Fans of the ABC TV series Time Team, in which presenter Tony Robinson urges British archaeologists to find out all they can about an historic site in three days, will be interested to know that Archaeology Week is being celebrated in Australia from today. 

Archaeologists at The University of Western Australia are marking this week by inviting two world famous archaeologists to give on-campus lectures:

Professor Emeritus Timothy Earle, from Northwestern University, Illinois, is an economic anthropologist who specialises in the archaeological studies of social inequality, leadership and political economy in early chiefdoms and states.

He has conducted field research in three world regions, represented by Argentina, Denmark, Hungary, Peru and Polynesia, where he studied the emergence of social complexity and political control.  He is the author and co-author of several books and papers including The Evolution of Human Societies:  How Chiefs Come to Power.

Professor Earle's lecture, "A Political Economy Analysis for Pacific Prehistory", is at 3pm on Thursday 17 May in Social Sciences Lecture Theatre 1.

Dr David S. Whitley, from California's ASM Affiliates (a US-based cultural resources management firm that provides historic preservation services to government and private stakeholders), is an expert in the creative genius of early humans.

He has 34 years' experience in the prehistoric archaeology and ethnography of far western North America, with particular interests in sacred sites, rock art, chronometrics and cultural heritage management.  He has also worked in southern Africa, the European Upper Paleolithic and Guatemala.  He is the author of Cave Paintings and the Human Spirit:  the Origin of Creativity and Belief.

Dr Whitley's lecture, "Shamanism and the Origin of Creative Genius in Western Europe", is at 6pm on Tuesday 22 May in the Webb Lecture Theatre.

Media references

Professor Alistair Paterson (UWA Discipline Chair of Archaeology)  (+61 8)  6488 2867
Michael Sinclair-Jones (UWA Public Affairs)  (+61 8)  6488 3229  /  (+61 4) 00 700 783