Date: 1-3 November 2019
Venue: Museum of London Docklands
Tickets: booking will open in the summer

We’re delighted to be hosting the CHAT (Contemporary and Historical Archaeology in Theory) conference this year. CHAT, established in 2003, hosts an annual international conference. In previous years, contributors have explored archaeological approaches to contemporary issues like climate change, homelessness, migration and colonialism. It is also a platform to discuss creative engagements with archaeology, making it an inspiring and interdisciplinary event.

This year’s conference, CHATmethod will, in a first for CHAT, venture beyond theory to directly address the basics of what we do and how we do it. We are seeking proposals for papers that provoke explorations of the practical ways in which we engage with the materiality of the contemporary and historical past. We will look at the ways in which we create and use our data, the tools that we use to communicate, and the processes by which we manage, assign significance and prioritise the work that we do.

As always, this year’s CHAT will reach beyond academia, to active research taking place outside universities, and welcome contributions that will pull apart, reflect, critique and reassemble method. We invite papers that upset, disrupt and politicise methods where needed. We also actively seek contributions from those working outside the discipline of archaeology.

At MOLA, across the sector, and in many of the countries in which we work, the overwhelming majority of archaeological fieldwork is funded by developers. We are particularly interested in contributions that explore how contemporary archaeology can function within the frameworks of the developer-funded sector.

For the full Call for Papers and details of the questions we’d like to explore, and for more details on the conference please visit the CHAT website.

We look forward to receiving individual and group submissions through presentations, film, discussions, debates, posters and performances. We are happy to consider non-standard formats and to discuss ideas for submissions. We ask anyone submitting ideas and proposals to send up to 200 words to CHAT2019@mola.org.uk by Monday 3 June 2019.

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