Digital Technologies and the Transformation of Archaeological Labor

Abstract

The use of computers and other digital technologies have had a long history in classical archaeology, but in the last decade, advances in software and especially hardware have begun to transform the way that archaeologists work in the field. This paper explores three examples of this phenomenon from my perspective as co-director, director, or assistant director of three different research projects between 2010 and 2019. These are the Pompeii Quadriporticus Project (2010–2013), the Pompeii Artistic Landscape Project (PALP, 2018–present), and the Tharros Archaeological Research Project (TARP, 2019–present). As a whole, these projects trace one history of digital technology’s impact on the organization of archaeological labor, from intensifying work due to increased efficiency, to increasing the pressure due to newly available data sources, and to reorganizing the in-field procedures that at once takes advantage of efficiencies and frees up labor at the trench edge.