Relocation of the Confederate Monument

A resolution proposing relocation of the Confederate monument located in the Circle Historic District to the Confederate cemetery on the University of Mississippi campus

Stonehenge excavations 2008

The following paper is the first published account of an excavation that took place at Stonehenge during April 2008. As this was the first excavation to take place within the stone circle for some forty years, the excavation has attracted an uncommon degree of interest, hence its publication in the Antiquaries Journal as an interim account of work in progress, in the form of an edited transcript of a paper first given at the Ordinary Meeting of the Society of Antiquaries of London on 9 October 2008. The paper explains that the 2008 excavation set out to date the construction of the Double Bluestone Circle at Stonehenge and to chart the subsequent history of the bluestones and their use at the monument. Evidence is presented for a provisional working date of around 2300 BC for the construction of the Double Bluestone Circle, while it is argued that the history of the site is far more complex than has been allowed for in existing interpretations, with a multiplicity of overlapping and intercutting (though not continuous) events, including substantial late Roman, medieval and early modern activity. The excavated material, and the evidence from the surviving stones, supports the suggestion that bluestones were brought to the site because of their perceived special qualities, perhaps for their supposed healing properties, and that some knowledge of those qualities remained current in later times with the result that in excess of two-thirds of the original bluestone volume has now disappeared

THE MONUMENT CIRCLE PROJECT: CURATING DIGITAL HISTORY FOR COMMUNITY DISCOURSE

poster abstractDigitized museum and library collections have transformed the knowledge landscape. The Internet enables audiences to explore high-resolution images of primary documents from around the world with a click of a button. Yet in spite of increased accessibility, many online collections remain concealed by inadequate search terms and incon-sistent citation methods. Under the guidance of Modupe Labode, Assistant Professor of His-tory and Museum Studies at IUPUI, I curated Monument Circle Project, an online collection of primary documents, annotated research materi-als and an interpretive blog to frame E Pluribus Unum, a controversial public art proposal, within a historical context. In 2007, contemporary artist Fred Wilson proposed to re-appropriate a figure of a freed slave from the Indiana Soldiers and Sailors Monument. Community outreach meetings revealed that broader perspectives of social and racial con-ventions from late nineteenth-century Indianapolis – the time in which the monument was constructed – were key to understanding the con-troversy surrounding the proposed artwork, yet were missing from public discourse. The art project was cancelled in December 2011. Using analyses of monuments by Austrian writer Robert Musil (1880-1942) and art historian Kirk Savage as an intellectual frame-work, I utilized Flickr.com, an image hosting and online community fo-rum, and WordPress.com, an open source blogging tool, to curate and interpret primary documents from archives across the country. I de-veloped standards to organize and manage these documents with the goal of increasing public visibility on life in Indianapolis during the turn of the twentieth century. Monument Circle Project demonstrates how digital history can add valuable and rich commentary to contemporary issues

Cremation practices and the creation of monument complexes: the Neolithic cremation cemetery at Forteviot, Strathearn, Perth & Kinross, Scotland, and its comparanda

Around the beginning of the 3rd millennium cal bc a cremation cemetery was established at Forteviot, central Scotland. This place went on to become one of the largest monument complexes identified in Mainland Scotland, with the construction of a palisaded enclosure, timber structures, and a series of henge monuments and other enclosures. The cemetery was established between 3080 and 2900 cal bc, probably in the 30th century cal bc, which is contemporary with the cremation cemetery at Stonehenge. Nine discrete deposits of cremated bone, representing the remains of at least 18 people, were identified. In most instances they were placed within cut features and, in one case, a series of cremation deposits was associated with a broken standing stone. This paper includes the first detailed assessment of the cremated remains at Forteviot and the features associated with the cemetery, and explores how the establishment of this cemetery may have been both a catalyst and inspiration for the elaborate monument building and prolonged acts of remembrance that occurred at this location over a period of almost 1000 years. The paper also outlines the parallels for Forteviot across Britain and, for the first time, draws together the dating evidence (including Bayesian modelling) for this major category of evidence for considering the nature of late 4th/early 3rd millennium cal bc society. The results and discussion have wide implications and resonances for contemplating the establishment and evolution of monument complexes in prehistoric Britain and beyond

Fire and memory: transforming place using fire at henge monuments

Henges — Late Neolithic to Early Bronze Age earthwork monuments — often have long life-histories of reuse and rebuilding over generations. At some sites, fire-lighting and the deposition of fire-altered materials played a significant role in certain phases of the use of the henge. This article reviews the evidence for fire in the life-histories of four henges in Scotland, and interprets the various ways in which fire was employed at different times and at different sites. It argues that fire had a transformational effect, not only upon monuments and materials, but it also characterized and transformed people’s experiences and memories of particular sites, thus creating links between monumental sites and quotidian experience during the Neolithic and Bronze Age in Scotland

Circle City Strife: Gay and Lesbian Activism during the Hudnut Era

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI)This paper will be discussing gay and lesbian activism in Indianapolis during the 1980s and how the mayoral administration at the time interacted with it. We know the stories of Stonewall and San Francisco. But what about gay and lesbian activism in the Midwest? What stories does Indianapolis have to tell? This thesis will cover how a portion of the movement played out in Indianapolis. It will shine a light on the 1980s and look specifically at police discrimination on Monument Circle, gatherings like the Gay Knights rallies and the 1990 Celebration on the Circle, and political efforts to combat the HIV epidemic. It will also explore the local actions by city government to undertake the urban renewal movement and how those efforts interacted with queer activism. Collections from the Indiana Historical Society, University of Indianapolis, and the Indiana State Library illuminate both sides of the social conflict to understand what made this moment in Indianapolis a touchstone moment for the city. This thesis argues that gay and lesbian protests and social gatherings on Monument Circle rendered the queer community impossible to ignore in the Hudnut administration’s dreams to reform Indianapolis into an entrepreneurial city

The origins of Avebury.

The Avebury henge is one of the famous megalithic monuments of the European Neolithic, yet much remains unknown about the detail and chronology of its construction. Here, the results of a new geophysical survey and re-examination of earlier excavation records illuminate the earliest beginnings of the monument. The authors suggest that Avebury's Southern Inner Circle was constructed to memorialise and monumentalise the site of a much earlier ‘foundational’ house. The significance here resides in the way that traces of habitation may take on special social and historical value, leading to their marking and commemoration through major acts of monument building