Our next Speaker Series event is on Dec 2, 11:30 am to 12:30 pm (MT)! Dr. Katie Biittner will be talking about archaeogaming and the early history of video game development. In-person and online, visit our event page for more info! 🏺 www.ualberta.ca/en/prairie-i...

Field school news! The IPIA will once again be running our Indigenous Archaeology Field School in St. Albert, AB, from May 25th to June 26th 2026. Applications will open Jan 5th, 2026. Learn more at our field school page: 🏺 www.ualberta.ca/en/prairie-i...

Oh hey, with the new Fallout trailer out and a new glimpse of the Kings from New Vegas I can reshare an old blog post about historical reinterpretation in the Fallout universe 👀 animalarchaeology.com/2018/03/08/f...

Seriously, though: "It also includes a route-finding tool to explore travel itineries and times in the ancient world." has some cool research questions about traveling in antiquity popping up here!

Mark Carney is about to announce more of his “elbows up” major projects. But under the surface, one that’s being sold as an Indigenous-led LNG project is actually — spoiler — American as hell. That’s not even the worst part! @emilylowan.bsky.social joined me to discuss:

Introducing Information Wasteland, a package about misinfo on the internet –– from AI iterations of digital blackface to a growing "alt-right pipeline" among wellness influencers –– edited by former features director @brittneymac15.bsky.social: www.teenvogue.com/information-...

My latest AI feature dives into a nebulous movement of people sharing esoteric codes, manifestos, glyphs, diagrams, and poetry generated with chatbots, all of it based around theories of AI sentience and mysterious metaphors about spirals.

Nice piece, and consistent with our findings that misinformation exploits outrage to spread online www.science.org/doi/full/10....

We already see literally this *exact* same claim from adults engaged in pseudoarchaeological content - that humans could not have [done whatever they're focusing on]. I worry about how difficult education on the past will become as kids who believe this begin to take notice of adults in popular 1/

This is happening on Thursday, btw!

*** ANNOUNCEMENT*** The #EAA warmly invites its members to attend a Special Meeting, which will be held online on Friday, 9 January 2026, from 15:00 to 17:00 CET. This Special Meeting has been convened by the EAA President following a written request from ten percent of the current membership. 1/

Oh hey, that's me! Very much looking forward to giving this talk at ITU next week!

I see a lot of pseudoarchaeology & pseudohistory in these spaces, used to begin the process of casting doubt that helps open doors to this pipeline. One influencer on TikTok, with 1.1 million followers, shares pseudoarch/hist Tartaria & Grand Canyon stuff to "question the narrative," as she puts it.

Incredibly bittersweet to be published in Teen Vogue this weekend after devastating layoffs, including my editor for this piece. It’s about how beauty influencers have fallen into and become part of the alt-right pipeline targeting girls and women www.teenvogue.com/story/womano...

This is one of the best explainers on the ongoing saga out of BC. Too few mainstream news articles touch on the connections to the Convoy, or the fact that it’s really the same movement, with ostriches. The farmers are saying this is just starting. it’ll be interesting to see where it goes now.

Hi Bluesky 👋 Small life update: I’m at the centre of a multimillion dollar lawsuit in Alberta launched by a failed candidate for Jason Kenney’s UCP It may be the longest and most expensive media trial in Canadian history I’m ready to go public about it and I want to share more details with you 🧵

Breaking News: Late last night Conde Nast illegally fired 4 union organizers who asked company execs to explain the downsizing of Teen Vogue and continued layoffs. We’ve filed a grievance.

NEW - The Trump admin has disbanded its federal cultural property investigations team and reassigned the agents to immigration enforcement, delivering a blow to one of the world’s leaders in heritage protection, according to multiple ppl familiar with the changes. www.denverpost.com/2025/11/06/u...

Thank you to all who attended, and to our wonderful speaker Dr. Andre Costopoulos for such an interesting talk! Stay tuned for details for our next talk in early December, perhaps a little something about archaeogaming 👀 🏺

Update on the Tri-Council info demands: personal info will be anonymized (good!). But the reasoning behind the demand for the info is concerning, the involvement of certain people is concerning, and the potential impacts to research is concerning. We should keep writing/drawing attention to that.

The 🇨🇦 Standing Committee on Science and Research passed a modified resolution this afternoon that the requested ricouncil applicant and reviewer data can be aggregated and anonymized. Thanks to the many researchers who signed letters pointing out legitimate data privacy concerns. 👏👏

Excited to share that, with @cat-tebaldi.bsky.social , we’ve published a new article in New Media & Society! We examine how far-right actors on X (formerly Twitter) instrumentalize wellness culture to spread reactionary ideology. Thread below 🧵

Got the editors' blessing to share this news. My chapter "National Socialist Black Metal & the Usurpation of Greece and Rome" will appear in the forthcoming volume "Abusing Antiquity? Classics and the Contemporary Far Right," edited by Helen Roche and @denisemccoskey.bsky.social!

I'm glad to see this finally appearing in media. That this is happening is alarming and the potential outcomes could be devastating to Canadian researchers and research.

🏺📜 Next month! I’ll be giving a talk about my recent work with @garstangmuseum.bsky.social at the Society for Museum Archaeology Conference in Liverpool. You can get tickets at the link below. www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/society-fo...

📜 This is also happening in about two weeks as well! I’ll be chatting about my previous museum collections work with local communities. www.tickettailor.com/events/museu...

25 Years of the International Space Station: What archaeology tells us about living and working in space 🧪 🏺 🔭 #SpaceArchaeology

I would really love to see Canadian media writing about this deeply unethical overreach that is an attack on EDI and will put thousands of Canadian researchers at risk should their confidential information be handed over. Plus, Steven Pinker is involved, that element is concerning enough on its own.

The Indigenous knowledge statement was made by Eric Kaufmann, multi-time author at Quillette and director of the "Centre for Heterodox Social Science." He teaches an online public course about "woke," featuring readings from Christopher Rufo, James Lindsay, Richard Hanania, to name just a few.

Highlights include a dude saying that 'females, black, and brown researchers are less productive' (I wonder why, maybe because more work is put on our shoulders??), & that 'elevating Indigenous knowledge to the level of science is a threat to the pursuit of truth' 🫠😭.

Holy guys. I've been reading more about this & it is So Scary. We need diversity in research. We need everyone's voices & ideas. #cbc #academia @cbcradiocanada.bsky.social I've been reading this meeting record on the topic & it is Chilling. www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentView...

I would really love to see Canadian media writing about this deeply unethical overreach that is an attack on EDI and will put thousands of Canadian researchers at risk should their confidential information be handed over. Plus, Steven Pinker is involved, that element is concerning enough on its own.

I've got tables at two christmas markets later this month and I've been having fun playing around with materials and colours to add a little bit of whimsy to my candle holders 😍

Oh that's going to be a Hard No on mining applicants data for weird anti-EDI stuff??? Check out the letter below if you hold/have applied to Tri-Council funding in Canada! #academia #tricouncil #sshrc

It's new article day! So excited that this piece with @luccousineau.bsky.social and @iamryanhopkins.bsky.social is out in the world. In it we work through our experiences studying the far-right & propose some ways universities can better support students. journals.library.brocku.ca/index.php/SS...

Definitely thinking a good response to the VP thing would be a larger collective response of some sort by several of us (we're stronger together) 🏺

Archaeologists speak up against the Vice President's blatantly disinformative use of archaeology for spreading these harmful Christian nationalist narratives 🏺

Big loser energy, yes, but the outcomes of this hugely unethical move could be very dangerous. Canadian researchers need to pay attention to this and speak out against it.

Announcing a brand new series launching this #Halloween 👻 Manchester Studies in the Supernatural explores how the #supernatural shapes human experience across time and place. Bridging disciplines and challenging boundaries, it welcomes bold new research on the #occult and the #unseen

Canadian researchers should be aware the there is a motion before the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Science and Research to force Tricouncils to hand over disaggregated peer review data on all applications: Applicant names, profiles, demographics Reviewers names, profiles, comments, and scores

LiDAR-Based Storytelling About a Historical Industrial Landscape in Southern Middle Tennessee anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.... "coal mining coincided with the convict leasing system that operated across the American South" "community archaeology" -> not just for Maya centers

This is awesome and hugely important.

Is anyone live-skeeting the Section 106 hearing? I don't know enough about how the National Historic Preservation Act / Section 106 / S(T)HPOs work but want to follow. 🏺 www.energy.senate.gov/live-webcast

🙄🙄🙄

🏺$1 million is not even pennies to Musk yet it's netted him valuable PR. Taking money from any source with extremely problematic ethical approaches that include promoting scientific & historical misinformation should be something archaeological organisations avoid.

Once again urging archaeologists to critically assess the AI push into archaeology. There is a huge swath of problematic ethical issues that come with the AI tech & tech lords & we don't have to make it easier for them to insert themselves in archaeology by welcoming them in. Don't be complicit. 🏺

Sharing for awareness: For those able and willing to help, the Embassy of Jamaica in DC is coordinating disaster relief in the U.S. They have asked folks to reach out to them at [email protected] to coordinate support. The government has info on donations supportjamaica.gov.jm

Our first Speaker Series event of 2025 is coming up! Join us on Oct 30, 11:30 to 12:30 pm MT, to hear Dr. Andre Costopoulos talk about the evolution of UFO beliefs from WWII to today! Attend in-person in Tory 14-28, or join us online (registration in the next post). Hope to see you there! 🏺

Straw poll for archaeologists 🏺: 1) Do you listen to archaeology podcasts? If so, which ones? 2) If you don't listen to archaeology podcasts, what podcasts do you listen to? 3) If you don't listen to archaeology podcasts, what would get you to listen to one?

Contemporary archaeology of the [former] East Wing of the White House, re: The Atlantic. 🏺 archive.ph/7j2o4