with archaeological material, including a number of those involved in the art programme attached to the Stonehenge Riverside Project. Although I think that the session could have done with more input from the curatorial and commissioning side of these various projects to set a clearer context for the work, it was an interesting set of presentations and great to hear a raft of papers from non-archaeologists.
My own research focuses on intersections between artistic and archaeological practice so after this fillip I was actually excited by the prospect of the plenary session ‘Art/Archaeology: Engaging critically with process’ with speakers Colin Renfrew, Doug Bailey and Kevin O’Dwyer, chaired by Barbara Dawson, Director of Dublin City Gallery. The contrasting ideas of Renfrew and Bailey are interesting. The former approached the session looking at how archaeologists can engage with art (basically that some art can look archaeological and some archaeology can look artistic), the latter looking at applications of artistic processes to critical examination of a process-led archaeology. My own work is very much of the Bailey type so I found myself critical of Renfrew, but, of course, he is an incredibly engaging speaker and the plenary was a fantastic experience. Fantastic, that is, until the speakers finished and other people got involved.
I count myself lucky to have been present at the asking of the most inane question ever put forward in a conference setting. Responding to a comment from Doug Bailey about pushing to examine archaeological processes through looking at artistic engagement, an American lady in the front row raised her hand and asked, “Recently, archaeology has expanded a lot and we’re now looking at all sorts of things that we weren’t able to ten years ago. Why can’t you just be happy with that?” To his credit, Bailey replied , “You know, I don’t even feel motivated to answer that question.” I have to put this odd moment down to the Jekyll and Hyde nature of such a large gathering. For every wonderful experience that is down to the widened demographic and diversity among delegates, there is also a moment of despair caused by the lower common denominator occasioned by the sheer volume of attendees. I hope everyone else in the audience was thinking that we can’t just be happy with that because we have enquiring minds and don’t want archaeology to stagnate. Unfortunately I don’t know who this woman was as I would love to be able to name and shame her. I likewise don’t know what she does for a living but I would bet that it involves pot sherds and counting. As someone whose conference attendance is dominated by TAG and CHAT, I often forget that for many people, engaging with archaeological theory is the exception rather than the rule.
The odd end to the session was compounded by the refusal of the Director of Dublin City Gallery to accept that art could be process-led and not necessarily result in a painting or a sculpture, despite the protests of a large number of artists in the audience. To my discredit I had a bad reaction to this display of general ignorance and closed-mindedness. I left the conference at lunchtime and walked home, staying there muttering things about wasted time and money for the remainder of Tuesday and the whole of Wednesday. From what I hear, the Tuesday evening wine receptions were all wonderful affairs but I was happy to watch the football on TV.
The bad time that I had over these two days was, I am aware, as much down to how I approached the Congress than to the individual things I’ve discussed. The people I spoke to who had a great week spent more time outside sessions talking to people than in sessions listening to papers. I think that next time (for I will inevitably end up at WAC again) I should limit myself to one session a day and instead devote myself to meeting as many people as possible. It sounds odd to say that for WAC to work, you have to not see it as an academic conference but as a lighter, social event. That is, however, the only way I can see of approaching it without becoming cynical, bored, incredulous or angry depending on your prior disposition. Needless to say, there were good things that I’ve not mentioned, but I’ve balanced this by holding back on just how bad the bad bits were.
Oh, and the sandwiches were shocking. Bah humbug.