Jeremy Sabloff on Archaeology's Role Models

Why should the best known "archaeologist" to the public be an unrepentant looter like Indiana Jones?

Is he the role model we want for our profession?

When I turn on the television to watch a show with archaeological content, why should I be more than likely to see Leonard Nimoy and the repeated use of the term mysterious?

It should be professional archaeologists routinely helping to write and perhaps even hosting many of the archaeology shows on television, not just–at best–popular science writers and Hollywood actors.

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Jeremy A. Sabloff. 1998 "Distinguished lecture in Archeology: Communication and the future of archaeology." American Anthropologist 100(4)871. Reprinted by permission of the American Anthropological Association.