Is he good or bad for archaeology? With all the fanfare about the new Indiana Jones movie coming out and USA Network running all three of the previous movies as well as tie-ins and the release of all three on DVD, the question arises.
Indiana Jones "preaches research and good science in the classroom, but is more of an acquisitive tomb raider in the field with a scorched earth policy about what he leaves behind."
David Germain, AP Movie Writer in Yahoo! News asked several archaeologists what their take on Indy was.
"Indy has been both a blessing and a curse for the misty world of archaeology..."
In the 1989 "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, the last of the three movies, he tells students, as his nerdy alter-ego Professor Henry Jones, Jr., that "70% of archaeology is done in the library and advises them to 'forget any ideas about lost cities, exotic travel...We do not follow maps to buried treasure, and 'X' never marks the spot.'"
Then he becomes Indiana Jones and smashes through crypts, kills Nazis, and desecrates a tomb by using a leg bone as a torch.
According to archaeologists, the only thing other than the classroom scenes that resembles real archaeology was in "Raiders" when the Nazis were excavating the lost city."
What Indiana Jones, the "Mummy" and "Lara Craft Tomb Raider" really benefit archaeology is by getting people interested in the subject and talking about it.
And These Guys Don't Even Know How to Spell It. I've Seen it As Archaeology and Archeology. --RoadDog
Being an account of some things I'm interested in, what I'm doing, and reflections on my past, especially music.
Listen to this man. Seven years of college, you know. Trying to reason with 2020 and, now, 2022.
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