|
menu
|
Di Smith
What
is your current position?
Executive Officer to:
Executive Dean, Faculty of Education, Humanities, Law and Theology, Flinders University; and
South Australian Consortium for Information Technology and Telecommunications Incorporated.
Where
did you study archaeology?
Flinders University of South Australia – completed my undergraduate BA, Honours and PhD in Archaeology at Flinders.
How
did you become interested in archaeology?
Fascinated by archaeology and history during as a child, I read lots of books on these subjects but thought that it was just a dream to think I could ever be involved. So I persevered with a mundane working life for eons. Suffering in this way though was actually a good all-round life experience, preparing me for the many things that I later became involved in. During the early 1990s I participated as a volunteer on several Australian excavations and surveys before diving into my studies. I worked in Aboriginal Heritage for the South Australian Government before launching into my PhD. My interests in Archaeology are broad and include rural heritage, Indigenous rock art, social memory, the archaeology of missions, material culture studies and oral history.
What
archaeological projects are you working on at the moment?
I recently completed my PhD which focused on the Archaeology of farm graveyards of vehicles and machinery. For the time being I am concentrating on publication and raising the profile of archaeology in South Australia.
Tell
us about one of your most interesting archaeological discoveries.
There have been many discoveries that I’ve found interesting, but probably one of the most endearing ones for me was finding a fully furnished cubby-house inside a well-camouflaged stock crate. The stock crate was part of a farm site full of scrap metal, cars, trucks and machines. One of the most bizarre discoveries at a similar farm site was a WW1 floating mine…
Tell
us about a funny/disastrous/amazing experience that you have had
while doing archaeology.
I know several archaeologists who will relate to this. Revolting – recording art in the searing heat inside a rock shelter with lots of droppings and the desiccated remains of several animals. Funny – the inappropriate things people wear or forget to wear in the field… Amazing – isolated rock art galleries and acres of car bodies.
What’s
your favourite part of being an archaeologist?
Teaching, talking with people about archaeology and giving people new insights into the past.
Follow
up reading:
2003, The Memory Machines: The Archaeology of Obsolete Vehicle and Machinery Assemblages on Farms, The Fifth World Archaeological Congress WAC-5, The Catholic University of America, Washington DC, USA, June 2003, Online abstract and conference paper, published at: http://godot.unisa.edu.au/wac/pdfs/103.pdf.
2003, 'Comparative Study on Farm Equipment Graveyards Between Alberta and Australia’, Interviewed by Cheryl Croucher, Innovation Alberta, Interview aired on CKUA Radio, Tuesday 8:00pm, September 23, 2003, and online at: http://www.innovationalberta.com/program.php?programid=103
2002, Dodge-tide: a rusting rural legacy? 20th Century Heritage. Our Recent Cultural Legacy, Dr. David S. Jones (Ed.), Proceedings of the 2001 Australia ICOMOS National Conference, School of Architecture, Landscape Architecture & Urban Design, The University of Adelaide, Adelaide and Australia ICOMOS Secretariat, Burwood, pp. 161-165.
2002, Funeral for a Friend: a discourse on the relationship between farmers, vehicles and machinery. Counterpoints. Celebrating Diversity in Research. Conference Proceedings 2001, Vol.1, No.1, Counterpoints Conference Committee, Adelaide, conference for Post Graduate students of the Faculty of Education, Humanities, Law and Theology, Flinders University of South Australia, held 19-20 April, 2001, pp. 114-121.
2002, Reincarnation: Investing in an archaeological working life, Proceedings of the Third National Archaeology Students’ Conference Adelaide 2000, Greg Carver and Katrina Stankowski (Eds), Southern Archaeology, Blackwood, South Australia, pp. 85-91.
2002, C.R. Pennell (ed.), Bandits at Sea, Book Review (by Di Smith) in The Great Circle, Journal of the Australian Association for Maritime History, Vol.24, No.1, pp.52-55
|
MOUSEOVER
CAPTIONS
|
| |
| |
|
