GIS for Archaeology and CRM

Juan A. Barcelo, of the Quantitative Archaeology Lab at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona offers a handful of very interesting articles and power point presentations on his site. Navigate by using the headings on the left-hand side labeled Analisis Espacial (Spatial Analysis), Estadistica (Set Theory), Inteligencia Artificial (Artificial Intelligence), and Visualizacion (Visualization). In each category are a group of papers and PowerPoint presentation on the selected topic. Many of these are written in Spanish, but a number are also in English. Note: the PowerPoint presentations require Internet Explorer to view.

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During 2007 the ESRC, as part of the Historical Geographical Information
Systems Research Network, is sponsoring a number of free seminars on the
use of GIS to study the past. These will be led by Dr Ian Gregory, author
of A Place in History: A Guide to Using GIS in Historical Research.
Historical GIS is a rapidly growing field within historical research. A
Geographical Information System (GIS) is a form of database management
system within which every row of data is linked to a co-ordinate-based
location. By using GIS historians can structure, integrate, analyse and
visualise the geographies of the past.

The seminars will consist of a mixture of presentations and roundtable
discussions and will help attendees to make better use of GIS in their
research, by considering what exactly GIS has to offer historians, in what
ways historians make, or would like to make, use of GIS in their research
and what technological and methodological issues are faced. They are aimed
at a broad audience including established academics, members of the
heritage sector, junior researchers and post-graduates.

The first seminar will take place in York on 28 February 2007.  Places are
limited and booking forms need to be returned by 15 December 2006.
Further details of the seminar, including a downloadable booking form, can
be found at http://ahds.ac.uk/history/hgis/seminar-york.htm

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This is a question I get every so often and the short answer is “Yes”, but finding one can be a challenge. With an increasing number of GIS savvy archaeological students graduating from college and looking to apply their art to the trade, GIS specific positions are in demand.

Knowing that a few students have landed on this blog, I though I would say a few words and compile a list of links that are a good starting point for the job search.

Job Fields

Within the broad field of archaeology, there are a number of settings that employ GIS techniques to archaeological data sets. In the US, most of this work is done in Cultural Resource Management firms in the private sector. These firms range in size from small shops to branches of large engineering firms. Each end of the spectrum has pros and cons. The GIS work in a CRM firm can be very monotonous at times, but new projects are always around the corner. If you don’t mind filling your time with repetitive database management and computer cartography, punctuated with cool analysis projects, CRM could be a good fit.

Academic departments are also a good place to wow our colleagues with archaeological algorithms and ancient analysis. Many archaeology departments have their token professor who uses GIS. Some departments are much more in depth and specialize in GIS in archaeology. Though chances are, if you are looking for a professor position, you know the challenges that are ahead of you. If I had the endurance to stick it out for the PhD., becoming a prof. would be ideal.

Museums and non-profit foundations are also a place to look for positions. Often times, these positions are based on specific projects and grants, so longevity may not be in the cards. Thought, arrangements such as this can lead to an impressive resume of very interesting projects. High variability in the pay scale and high turnover make this a demanding setting, but great data sets and interesting projects could make it very rewarding.

Finally, GIS is also applied to archaeology at the State and Federal government level. Each state has a State Historic Preservation Office [SHPO] (or something similarly named) that advises other agencies and private companies on archaeological regulations and acts a the repository for historic and archaeological data for the state. Many of the SHPOs I am familiar with have at least one GIS person if not more. SHPOs have a tremendous amount of sensitive data on their hands and many people who need access to it. Not wanting to be the bottle neck, many SHPOs across the country have and are making attempts to automate data access. This process, for most SHPOs, is a huge undertaking transforming dozens of paper maps and thousands of forms to databases and web front ends, a process that takes years. Landing in one of these positions provides great project experience and offers insight into the working of the political world.

Job Skills

Archaeologists in general are skilled in many different fields. An archaeologists needs to know bit about pedology, geology, geomorphology, biology, chemistry, geography, and beer-ology to name a few. Working with computers in archaeology is no different. Many positions are as much computer generalist as they are GIS person. Be prepared to format reports, create spreadsheets and DBs, fix a computer, run a GPS, hack your outdated software, and most importantly, create your boss’s Powerpoint presentation. Further, many GIS archaeologists are also archaeologists and therefore required to swing a shovel when they are needed. Although digging the frozen much on the side of New Jersey highway in January sucks, sometimes taking a break from pixels is a good change of pace.

Links

As a preamble, I think it is important to emphasize that connections, networking, and personal commendation or more likely to land you a job than blindly sending emails. Try giving a phone call to local CRM firms and museums; often times, websites are way out of date and you could get the jump on an open position. What’s the worst that can happen?

The list below is somewhat organized. I am sure there are plenty more resources out there, so if I am missing any, write a comment or email me.

General Info:

• Society for American Archaeology job postings
  
• Archaeology/GIS Specialist job description from archaeology.about.com

Archaeology Job Postings:

• Shovelbums Archaeology job postings
• Archaeologyfieldwork.com job postings
  
• eCultural Resources job postings
  
• Archaeological.org job postings
  
• Museum Jobs postings

List of SHPOs and CRM Firms

• List of State Historic Preservation Offices
  
• List of CRM Firms Worldwide
  
• List of CRM Firms for US
  
• Not GIS specific, but a listserv discussion on Archaeology job skills (last post is quite apropos)
  

Some UK GIS Job sites (Thanks to Steve White)

• General GIS jobs in the UK #1
• General GIS jobs in the UK #2
  
• General GIS jobs in the UK #3

Some Academic Departments with GIS/Archaeology

• University of Arkansas and Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies
  
• SUNY Buffalo and National Center for Geographic Information and Analysis
  
• Washington State University
• University of Sydney
• University of Glasgow
  

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Sorry for the lack of posts over the 4th of July Holiday. My favorite fishing spot does not have Wi-Fi

Back to the posting…

This is the title of a recent thread on the Online Archaeology forum that has drawn a great response with some interesting observations.

The Discussion

The thread started innocently enough with a few folks asking about applications of GIS in archaeology, if it is valued, and whether it is worth while to take a class in it. As with the Online Archaeology site, many of the responses and view points here are from the UK.

Initially, many responses stated that they have used of heard of GIS in archaeology here and there, but overall it was too expensive. User AntArch, came to the table with the first informative response clearing the air of some misconceptions and describing more the essence of GIS, how it can be used in archaeology. Citing the lack of university training, lack of exemplar data sets available, and resistance from the contract/professional units due to time and cost, AntArch ultimately agreed that, yes, GIS is undervalued in archaeology.

A number or responses back and forth generally agreed that GIS is a very powerful tool for the archaeological tool chest, but often unused because of the real or perceived notion that is is too expensive, there is a lack of trained users and a confusion about what the “GIS” is and what it can do. To me the latter seems like a major reoccurring theme.

Then the discussion got very interesting! From the pleasant banter of general agreement, user “Snooks” words cracked like thunder (that may be a bit dramatic, but…)

“I am in a key IT position in one of the major contractors in the UK… I can tell you I have not seen GIS used in commercial archaeology. Too expensive and too time consuming…We want jobs to come in fast and reports to go out fast. No time/money to waste on GIS analysis.”

Well, that was one hell of a statement. AntArch followed this is a well crafted response expressing dismay for Snooks point of view and arguing the basics of what contract archaeology is all about. Not that this is the topic of the discussion, but Snooks obviously brought it into play with his/her statement. Snooks and AntArch had it our back and forth, with Snooks taking the business is business hard line. Snooks goes so far as to say that commercial archaeologists fain a desire to be academics, but we “inherently” cannot because of our pursuit for the almighty buck (or 0.781933 euro). After a few volleys, Snooks conceded that ideally, collecting “GIS data” is the proper and ethical thing for archaeologists to do, but in this business climate, it won’t fly, so don’t bother getting training because it won’t get you a job. I’m glad no body told me that when I was in school!

The responses that followed were all in support of AntArch’s pro-GIS position. Mostly stating that they too work for a commercial company using GIS practices on nearly all projects. Further, these responses addressed the common gripe of too much money and time and encouraged students to take a look into GIS as an addition to their studies.

The Conclusion

Although Snooks dollar-first-archaeology-later attitude was abhorrent within the forum, it certainly opens a can of worms that is right for the picking. When GIS techniques and practice is so evidently useful to archaeologists, what is the barrier that keeps it from common acceptance. As shown, time/money is the most often cited reason, but is it more of a contract vs. academic problem, or is it just a lack of understanding of what a GIS point of view is capable of?

It seems to me that the misunderstanding of what “GIS” actually IS causes a rift which trickles down to create the subsequent issues. Surely, I am no GIS prophet who claims to “get it”, but I have dealt with GIS and Archaeology enough to see the bigger picture. Within the forum discussion, the term “GIS” is often batted around as a commodity; a thing you have or do not have, GIS either is or is not. Of course, GIS is not a singular thing, rather a collection of things composed into a system that has objects and properties. The classic analogy is GIS as a toolbox. Tools can be used in different ways to solve different problems. To know how to address an issue, you need to know your tools. GIS is endlessly scalable. GIS tools can be used in an archaeological project from the level of visualizing GPS points, a quick aerial/satellite overlay, or complex model building and analysis.

Within the forum, the “too expensive” argument for GIS is put in it’s place by suggesting the numerous open source / freely licensed GIS programs (See a recent post by Mapz the GIS librarian). As far as the “too expensive” argument applied to training personnel, I am sure one could find a GIS knowledgeable intern or entry level archaeologist for a low price. I was one of those for a number of years and I know there are plenty more out there. The computer skills needed to learn your way around a GIS are not for beyond the basic skills most college kids already have. I would stress that a back ground in Geography and GIS theory is as important, if not more so than computer skills, but getting your foot in the GIS/Archaeology door does not have to be costly.

The discussion on the Online Archaeology Forum is a very important discussion for Archaeology and a whole. The replies give good insight into the level that GIS has permeated archaeology and has become (or not become) an accepted tool. The topics raised by the simple title “GIS; Undervalued in Archaeology?” go far and wide beyond the use of GIS in archaeology. I hope this discussion develops as time goes on.

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ArcheOS Akhenaton, an archaeologist tailored GNU/Linux operating system released a new version (1.1.6) today. You know you’ve made it when your field gets its own Linux Distro!

ArcheOS, billed as “The first GNU-Linux distribution for archaeology”, is a PCLinuxOS based released under the General Public License (GPL). Created by the Arc-Team, a 5 archaeologist/craftsman group from the Universities of Padua and Vienna, ArcheOS is a collection of opensource and freely licensed applications that fit well with what archaeologists need to do.

A table of the software follows: (red indicates new to version 1.1.6)

The provided software covers a wide breadth of functionality. Though probably not complete for some users, this distribution is a great starting point for someone wanting to cut the software budget and get down to work. I have only dabbled in the world of GNU/Linux distributions; I wish I had more opportunity. If I do get the chance to dust off an old laptop and mess with Linux, this will definitely be my first project.

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Mapz the GIS Librarian posted an great list of freely available GIS software.  Setting this list apart, is the classification of software into use categories and Mapz annotations.  Outlined is a pretty complete suite of applications that can be used to address many spatial problems.

Having read a survey a few years back regarding archaeologists use of GIS, one of the main issues with integration was cost.  As with many opensource and free licenses projects mentioned on this blog, Mapz list of applications offer a high quality work around for having a slim GIS budget.  Most of these programs are user friendly in both form and function.

Good stuff Mapz!  As mentioned in the post, you can also check out Freegis.org and the Very Spatial Free GIS list.

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Although my blog “GIS for Archaeology” was not mentioned in the new GIS Monitor article, “GIS in Archaeology” I will be the better person and post about it anyway.

Pointed out by SlashGeo, the current issue of the GIS Monitor has an article focusing on the use of GIS in Archaeology. Stating that Archaeology is a perfect fit for the use of GIS, the article points out that Archaeology is the only humanity field to embrace GIS to a large degree. The material for this article is derived from a talk with Dr. Caverlee S. Cary from the Geographic Information Science Center at the University of California at Berkley. Dr. Cary and the GIS center have worked with archaeologists in the past and offered comments on how they see archaeologists using GIS.

GIS and archaeology are a perfect match, according to Cary, because linking attribute information to locations on the Earth’s surface “is exactly what archaeologists need to do when they are documenting a site. The core of archaeology is that you know exactly where on or in the ground any given object that has been discovered came from.”

One application that the article focuses on is the use of remotely sensed images in archaeology. Describing how aerial and satellite imagery is used for finding new sites, mapping known sites, and evaluating environmental conditions, Dr. Cary states that this application is new to archaeology. Although she is correct in here assertion of uses, Remote Sensing in archaeology has been around for nearly as long as remote sensing itself. Aerial photos have been a main stay of archaeological data from the beginning, as well, Landsat and other remotely sensed data has been brought into our work flow for 20+ years. I do not dispute that Dr. Cary is fully aware of the history of RS in archaeology (She is co-author to a paper on this topic at Berkley this week), but I want to give my readers an impression of the depth to its use.

My 2 cents

As suggested in my post on the Integration of GIS in Archaeology, Archaeologists have used GIS technology and techniques for quite some time. A single example would be the Computer Application and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology conferences that have been held since 1973. GIS like methods appeared in this conference in the early years and by the Early 90’s, it had become a stand alone topic.

In my job, we use GIS for many tasks from the management of historic resources, to sensitivity analysis, landscape modeling, 3D visualization, general cartography, scenario testing, and many more. Archaeology is a spatial discipline. We are taught from day one that once something is pulled out of the ground, it better be recorded well enough that in 100 years, someone can find that point on earth within a centimeter. Spatial accuracy is a hallmark of archaeology and a big reason why we jumped on the wagon so early. This is aside from the fact that we are nerdy bunch!

If anyone is interested to know more about he we use GIS in archaeology, give me a yell.

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I ran across a relatively new blog (GIS in Science) today that is established to be the discussion forum for a new project that evaluates the value of Geographic Information Systems within Science. Run by members of the Spatial Information Laboratory (SPIN Lab) at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, GIS in Science also has a large body of contributors from a variety of disciplines and locations.

What drew me to this site was a post and paper discussing the the integration of GIS within the discipline of Archaeology. Before I talk about the paper, I would be helpful to briefly outline the context which this group has developed to evaluate how well GIS is integrated into various scientific disciplines.

Modelling the integration of GIS in a scientific discipline

In a short paper entitled, Modelling the integration of GIS in a scientific discipline, the author discusses an outline of an explanatory model that evaluates the value of GIS within a discipline. The model that the author is searching for is intended to go beyond the typical quantification of publications and citations to a more in depth search which is also qualitative. Basically, the model which is proposed offers six stages before GIS is fully integrated. Briefly, the stages are defined by:

Stage 1, pioneering publications and presentations
Stage 2, invitational presentations
Stage 3, sessions and symposia dedicated to topic
Stage 4, academics seeking training
Stage 5, academics providing training
Stage 6, construction of large scale data base for research and analysis

and full integration. At the point of full integration, GIS is woven into a substantial part of the academic research work flow and education. This model represents the initial ideas of the project group and are certain to be updated and refined as the model progresses.

Integration of GIS in Archaeology

As one of the initial disciplines surveyed by the GIS in Science project group, Archaeology is discussed as being more broadly integrated with GIS than other historical sciences. As early as the 1970’s archaeology had started to turn some attention to the need of studying space as a prime attribute of culture. As noted by Hans Kamermans of the University of Leyden,

“Archaeology is the determination of human behavior, from the location of cultural objects.”

As the 1980’s progressed, computers were heavily used in archaeology and early GIS methods were adopted. Conferences in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s involved more topics of spatial analysis and GIS. As well, publications on GIS in archaeology grew in numbers. By the late 1990’s conferences had specific sessions dedicated to GIS and GIS was a topic available for study in a large number of universities. This area of study is more available today. The author of this paper conclude that to this point, stages 1 through 5 of the model if GIS integration are fulfilled, but Stage 6, large scale databases, are still outstanding.

Although attempts at large scale archaeological databases have been made since the early days of computers in archaeology, no one database has been constructed to satisfy the needs of various researchers, both academic and professional, that covers a broad region of space and time. Specific databases have been created for specific purposes, which work very well, but large scale applicability is still unrealized.

The problems with the advancement of GIS in Archaeology are the lack of a large scale database and time:money. While the issue of the database is that of multiple recording methods, multiple data uses, and endless varieties of research questions, the issue of money is pretty obvious. By universities and private companies dealing in archaeology have little budget leeway for implementing new and novel uses of technology, such as GIS. Though, as stated by the project team, this is not the end of the road.

Archaeology has great value in the use of GIS for the integration of multiple data sets and measurements, spatial analysis, and predictive modeling. These areas are where the use of GIS in archaeology is vibrant and where advances have been made. The author continues by conjecturing the future fields in which archaeologists can take advantage and advance GIS. It is the areas of temporal GIS and 3D/4D applications that the author feels Archaeology will turn to. Noting that time is just as an important consideration as place, archaeologists will embrace this dimension of GIS. As well, visualization in 3D will become a common GIS application in the future of archaeology.

What does a GIS Archaeologist think about this?

The project is very ambitious and I think very worth while. I am very interested to see how other disciplines use GIS and how well integrated they are comparatively.

As far as the discussion of GIS in Archaeology, I believe they have a nice synthesis, but perhaps thier view is a little narrow. First off, the article makes more than a few references to the distinction between academics and “the large group of non-academic, professional archaeologists that use the data for so-called ‘Cultural Resource Management’” Pardon? Was I just called a non-academic that does ’so-called’ management? I have passed through the ivory tower, but I didn’t find the chairs very comfortable. Perhaps the rift between scholars and professional is greater in parts of Europe, but the degrees above my desk and the resources that my employer has effectively managed comfort me in knowing that their academic slant is misguided. Moving on. Secondly, I am an archaeology who does GIS 99% of the time. For me, it is totally integrated into the discipline. I think the authors need to explicitly define what they mean by archaeology and where they seek to find integration. GIS is, of course, methods, applications, techniques, and/or a paradigm. Integration can be through broad application or specialization. I would be interested to know how the project team defines these terms.
The creation of large scale archaeological data bases is well underway. As seen by a number of papers at the Computer Applications in Archaeology conference, there is great research in this area. I am sure the project team is aware of this research, one of the papers authors, Hans Kamermans, is the Secretary of the CAA steering comity. Here are some links (OCHRE, Open Context) to very cool projects which take archaeological data recorded in very different lexicons and standardizes them based on various means. This is a very active field of research and definitely one to watch.

As far as the issue of time and money, us ‘non-academics’ have found a variety of ways to sneak technology into our bare bones projects. I have to give credit to many university researchers who have pioneered new methods and continually developed them to a point where professional can employee them with some certainty. Although, just as much credit should be given to quick thinking archaeologists who adopt proven and effective technology from other fields. In today’s climate of free Internet service, APIs, open source, and the whole lot of democratized technologies, the money barrier will be continuously overcome with the confidence in imaginative individuals.

As far as the future of GIS and archaeology, it’s any ones guess. I think 3D visualization is already a big application for GIS in our field. Chances are it will grow, but you only have to look to the problems that many disciplines have had with 3D vis over the past decade. 3D has been the future since the future has been made the past. On the other hand, advancements in 3D geometry capturing and the constant advancement of Google and its competitors definitely give a breath of fresh air to this department.

I will certainly check back to GIS in Science. I am very curious to see where archaeology falls on the spectrum of disciplines.

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If the stat that 20% of the world has access to the Internet is correct, then you can now share your GIS data with ~1.1 Billion people very quickly.

Yesterday, Google announced a number of amazing changes ranging from a new redesigned beta version of Google Earth to an updated version of the KML (2.1) language. So as not to repeat what many have already said, check out the recent posts at Ogleearth blog for great coverage. My intention here is to talk about just one aspect of the new changes, the ability to display KML files in Google Maps.

KML (Keyhole Markup Language) is an XML language that is used to encode geographic information (points, lines, polygons, images, models) for use with Google Earth. With the new changes in KML 2.1, this same information can be viewed in Google Maps. The interface between Google Maps and KML 2.1 could not be more simple! In the search bar of the maps.google.com window, simply type in the URL of the KML file you want to display and voila!

So you don’t have any KML files, but you want to publish your data in Google Maps. If you have ArcGIS, GIS data, and some sort of web space (I use Bluehost.com), it is fast and simple. By using one of two products, the KML Home Companion or Export to KML, both VB scripts for ArcGIS 8.X - 9.x, GIS data can be written to KML files in seconds. Later, I will discuss the limitations of this process.

Here is a quick example. First, I downloaded publicly available data from the Delaware State Historic Preservation office. The data set consisted of a point file for the National Register of Historic Places Listed Structures for all of Delaware and a Polygon file of National Register Listed Historic Districts. These data are in Delaware State Plane coordinate system, but both KML export routines will reproject on the fly as long as the data is attributed correctly. I took a subset of these files; Google Maps can only handle so much data, but I have not found what the threshold is yet.

By using the simple export tools (each does things slightly differently, you’ll see which works best for you) the KMLs are written and simply FTPed to my web server. The process honestly takes less than 30 seconds. From here, go to maps.google.com and cut/paste the URL of the file on your server and there you have it. Here is my quick example: http://www.gisarch.com/kml/NR_pnts1.kml and http://www.gisarch.com/kml/NR_dist2.kml (cut and paste links into search bar of Google Maps page, or use these links if you like skipping steps: points, polys). From here, you can also click the “link to this page” text and grab the URL that points directly to your new Google Maps (”Link to this page” example). Taking it a step further, take your new URL and stick it in www.tinyurl.com to shrink it and come back with http://www.tinyurl.com/fm8vl as your new Google Map URL. When exchanging data with those in the know, all you need to do is tell them to go to “fm8vl“. How cool is that? Maybe a small stretch, but hey, why not? (note: the Tinyurl trick worked most of the time, but failed here and there)
What if you want to see both data set? Hack the KML! Use a text editor (I like HTML-Kit) to cut and paste the geometry from one into the other and you can now see the NR points and Polygons in the same map (example: http://tinyurl.com/j2t2d). I had to trim the points to make the map load, but you get the point.

As you have seen, some of the features do not have the name attribute correct and the points symbols differ. This is due to the differences between KML home companion and Export to KML. Export to KML plainly lets you set the field to have as the name for each feature, but for KML Home Companion, it is not as apparent. I will have to look a little further to find what I am missing. Also, Export to KML would changed some of the more complex and small polygons to points during the export, whereas KML home companion exported every poly with no complaints. The output text is not the same for each script, but they can be hacked together.

I know this is a pretty low tech and minor example of how this new feature can be used, but as far as I am concerned, it is an amazing step in opening the door to allowing more people to share geographic data. With a process as simple as this, open data, export, FTP, and view, we should see a whole new lot of Google Map creations coming through the door.

The experimentation continues!!!

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News Realease from Greg Yetman:

Beta Release of New Raster Datasets by CIESIN/SEDAC
May 31, 2006

The U.S. Census Grids, 2000 (currently in beta release) provide raster
data sets that include not only population and housing counts, but a
wide range of socioeconomic characteristics. Produced by CIESIN’s
Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center (SEDAC), these gridded data
sets transform irregularly shaped census block and block group
boundaries into a regular surface—a raster grid—for faster and easier
analysis. Data sets are currently available for the year 2000; those for
1990 will be released in the near future.

See: http://beta.sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu/usgrid/

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