| Entry: | First a word on today’s excavation, then some confessions and concerns.
Continued excavating unit 31210 in building 105. The aim is the same as before: to get the unit down to an arbitrary level before starting sondage in the northern half of the building.
As I approached the NW niche of the building, I started encountering clustered potsherds. These were part of the same cluster that APV excavated as part of u. 31184 last week. These upper portions of the cluster were disturbed yesterday when the adjacent walls were cleaned, and some of the pottery was bagged as belonging to u. 31184. (The cleaning also revealed the two refitting pieces of groundstone [x13 and x14] I discussed yesterday.)
As I encountered even more in situ potsherds in the fill of u. 31210, the remaining cluster was given a separate number: 31216. The cluster was photographed before and after the potsherds were removed, as there were dense lenses of phytoliths underneath the pottery. The lenses do not show any recognisable patterning. The fact that they've been preserved only on the undersides of the pottery suggests that the plants and sherds were waste that was dumped into the building, after which only those phytoliths protected by the pottery were preserved undisturbed. You can read the story in more detail in the appropriate unit sheet (yep, that's 31216, folks).
Working on the cluster was an enjoyable flashback to my last year's excavation in Szazhalombata, Hungary. I find digging most enjoyable when I can obsess over the little details. Obviously, this approach is at odds with the current objective: to find the much anticipated floor surface. I fear I haven't managed enough on this front. Our project director jumped into the trench for a while to lend a hand and, more importantly, give an example of how the thing should be done. I have to admit that there are ways in which I could've been more efficient, particularly with regard to finds sorting and working tempo. I believe that today in the 20 minutes or so I learnt more about efficiency than I've learnt over the previous excavation. No surprises here: you learn from others, and the more experienced the better.
However, this final hour in the trench also brought all the stress to the surface. Having the trench supervisor and project director give different, even contradictory orders makes me confused, confusion contributes to stress, and stress has to be released one way or another. Unfortunately, this sometimes leads to misjudged criticisms, voiced at a wrong time, in the wrong place. Today this regrettably happened for stupid reasons that should've been brought up in another manner on another forum, for example here in the diary.
Well, now that the obscure little confession’s been made and the cat's out of the sack, I might as well elaborate on the topic of stress and criticisms.
I believe that in our current situation on the field, multivocality does not work. Yes, multivocality is one of the cornerstones of the entire Çatal project and a nice ideal. But to really have multivocality, we need resources (time and money) so that people get the room to develop and share their views. Right now on the West Mound, all resources are running low. This includes simple things such as workforce, buckets, and nerves. All this exacerbates the stress we get from contradictory orders. In other words, what we have now is a confusing situation where the ideals - multivocality and zero hierarchy - cannot stand up to the reality. Right now, ideals are not pragmatic. What we want to do now is to get things a, b and c done as fast as possible before the trench needs to be closed. That's fine. But it's not fair to try maintain the illusion that we are working under a truly multivocal paradigm. Everybody sees that in order to meet the objectives, we need clearer marching orders and less confusing debate. It's not just me who is saying this.
The interesting thing is: what does this crisis for multivocality mean for the cornerstone values of the Çatal project? Does this show that Çatal is, ultimately, a failing experiment in multivocality? Right now multivocality seems a luxury that is not always affordable or even desirable on the field. |
