{"id":3269,"date":"2024-08-04T08:45:49","date_gmt":"2024-08-04T13:45:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/antiochia2014\/?p=3269"},"modified":"2024-08-04T08:45:49","modified_gmt":"2024-08-04T13:45:49","slug":"week-three-the-new-skills-ive-learned-along-the-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/antiochia2014\/2024\/08\/04\/week-three-the-new-skills-ive-learned-along-the-way\/","title":{"rendered":"Week Three: The New Skills I’ve Learned Along the Way"},"content":{"rendered":"

This whole experience in Turkey has been really valuable, even if I never go on an archeology dig again.\u00a0 It has taught me valuable lessons and skills that will go on to help in future experiences.\u00a0 One group of skills that I have definitely worked on during this experience has to do with people and interacting with them.\u00a0 You are interacting with people constantly whether it\u2019s the people working with you in your unit, the larger St. Olaf group, or all the other people who are here on site.\u00a0 While liking everyone is not necessarily a requirement, getting along with others is something that will help make this experience so much better.\u00a0 Thus, navigating the sometimes turbulent waters of this dig has definitely helped to hone the skill of getting along with everyone, even if you do not necessarily like everyone.\u00a0 Being friendly with someone does not automatically make you friends, but it does ultimately create less tension and friction, which unsurprisingly leads to a more smooth experience.\u00a0 On a happier note, teamwork and collaboration has been another skill that I think has flourished for me.\u00a0 So much of what I have been doing has involved the unit I am working at and thus the team members I work with.\u00a0 As we are digging and have been uncovering more features, we are constantly talking with each other.\u00a0 Sometimes, okay maybe most of the time, it is about things unrelated to the digging or the site at hand, but there is also a fair amount of theorizing or coming up with potential ideas about what is happening at our unit or talking about the other units or sites.\u00a0 Plus everyday we dig, we come back and together write the official notebook for the site, allowing for us to have a more dedicated time for theories and focusing solely on our own site.\u00a0 It really encourages collaboration and keeping an open mind to other ideas.\u00a0 It also helps to encourage critical thinking and learning from others.\u00a0 I have learned how to make sound hypotheses about what various features might be or mean and place the work that I\u2019m doing in a larger context.<\/span><\/p>\n

Last blog post I talked some about the physical side of the work and how I surprised myself with my own strength.\u00a0 I think that working here has helped me gain strength and more physical skills as well.\u00a0 If I ever apply for a job or choose a career where strength is needed, I can definitely point at this experience. I also feel more confident in my own strength.\u00a0 I have proved to myself that I can pick up heavy rocks, take out particularly stubborn roots, and even just labor in the heat and humidity for hours at a time.\u00a0 I can take this newfound confidence into whatever I do next.\u00a0 If I ever choose to go into archeology and participate in more digs, I have also learned so much about how to conduct archeology.\u00a0 I can identify pottery, bones, roof tiles, rocks that might be deliberately placed, and so much more.\u00a0 I\u2019ve learned how to trowel, do Munsell tests, when to open new loci, and take elevations.\u00a0 While these skills are critical to archeology, they also promote other skills that will be helpful for other careers.\u00a0 I have picked up a good eye for details from this internship through those skills mentioned above.<\/span><\/p>\n

It has also been really fun working with the Turkish workers and students and being immersed in Turkish culture.\u00a0 I\u2019ve learned some Turkish, both from the Turks themselves and also from other American and English students.\u00a0 I do want to work on learning more so that if I hopefully return to Turkey at some point, I can better communicate with them.\u00a0 It\u2019s been really cool to learn about the differences in Turkish culture and I think it\u2019s really important to try and not hold on solely to your American habits and customs.\u00a0 I\u2019ve loved getting to listen to Turkish music on the bus rides back from the site and getting to try some Turkish foods, even if it\u2019s only a couple of bites.\u00a0 One of the things that has surprised me is just how nice a majority of the Turkish people have been.\u00a0 It\u2019s a quality that I think that I will try to emulate when I return back to the states.\u00a0 I think it\u2019s a trait that we as Americans don\u2019t always necessarily fully embrace to the same degree as the Turks appear to and I want to try and be more conscious about it going back home.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This whole experience in Turkey has been really valuable, even if I never go on an archeology dig again.\u00a0 It has taught me valuable lessons and skills that will go on to help in future experiences.\u00a0 One group of skills that I have definitely worked on during this experience has to do with people and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4892,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3269","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-research-blog"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4Iz8A-QJ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/antiochia2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3269","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/antiochia2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/antiochia2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/antiochia2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4892"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/antiochia2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3269"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/antiochia2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3269\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3280,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/antiochia2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3269\/revisions\/3280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/antiochia2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3269"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/antiochia2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3269"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/antiochia2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3269"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}