WOMEN OF ASOR
by Beth Alpert Nakhai
During the past year, ASOR’s publications and membership team, Kevin Cooney and especially Aviva Cormier, created a resource map for its membership, emphasizing the efforts and successes of ASOR’s women members working in Near Eastern archaeology. (View the interactive map here, and read simple instructions on how to navigate the map here.) This “Women of ASOR” resource map is just the beginning; our next project will be to expand our map to include our entire membership base. In an earlier stage of development, this digital resource was presented at the 2012 ASOR Annual Meeting during the session “Women in Near Eastern Archaeology: An Open Forum,” chaired by Beth Alpert Nakhai.
The “Women of ASOR” map will act as a networking resource for ASOR’s membership, as it displays the locations of professional women members around the globe – pinpointing the universities, museums or other organizations where they work and the sites at which they excavate. Furthermore, this map will serve as a resource for ASOR’s junior members who may be looking for advisors, excavation opportunities, and inspiration for their budding careers.
Each professional woman member has a profile pinpointed on the map at her institutional location (such as the university or museum at which she is faculty or staff). These profiles include a contact email address, institutional and departmental affiliation, academic position, and professional specialty. In addition, links direct map users to departmental or personal websites that contain more information about the ASOR member. Also displayed with the profile are the member’s affiliated archaeological project (if relevant), its website, and a link that takes the map user to the geographical location of the archaeological project. All of this data was gathered from university and departmental webpages and other publically available profiles on the Internet.
You can view the “Women of ASOR” resource map here. If your profile is not on the map and you would like to be included, please email the appropriate information to asormemb@bu.edu. If you have any comments or questions, or if you would prefer that your professional information not be included, you can also email asormemb@bu.edu.
The “Women of ASOR” resource map will be on display during the upcoming ASOR Annual Meeting, during the Mentoring Lunch organized by the ASOR Initiative on the Status of Women (Saturday, November 23rd, 12:45-2:00; see program for further details). This is the perfect opportunity to see how ASOR’s resources help to facilitate mentoring between ASOR’s senior women and its junior members, and how they support scholars in the field of Near Eastern archaeology.
We are very excited to present to you, our membership, this resource map, and we look forward to offering further resources and tools in the near future.
