If we ignore the Siva Stones, which Jones seems to have always planned to return to the village from which they were stolen, Jones’ success rate at converting “this object is probably mythical” into “this object is part of a publicly accessible museum collection” rises to one in five. His methods may be unorthodox by modern standards, but 20% is a lot higher than average, considering that we remember the names of archaeologists who do this even once.
Jones, who we’re led to believe works at an old-money institution, if not an Ivy than a near-Ivy, has a classroom of at least two-thirds women...Suggesting all those women are in Jones’ class because they want to sleep with him—a common assertion—rejects out of hand the possibility that these women are legitimately excited about archaeology as Jones presents it, which seems like a skeevy and disrespectful move to me.
Bwahahahah !
Another anecdote: I’ve had wonderful professors, I’ve had brilliant professors, but without doubt the most badass professor I’ve ever had the pleasure to work with was Doctor Kimberly Bowes, a late classical archaeologist who spent a year teaching what amounts to introductory Mediterranean political science and history. Dr. Bowes knew a billion languages and she spent her fieldwork being lowered down pits into buried villages and subterranean temples of blood-drinking cults (I mean, Christian churches, but, you know, same diff). Having swallowed the “real archaeologists aren’t Indiana Jones” pill along with every skeptical kid my age, I thought she must be the exception, the Sole Awesome Archaeologist. Then a colleague of hers arrived one day to watch her class—he rode in on his motorcycle, with leather boots and a lanky figure and the kind of five-o-clock shadow actors pay people to help them fake.
Wonderful.
http://www.tor.com/2017/08/09/defending-indiana-jones-archaeologist/
Dr Jones, artifact smuggler.
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