Archaeology for the public in Greece minus/plus ten

Abstract

It must have been around ten years ago, when I was invited to present my -shaky then but promising- progress of PhD thesis at the University of Athens, on social and economic trends in heritage management, discussing island cultural resources and the role of the interested communities. I remember myself at the end of my talk, standing in front of a bewildered and intrigued (in equal doses) audience, only to experience the -somehow- apologetic comment of the organising professor to the audience: “I see that we need to look into these things now, that all became science”. I have talked about this memory elsewhere in detail (Lekakis 2015) mainly to pinpoint that even though 40 years of concrete bibliography have then lapsed -McGimsey, for example, produced his seminal volume in 1972- there was still a lack of information about the concept and practices of public archaeology, at least in the Greek academic context.