It has been a busy August month with the MAEASaM team presenting at two conferences including the 16th Congress of the Pan African Archaeological Association for Prehistory and the Related Studies, held between 7th and 12th August in Zanzibar, Tanzania, and at the Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology Conference (CAA 2022) held in Oxford between 8th and 11th August in collaboration with our sister project Mapping Archaeological Heritage in South Asia (MAHSA) with colleagues from Southern Methodist University, Texas, USA. Here are a few sneak peeks on the various topics that were covered.
MAEASaM at the 16th Congress of the Pan African Archaeological Association, Zanzibar, Tanzania, 7 – 12 August 2022
Left: MAEASaM Principal Investigator, Professor Paul Lane presenting the MAEASaM Project to delegates in Session 20: Learning From the Past and Looking to the Future: reflections on Digital African Heritage Management in a Changing Global Environment, chaired by MAEASaM’s Project Manager, Dr Stefania Merlo and MAEASaM’s Regional Project Manager, Dr Faye Lander.
Left: MAEASaM’s Postdoctoral Researcher, Dr Akinbowale Akintayo presenting on predictive modelling of archaeological sites in Mbeya region of Tanzania during a session run by the MAEASaM Remote Sensing Working Group, Dr Nadia Khalaf, Dr Akinbowale Akintayo, and Dr Pamela Ochungo. Pictured to the right of Dr Akintayo is MAEASaM’s Dr Mamadou Thior, lead author on the paper ‘Modelling the Presence of Shell Clusters in the Saloum Delta of Senegal.
Right: MAEASaM’s Postdocotoral Researcher for Zimbabwe, Dr Ezekia Mtetwa, highlights Zimbabwe’s long walk to digital heritage during the session on Digital African Heritage Management.
MAEASaM at CAA 2022, Oxford, UK, 8 – 11 August 2022
MAEASaM with Mapping Archaeological Heritage in South Asia Project (MAHSA) and colleagues at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, ran a first session of its kind at CAA 2022 on 10th August 2022. The session ‘Reaching Across the Digital Divide: towards equitable practice in digital archaeology and heritage management’ brought together a number of delegates from India, Pakistan and Southern Africa to reflect on and discuss digital accessibility and equitablility for those who are so often marginalised within the digital arena particularly when it comes to archaeology and heritage. Pictured to the right is Professor Serena Coetzee, MAEASaM Advisory Board Member and Head of Department Geography, Geoinformatics and Meteorology, University of Pretoria, South Africa and African Regional Representative of the UN GGIM Academic Network, giving a presentation on the digital divide and resources needed to sustain data quality for the immediate future.