Course Catalogue

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The Pottery Skills course develops students' practical skills in a variety of techniques used to record and analyse archaeological pottery and provides the grounding necessary to critically evaluate the life-cycle of vessels, from production to use and discard. Techniques include traditional classification, illustration, and metric analysis combined with digital microscopy, 3D modelling, and experimental vessel making. This hands-on course, involving prehistoric and historic period UK and international collections, will encourage students to reflect on everyday archaeological materials and their importance in framing past communities' lived experiences.

5x1hr lectures; 5x1hr seminars; 10x1hr practical classes delivered as part of a weekly 2hr session over 10 weeks as

scheduled on MyCampus.

This is one of the Honours options in Archaeology and may not run every year. The options that are running this session are available on MyCampus.

Available to all students fulfilling requirements for Honours entry into Archaeology, and by arrangement to visiting students or students of other Honours programmes.

None

None

Skills Portfolio equivalent of 2,000 words - 50%

Project Design equivalent of 2,000 words - 50%

Reassessments are normally available for all courses, except those which contribute to the Honours classification. Where, exceptionally, reassessment on Honours courses is required to satisfy professional/accreditation requirements, only the overall course grade achieved at the first attempt will contribute to the Honours classification. For non-Honours courses, students are offered reassessment in all or any of the components of assessment if the satisfactory (threshold) grade for the overall course is not achieved at the first attempt. This is normally grade D3 for undergraduate students and grade C3 for postgraduate students. Exceptionally it may not be possible to offer reassessment of some coursework items, in which case the mark achieved at the first attempt will be counted towards the final course grade. Any such exceptions for this course are described below. 

This course aims to:

■ Provide hands-on training in professional standard pottery recording techniques as applied in archaeology.

■ Develop practical skills in scientific and metric data collection and analysis.

■ Develop transferable skills in technical data analysis and its presentation to specialist audiences.

■ Critically assess methods and applications of pottery analysis in archaeology to build a knowledge base of the development of current practices.

By the end of this course students will be able to:

■ Independently plan and execute simple to medium complexity projects using standard methods of pottery recording and analysis.

■ Evaluate pottery vessels and assemblages, develop appropriate research questions and analytical techniques, and justify proposed approaches in writing.

■ Synthesize the outcomes of technical analysis and communicate the results to specialist audiences.

■ Reflect critically on specific analytical methods and their usefulness for understanding archaeological pottery.

Students must submit at least 75% by weight of the components (including examinations) of the course's summative assessment.