illicit antiquities trading in economic crisis, organised crime and political violence
Thought and practice regarding the voluntary worker wage exemption appear to be closely connected with much larger efforts at privatisation, workfare and the breaking of the British social contract. Much like its subject, this has been cut in half; but it’s still tldr.
[Now cross-posted on (un)free archaeology.]
Excellent post. I have been there and found it very depressing & demoralising, my current job ends in 6 months or so & I am terrified of doing the whole unpaid crap again, getting experience (which is either depressingly mundane unskilled work which offers little learning experience or skilled work I should legally be paid for). I also suffer health problems & can’t work full time & this throws up yet another barrier. The worst thing is knowing I’m not the only one, that this sort if stuff is common and increasingly encouraged. On the plus side I have little hope of ever earning enough to pay back my student loans so that’s two fingers up…
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Ha, yeah, when I heard they were going to try harder to get people’s student loans back, I (tried and failed to work out how much I owed them now and) wished them good luck.
Sorry to hear you’ve been unwell. As you say, as well as the immediate problem of the ill-health, it has so many negative knock-on effects. You should do the illegally-unpaid work, then sue them for back-pay!
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conflict antiquities 