What is the minimum education qualification required to become an archaeologist?

If you are interested in the field of archaeologist, one should be well aware of the past knowledge of past. He should know about the history. Academic qualifications are not always essential most paid employees have archaeology degree ,first class honors degree or a post graduation degree is the requirement in order to enter this field .graduates from other discipline should obtain relevant post graduation degree ,where degree in scientific and engineering subjects is useful for laboratory purpose or reconstruction projects .If the person is having knowledge in history he can deal with planning of excavations while if a person is having knowledge of modern languages like Latin he is helpful in collaborating with foreign colleagues .organized training is being provided to these people by various training centers which can experience best practical experience .

Key skills required by the company are:

• Meticulous attention to detail
• Accurate writing drawing and photography skills
• An inquisitive mind
• Good it skills
• Driving license
• Flexibility in terms of locations like person should be able to adapt to any environment ,he should be physically fit
• Tetanus vaccination
• Driving license
• Knowledge of current area of research in archaeology
• Basic training in archaeological heritage management
• Applying critical ,logical, creative thought
• Working with an ethical commitment and social responsibility
• Resolving problems effectively
• Learning while working as a team and coordinating multidisciplinary teams acquiring a solid cultural preparation

In this field practical experience is very important ,like in united states archaeology lies in one of the four branches of anthropology thus you will be given a anthropology degree with a concentration in archaeology ,now if someone is interested in teaching or research work he or she should have PhD degree .In order to gain the experience in this field we can gain experience by working under the guidance of an archeologist so it will help you in gaining experience and leaning more and will help you in finding jobs in future.

Archaeologist is a person who basically deals with the study and analysis of architecture, bio-facts and cultural landscapes. They study human history, which involves surveyance, excavation and evaluation of the data collected to learn about the past. Archaeologist mainly research on the following topics:

• Art history
• Ethnology
• Geology
• Geography
• Linguistics
• Paleontology
• Paleobotany
• Information sciences

The main purpose of archaeologist is the study of the past and human race. Since the people of the past don’t make use of writing so there are no written records about them, so the field left to know about the past culture is archaeology, many important achievements of human history including evolution of humanity occurred during the past so in order to study this we need archaelogist, they play important role in studying human history, their culture. An archaeologist is a person who studies people and what they did in the past with the things they have left behind .Mainly they look for artifacts that will reveal more about the past. The main things an archaeologist look for are the features like they look for the evidences left behind because of some activity done by our ancestors so these are called features for example a feature can be a firepit, or sometimes they find holes dug by our ancestors in order to store their foods so these kinds of features help the archaeologist to know more about our history.

Following are the things which archaeologist requires as a tool for his job:

• Maps.
• Compasses.
• Picks and showels to dug.
• Buckets to carry the dirt.

Archaeologist draws maps in order to know in which place the thing is found, they draw maps of everything they dug, this information may help the archaeologist to know what might had happened in that particular space. It is not only the prehistoric or preliterate culture that can e studied by archaeologist but also the historic and literate culture. Archaeological excavation existed even when this field was still the domain of amateurs, it can tell us different types of information such as stratigraphy, three dimensional structure etc. Excavation is the most expensive part of this field and it can also be called as destructive process as it deals with ethical concerns, so only few sites are excavated and it mainly depends upon the country and the method used. Sampling is more important in excavation survey. So basically the main aim of a archaeologist is to study the past cultures and reveal the information they are getting from that data like how are ancestors might have lived because no written records are their.

What is the salary of an archaeologist?
The archaeologist work in the field or the lab. The salary also range from $30,000 to $100.000 depending upon educational background ,your employer, and the experience you have gained by working under the experienced archaeologist and it also depends upon what kind of degree you posses ,like whether you are a master degree holder or you are a PhD degree holder ,a person having masters degree will only find jobs at low level ,for example schools or small museums whereas the person who is a PhD degree holder will get job in big universities and big museums and the salary varies according to this ,a person working in  a school will be paid less whereas a person working in big universities will be paid more in comparison to master degree holder .So the salary depends basically on the experience and the education.

National salary data of an archaeologist.

Salary range in forest services-$43000-$72,214

Salary range in popular industries

Average salary of archaeologist on the basis of degree.

BACHELORS OF ARTS (anthropology)-$20,000-$41,000.
MASTERS ARTS (anthropology)-$31,000-$42000.
PhD (anthropology)-$37000-$64000.

Thus from the above data it is cleared that the average salary of an archaeologist in government sector and in private sector is more as compared to universities and non-profit organization, thus a government job is giving more salary to the archaeologist and it is lucrative and usually employ large number of archaeologist .So working in a government sector is more profitable to an archaeologist as compared to working in universities.

3)    Employment opportunities differ widely from country to country or from state to state .University, college posts are prestigious but are very scarce, as they generally hire PhD degree holders or they require a specialist. Field archaeology posts are widely available and tend to give more experience but these are paid less. In some countries tourism offers an opening for qualified archaeologist, but there is a rule that no training can provide full time employment to the archaeologists, where who have expertise I a specific area stand a better chance of obtaining well paid post.

Positions for which one can apply are:

• Environmental technician 11-archaeologist
• Exhibits specialist
• Interdisciplinary supervise archaeologist
• Senior proposal coordinator
• Post doctoral researcher
• Senior tenured faculty position
• Principal archaeologist or team leader
• Historical and architectural review board consultant

Other positions where one can apply for job are:

• Museum position: The job openings are their in university museum. The position for archaeologist in museum includes curator, archivist, or technician .For this position the minimum qualification should be master’s degree. In this position he or she is not involved for teaching purpose but they carry out research, analyze it and then publish it.
• State and federal government position: Archaeologist also work in state and federal government offices, the departments that hire them include forest service, bureau of land management, national park service, highway department, cultural resources management. Here they help in protecting and conserving the important archaeological sites in the region .for this position one should have master’s degree then he or she can get job in this setae and federal government.

So by knowing all this we came to know that there are many job openings for archaeologist in schools .colleges, universities and also in museums and state government and its not like that they have to work outdoors only .The career option depends upon the degree which a person is having like master degree or the PhD degree and depending upon the degree an archaeologist can get a job and will have great and bright future.

What are the special responsibilities of an archaeologist?

An archaeologist play very important role in the study of past history, they mainly deals with study of human race etc.The archaeological study mainly consist of several distant phases each of which uses its own kind of methods .Following are the methods-

• Survey
• Excavation
• Analysis

The first step in this process is the archaeological survey which involves regional survey which is an attempt to systematically relocate previously unknown sites in the region; other is the site survey which involves the survey of sites such as houses and middens, within a site. This method of survey is a very cheap method, like it requires extensively less time and expense because it doesn’t have need of processing huge volumes of soil to discover artifacts .This method is very safe because there are no ethical issues related to this method like no destruction of sites, and this survey data is drawn in maps and all the information gathered can be seen from these data. The simplest survey techniques is the surface surface which can be carried out either by using foot or machinery  to search the features and artifacts present on the surface .Aerial survey is done by using cameras attached to the balloons or to the kites. Geophysical survey is very important survey to look beneath the ground.

Excavation is the second step -modern excavation techniques require precise location of features and object, this method is most expensive method because of which very few sites are excavated entirely. Site plan is also important part of this method.
Third step involves the analysis –once the artifacts and structures are excavated or they are collected they are studies further. The artifacts collected were clean, after that find other areas where similar artifacts can be found .The bones, plants collected from the site can all be analyzed while any text which is found in the site is also analyzed.
Thus these techniques provide useful information that would otherwise not be known and therefore contribute to understand how our ancestors work ,thus archaeologist have uncovered  long last layouts of medieval villages and thus contributed a lot to the society