Blogging Archaeology - future directions

So as noted over on Doug's Archaeology blog, many people who have been taking part in the SAA Blogging Carnival didn't post anything for February, in response to the open ended question of blog about whatever you like. My excuse is, that I did start working on something, but it started to evolve into a full length piece which I will probably submit to either the IA issue or e-book on blogging archaeology that are in preparation. I couldn't help but do a little background reading into the use of social media and blogging as a research tool, and became immersed in the vast amount of literature on the topic. So my theme for February ended up being, Archaeological Blogging as a Tool for Self Reflexivity...or something along those lines. It actually links in very well with a lot of thinking I've been doing recently about bringing together archaeological science and theory, partly due to co-convening a course in theoretical archaeology this year, but also the experience of blogging and taking part in the carnival. As a more discussion based article, rather than dealing with primary data, it is a relatively new area for me, so we'll see how it turns out.

March is the final month of the blogging carnival and the question is, where are you going with blogging or where would you like it to go? I am going to answer this one in terms of my own blog, and again it really follows on from my thoughts above. The reading I have been doing on the use of blogging as a learning tool has really inspired me to make more use of this (and Twitter) in my own research and teaching. I also hope to expand the content of my blog to include more discussions/critiques of recently published papers. Another lesson learned from the carnival is that wider engagement beyond your own work makes for a better blog, and I like the idea of blogs for 'public peer review'. Or simply just commenting on new and exciting work in the world of ancient poo and geoarchaeology!