Professor Caitlin O’Grady Wants You to Rethink Archaeology from the Field to the Classroom

Written by Fiona Dunlap

 

On Wednesday, April 19th, 2025, Caitlin O’Grady stepped up to the podium and addressed a room full of donors, students, and faculty. The Assistant Professor of the UCLA Department of Anthropology and the UCLA/Getty Program in the Conservation of Cultural Heritage opened the UCLA/Getty program reception, an event that celebrates the research and innovations of the program’s cohort and faculty. While students aim to preserve the histories of objects they conserve, O’Grady’s research focuses on the history of the field itself. Her presentation, titled “Legitimizing the Past: The Role of Conservation Expertise and Institutions in Assembling a Sustainable Future,” reflects her decade-long research on the history of archaeology and conservation and its subsequent shaping of the disciplines’ present and future.

For O’Grady, the path to conservation and archaeology was not linear. Growing up, her parents traveled with her and made it a point to visit archaeological sites. Ultimately, “that exposure, comfort level, and excitement associated with traveling and going to archaeological sites was fundamental for me,” she explains. Uncertain about her career path due to her interests in the arts and sciences, her foundational exposure to archaeology cemented her desire to work with culture and the arts. A nudge from a friend led her towards the opportunity to explore conservation through a program called Studio Art Centers International, which allowed her to take advantage of the city of Florence, Italy, and the on-site experiences it offered.

Years later, she established herself as a professor at the University College London. Teaching for 10 years in the UK made her aware of the pedagogical histories that have shaped the respective fields of archaeology and conservation into what they are today. Her background in art history, materials science and engineering, and conservation gave her a unique lens to observe the histories of these fields. In having to navigate “that intersection and play a role in different disciplines,” O’Grady explains, “I’m interested in how archaeology and conservation developed as university disciplines together.”

In digging deeper into these histories, she became aware of the delineations of expertise established in these pedagogical systems. “I was interested in the ways people set boundaries on their disciplinary knowledge,” she explains. “Who’s doing the actual work? Sometimes it’s archaeologists, local laborers, oftentimes it’s family members who have some degree of technical hand skills.”

During the early 1900s, archaeologists’ primary roles were to travel abroad, conduct excavations, and bring artifacts back, often in the context of colonial exploitation of foreign lands. Because archaeologists were college-educated, published, and sponsored by institutions, they were regarded as the experts on digs. O’Grady adds, “what tends to happen is that anyone who participated in preservation, aside from archaeologists, is invisible to the entire process.” Participant sheets and budget documents are some of the few places where other contributors can be found. For instance, women who were technicians (the modern equivalent of a conservator) in the field were only acknowledged in passing, such as in a footnote that simply reads “thank you to the Mrs.” At the time, “conservation was equated with housekeeping, equating it to repairs done in the home.” This reflects the views on conservation at the time:  “Conservation allowed archaeologists to create visions of the past based on data. Ethics were framed in terms of data sustainability including loss of information.”

The hierarchies also reflect a clear colonial bias through the marginalization of local laborers. “In the hierarchy, their absence is clear,” she explains. These laborers were highly skilled and knew the terrain, offering a service that could not be done by any other member of the team from abroad. Yet, such local experts are difficult to trace in recorded histories. “Challenges arise with knowing their full names or proper names, as they’re not spelled correctly.” Their knowledge base was deemed “epistemologically insufficient” without a formal education. However, traces of these individuals can still be found in archives and records. O’Grady searches for clues through wage lists, travel records, photographs, films, and budget line items for items such as wax.

In contemporary times, O’Grady acknowledges the essential shift away from these colonial hierarchies and recognizes that they can be challenging to uproot. The very act of a Western actor traveling to foreign lands reveals the persistent colonial undertones. Local experts are highly skilled and often possess knowledge of the landscape that foreign actors may lack, yet they “aren’t paid as much as they should be.” As she explains, local laborers are coming in with different priorities and often aren’t seeking academic notoriety. O’Grady explains, “In reality, the university system is completely at odds with the system in which these colleagues work.” However, University researchers must do the necessary work to “find a happy medium where everybody can meet and engage the needs of both groups.” This means local experts are partners in decision-making processes and are viewed as valued collaborators. This requires time, but is crucial for fostering equity in the field.

Collaboration enables projects to evolve, as exemplified by the dig site she has been working on in Türkiye. Overseeing the site’s big-picture operations, O’Grady utilizes her expertise in three fields to offer consulting on preservation and treatment and research interpretation of artifacts. Her expertise in pottery techniques is crucial because the dig site in Türkiye is filled with sherds, or fragments of pottery. She explains that these objects are often disregarded because they are seen as uninteresting; however, O’Grady sees them as a puzzle to be decoded. She is interested in their function and how the making of these sherds might inform us of their usage. The sherds have been rounded and pierced, and she explains that other researchers have hypothesized that they were used for “fishing in the form of net weights or textile manufacturing. Someone was theorizing that they were used for honey production.”

 

O’Grady also plays a role in shaping conservation and archaeology through her teaching at UCLA. “I’m not formal in the classroom. I find that that sets up barriers that inhibit the ways people talk to each other and discuss topics and the way they participate, if they think that there’s a hierarchy in place, that sort of limits people’s responses…” Instead, she takes a “laid back and relaxed” approach in the classroom. By emphasizing hands-on learning, through viewing objects and encouraging students to lead projects and discussions, O’Grady implores the next generation to think outside the box. She encourages them to not only ask questions, but to learn how to seek the answer. It is through this innovation that the future of these fields may be advanced into space, where history can be preserved without the bias of previous generations.