Wonder Woman of the Week: Natasha Billson
There's a growing question in international archaeology in the post-colonial world- a question of the purpose of the field. Facing museums in Europe and North America stockpiled with stolen artifacts and world history education centered in on a European bias, archaeologists across the globe are attempting to answer the question of what the purpose of archaeology is if not grave robbing and ethnocentric education. One archaeologist is making the case for a new purpose of the field- uncovering the truth that voices of the past can provide. Natasha Billson is a British archaeologist who specialized early in her career on London history and archaeological methods but has since expanded her scope to educating international audiences on an unbiased world history.
Apart from expanding her work to include research on ancient cultures from modern-day Ukraine, Natasha Billson has also started a youtube channel educating viewers on archaeological methods and giving first-hand glimpses into the daily work of archaeologists on her YouTube channel Behind the Trowel. Billson is also a reoccurring voice over artist on the archaeology show Archaeology Time. Most importantly- in a world where the few archaeology show that exist all seem to have white, male hosts- Billson is breaking barriers and giving women and people of color an archaeologist to inspire them. As more women and people of color become public archaeologists and anthropologists, their work can not only help rewrite false narratives of history and dissolve ethnocentrism in the field, but also inspire a new generation of archaeologists who can find new purposes for archaeology in the future.
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