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| Dean Crawford |
"Perhaps this is due to the start I was given in life and I can only thank my parents for that. When I say that, I don't mean so much in a financial sense, although they have always helped me way above and beyond the call of duty.
"Having been self employed since I left school, I have always had the freedom to do and express how I feel, without the fear of any repercussion unfairly affecting myself or my career. Always free thinking — not suppressed or tied to any required mindset or ideology. This will never change, it is nice to communicate in a way without any animosity or prejudice toward others with a difference of opinion.
"The hobby of metal detecting is complex. Like archaeology itself, there is much opinion and criticism directed at the methods and people involved. Always a little horror story to tell, or be heard, but there are so much more positive things to be enjoyed and to learn from.
"I do not wish to control others, as I do not wish others to control me. But yet some of the fallacious views surrounding my pastime attempts to do just that, so I know how it would feel, should I be naïve enough to try this in other people's circles.
"I would never attempt to interfere in other peoples lives, with hard opinions concerning their affairs — opinions that could never be formed accurately from outside. One needs to be inside the theatre to view the performance, to fully understand the story — the whole experience, before passing comment or criticism. To do so from afar would simply highlight one's ignorance. To make a career out of it would make you a idiot. But we accept that the world is a big place and this does happen!
"Positive communication and sharing personal experiences are good and we can learn from these things.
I am free to speak on the subject of metal detecting in the UK, and most importantly, from personal experience. Mature criticism is not only invited, it is very important to me for improvement, but only from those who also like to listen and learn. This is how we move forward.
"I have been lucky to have found many unique and rare objects that have filled gaps in our knowledge. I am also glad to have helped others such as archaeologists and numismatists in the study of our past. I will continue as I have done — making finds, looking to understand, study and record them, wherever I feel the information will do its best for all of us."
Dean Crawford
Tomorrow will be the last episode: my own summation of this series.
John's Coydog Community page
Hello John:
ReplyDeleteDean sums it up well:-
"One needs to be inside the theatre to view the performance, to fully understand the story — the whole experience, before passing comment or criticism. To do so from afar would simply highlight one's ignorance. To make a career out of it would make you a idiot."
All I will add is not so much, "would make you an idiot," more, 'has made.' There's obviously insufficient work in the overseas language school industry to keep some undistinguished people gainfully employed.
Best
John Howland
England
Hi John,
ReplyDeleteAs Dean says, the world is a big place. There's always going to be a couple of people who are loud, misinformed, and willing to sacrifice knowledge on the altar of prejudice. Fortunately, no one takes them seriously!
Best,
John
I would just like to say that I found the whole series illuminating. Dean Crawford is a 'good' metal detectorist and I am sure there are many others like him, he educates us all along the way of this hobby. For me when Saxon or Viking 'treasures' are uncovered there is a sense that we are adding to our knowledge of these long dead people and so of course with coins as they contribute to the understanding of the movement of tribes within the Iron Age.
ReplyDeleteHi Thelma,
DeleteThank you for this. Your first sentence says what I was hoping might be revealed when I asked Dean to contribute to my blog. I was really unsure of whether he would agree to do so as he represents a side of metal detecting about we hear very little. I learned a lot, myself. Most of the communication I have had with Dean over the years has been about Celtic coins and particular details at that, not the sort of thing that is discussed so much in public fora, more privately among specialists.
Dean did an excellent job of bringing something of that information to the public. Better than I could, in fact. Most of the private discussions I have have had with Dean over the years have been very detailed and about topics which would not have much general interest -- predominately about the Dobunni, their coins, sites and connections.
American archaeometallurgist and Celtic specialist, Mark Hall and I once tried to start a discussion list about Celtic coins from a specialist point of view many years ago but it fell flat on its face.
Best,
John
"One needs to be inside the theatre to view the performance, to fully understand the story"
ReplyDeleteAh, like Mr Hooker in far-off Canada, you mean? There is a great difference from the days (late 1970s) when to find out about metal detecting, I'd have to go to a club meeting in a tin shack on the edge of town. Now a lot of exchange of information and views takes place online. This means that by viewing the forums, reading the blogs and following the action and observing regular patterns of activity and views expressed there, not only researchers, but also the general public who are heritage stakeholders and foot the bill for the PAS and other functions, can get a worm's eye view of the action, plot and performance in the "theatre". In fact the very same picture as detectorists themselves transmit to the outside world.
I fail to see why it would be considered "idiotic" to persuade heritage stakeholders to pay attention to the implications of what they can all see for themselves in the social media produced by artefact hunters. That is after all the function of social media, to prevent groups (such as metal detectorists) becoming ghettoised. Artefact hunters present a picture of their hobby to the outside world through the social media and others comment on what we can all see there. That is what free speech is, comrades.
I really do not understand what point to you are trying to make about me, Paul, and as for metal -detecting in the late seventies, I know nothing at all. I came to Calgary in 1966 before metal detectors were being sold. Henry Mossop was one of the first metal detectorists in Britain but his collection was sold after his death by Glendinning's, London, in 1991. I never knew him but had a number of conversations with his archaeologist collaborator Jeffrey May after Mossop's death and in the earlier days of the web.
DeleteThe medium is the message as another Albertan, Marshall McLuhan tells us, so in online metal detecting discussions we get the message of the medium, far from anything like a general picture. I think that your own blog proves just that because I have not seen on it, since its outset, the sort of things that Dean has brought to our attention in this series.
The same is true for archaeology: you do not find online discussions about Celtic coinage from archaeologist specialist Colin Haselgrove yet we wrote back and forth on the subject quite a bit in the eighties. Vincent Megaw used to discuss things online but with the animosity generated by Simon James' "No Celts cult" he stopped engaging in online discussions completely. We have continued discussing early Celtic art since he left the public fora and it was Vincent who put me up for my FSA.
Best,
John
The point I am making is that any comments that may be addressed to the issues surrounding collecting cannot be judged on whether they are being made only by metal detectorists or collectors with their "special/privileged knowledge" that Mr Crawford claims. And there is the rub, I do know about metal detecting from personal observation since the late 1970s, been out there with them, in their clubs, discussed their finds with them in the flesh, as a civil servant have sympathetically listened to their presentations when they wanted the law changed in Poland (and supported such moves in fact). In return, I have had them lie to me, cheat me, and more recently insult me and threaten me and my family. I have a lot of experience with metal detectorists - all of them "ambassadors for the hobby".
ReplyDeleteNo, you will not find on my blog the sort of glib fluffy bunny stuff you and other supporters of artefact hunting and collecting incessantly publish. This makes up the bulk of the online traffic on the topic and I see no need at all to duplicate the efforts of those that churn out the meaningless stuff in such huge quantities. My blog is about what I perceive (it is my blog) as the important issues in current policies on portable antiquities collecting (those "present tensions" your blog purports to be about) and I hope will stimulate others to question the spin. These are issues that will not go away however much the fluffy bunny crowd want to ignore them and pretend they are unimportant (I might say we see nothing of any of them in two weeks' worth of Mr Crawford's posts here). That does not make me an "idiot" for raising them, it means I see a need to present the other side of the matter which is presented in general in the anglophone world in an extremely one-sided way and has in the past been accepted rather too uncritically by many.
Yes, everything that Mr Crawford has "presented" is actually discussed by me in my blogging (and before that on discussion lists like britarch and the PAS forum); the "look what we found" trope, the "hoiking as rescue" one, "coins pro toto" and so on. [You want the "lost opportunity" one? Is the reality behind the anecdote as we have it here, at third hand?] There is nothing new here really, it is the same old justifications offered by artefact hunters, all of it part of a canon formulated decades ago and simply repeated uncritically as mantras, and the counterarguments undigested. Round and round we go.
Yet all the time the real issues, the nagging questions about the hobby and its place in the wider picture of the global issues are being dodged by artefact hunters and their supporters. When they are raised by persons such as myself, instead of discussion, we get the personal attacks and insults, both veiled and open. Including on your blog. I think that says a lot about the milieu and its ability to justify the current sorry status quo.
You must send me the link where you discuss the distribution patterns of the inscribed Dobunni issues, I must have missed that post. As for my own blog writing, the information in the 32 part Iceni hypothesis:
ReplyDeletehttp://pasttimesandpresnttensions.blogspot.ca/2015/04/the-iceni-hypothesis.html
could hardly be called "glib fluffy bunny stuff"! Plenty of information from Dean in that as well as information sent to me from Robert Van Arsdell -- Celtic Coinage of Britain:
http://www.vanarsdellcelticcoinageofbritain.com/
I think that you have taken personal issues and attempted to turn them into something public, something posing as an overview of an activity. But you have also done similar to others, such as the time you publicly attacked Wayne Sayles' wife (with nasty comments about her gift shop which has nothing at all to do with metal detecting or collecting coins or antiquities).
There are many people who remain silent about the real issues for fear of being intimidated by you in the same ways that you attempt to intimidate and mock me in this very reply.
Some revel in such squabbles -- each to their own, but my blog is not about such things. My last series: The Palaeolithic Artist:
http://pasttimesandpresnttensions.blogspot.ca/2015/08/the-palaeolithic-artist-part-1.html
is esoteric indeed, and is not evened aimed at any audience. It is a personal study done for personal reasons: a metal exercise; the application of Jungian psychology to the period; and something for my grandchildren to learn something of me once they are old enough to understand it. But it is not any sort of rant.
I suggest that you read Amanda Chadburn's obituary of Tony Gregory at the end of her:
"Snettisham and Bury: some new light on the earliest Iceni coinage", p.70f, In:
_Celtic Coinage: Britain and Beyond -- The Eleventh Oxford Symposium on Coinage and Monetary History_, ed. Melinda Mays, British Archaeological Reports (BAR) British Series 222, Oxford 1992 for the way that another archaeologist brought archaeologists and detectorists together. Jeffrey May did not have that emphasis in his relationship with the farmer/scholar Henry Mossop. Online squabbles pale in comparison.
Best,
John
That should be "mental exercise, not "metal exercise"!
DeleteJohn
Hi John:
ReplyDeleteI think it's all down to professional jealousy.Dean appears to be a knowledgeable source, and is stealing certain thunder, methinks. One Warsaw website carries the following:-
"Celtic culture, especially its spiritual sphere, still hides many secrets. Particularly interesting are the issues of religion and mythology, being inspired many legends and literary works.
The aim of the workshop is to develop the skills of speaking and reading and expanding general knowledge. Work on language is based on materials that spice up language classes and encourage further work.
Classes are given by Paul Barford, who is a teacher of English and archaeologist, are designed for people at FCE, CAE. For further information: (22) 833 91 12
CONTACT DETAILS
ul. Fr.. J. Popieluszko 21/24
01-595 Warsaw
+48 022 833 91 12
+48 022 833 91 12 "
The PAUL BARFORD Language School has its registered offices at:-
59c, 01-950 Warsaw / Wrzeciono 59c, 01-950 Warszawa
Best wishes
John Howland
England
Hi John,
DeleteOne of the few moments in my life when I'm almost speechless!
Best,
John
Why are you "speechless"? Why on earth are you publishing people's addresses on your blog? What kind of an independent scholarship is this ad personam junk suppose to be? (I have no "language school", but I many years ago I did run a popular course on Celtic mythology as an experiment, I am glad to see Mr Howland takes such an interest in the topic).
ReplyDeleteWhat happened to your "Content-rich comments with information about the subject matter will always be welcomed"? Is this anything to do with cultural policy, "Past times" perchance, and what kind of "present tensions" has this any relevance to? Certanly you seem set to create your own. Is this the sort of thing Vincent Megaw (who I met in Warsaw, and there is a tale there) approves of and is that why he proposed you to the Antiquaries? This is precisely the sort of behaviour - substituting for proper discussion that I was writing about. Shame on you John, dropping to the level of the worst of the metal detectorists in their Personal vendettas. Your FSA is cheapened by this sort of thing John.
Because it answers both to your motives and methods. I presume you would not want me to give particulars and links, and I have to rush out right now anyway. It also provides a lesson on how long things can remain on the web and the benefits of being truthful, always.
DeleteHi John:
ReplyDelete'PAUL BARFORD' has its registered office at; ul.Wrzeciono 59C, Warsaw, 01-950, Mazowieckie, Poland, operating in the industry of foreign languages (85.59.A). The company was registered with the Central Registration and Information on Economic Activity (CEIDG) on 2014-10-01.
NIP: 5261582736
Code: 147358561
Many years ago, eh?
"Shame on you John, dropping to the level of the worst of the metal detectorists in their Personal vendettas. Your FSA is cheapened by this sort of thing John," writes the experimental Celtic lecturer. Can't for the life of me imagine why your publishing a fact about Barford's activities should cheapen your FSA.
His comments towards detectorists, collectors, and anyone in the collecting sphere is and has been of the worst kind. As he's sowed, so has he reaped. Why he wants, evidently, to keep his dimmish light under a bushel seems bizarre. Then again, he's a modest man with lots to be modest about.
He and his loathsome pal, Nigel Swift, of Stourport, Mercia, plumbed new depths by suggesting on his PACHI blog that I was organising or encouraging violent attacks on them and their families. In the end I was obliged to make an official complaint to the West Mercia police. Barford sadly, was safely beyond judicial reach.
Like all bully-boys, he squeals like a stuck pig when cornered. If he has any sense at all (which I doubt) he'll turn his attention to other things.
Best
John Howland
England
Hi John,
DeleteAs I have said many times before, a popular Black PR trick is to accuse others of doing what the trickster is doing. We have certain evidence of that here. I have no fear of bullies but I see no need to allow him to continue. Nothing good is served by doing so. He had the chance to move the current detectorist/archaeology conflicts toward constructive discussion as Dean did, and chose not to. So, you we will just have to leave the answer to your last sentence a mystery. Unless he continues it on his own blog, of course. LOL!
Best,
John
As the OP stated-- " ... it is nice to communicate in a way without any animosity or prejudice toward others with a difference of opinion. " I will say I feel the same. It is those that stop the discussion that might be prejudiced or show animosity.
ReplyDeleteNot many places to have an opinion represented unless one is singing to the choir. Rare for anyone to actually take issue up directly with a person in the detecting community. Rarer yet is someone willing to allow those confrontations to be aired and continued.
Participation ( other than fluff) in detecting venues continues to wain while problems continue to escalate. Whichever side of the screen a person is on I encourage them to put the hobby in front of themselves. Confronting problems directly is a bit harder than seeking praise directly.
Thanks, Gary, and it's nice to hear from you again!
DeleteLet us all hope that others will take what you say seriously and create blogs and write articles that express those ideas. People who can only denigrate detecting to those of like mind are almost as pathetic as those who fear them.
Best,
John