Session: #882

Content:

The “synthesis” of research should ultimately contribute to archaeological narratives that impact on the public understanding of the past. When we talk about synthesis, this includes the masses of grey literature reports from commercial, community, academic or publicly funded archaeological investigations as well as formal publications. But how much should synthesis signpost and when does synthesis become a research agenda or framework?
This session will examine the needs of the different audiences such as researchers, curators, local communities, and the wider interested public - in terms of access to data, narratives and formats. Synthesis is vulnerable to time-lag, and to privileging certain perspectives, as it tends to be undertaken by senior staff, and due to the demographic profile of these staff, very often older, male staff. Whilst their experience and perspectives are valuable, so are those of others.
For some synthesis is about revisiting past data sets and narratives and updating in light with the results of more recent investigations so proving an improved paradigm, for others it's just about drawing together different strands of evidence from across the breadth of the archaeological profession and, more widely, from allied disciplines. Data may be from a single site or from multiple sites/locations, from different aspects of a single specialism or the collation of information from several specialisms.
This session asks:
1. What can synthesis achieve and what is the value of comparative analysis?
2. At what scale of analysis should we be considering synthesis; Regional, National, European or Global?
3. How do we decide on appropriate themes for synthesis?
4. How are synthetic studies used to plan future investigations?
5. How can we achieve more rapid synthetic studies; is there room for interim discussion papers?
6. Should adequate funding for Synthesis be budgeted for at the start of the process?

Session: #882

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