April 22, 2022 • 13 mins
Tracy and Holly talk about the language used when talking about archaeology. They then talk about the domestication of geese.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
of I Heart Radio, Hello and Happy Friday. I'm Tracy B.
Wilson and I'm Holly Friday. This week we had our
Unearthed episodes for the first three months. It is always
(00:21):
an adventure going through these and this adventure this time
has been informed by another podcast. UM. That podcast is
called Sapiens, a podcast for Everything Human, and this season
of the Sapiens podcast is specifically about how black and
(00:42):
Indigenous people are changing the field of archaeology, which is
something that I have been trying to be more mindful
of while working on these episodes. UM. As of when
we are recording this UM, I think there are six
episodes out in the season. I'm not sure how many
there will be all together. UM. Some of the stuff
(01:04):
that they've talked about is stuff that I have thought
about before and have tried to incorporate into the podcast,
like the kind of language that we talk about when
we talk about the things that are done at archaeological sites.
Like something that has already been on my radar is
making sure that when we're talking about, uh, something related
to an indigenous culture, we're not using different language with
(01:27):
loaded connotations that we wouldn't use something that makes UH,
that would make what we're talking about seems somehow less
or inferior. But then there's also layers that I have
never thought about at all. Like in the first episode
they talk about language, and one of the things that
they talk about is describing the objects that are found
(01:49):
in archaeological sites UM as belongings, because in a lot
of the cultures that we're talking about, that's a person's belongings.
It's not an artifact, it's not a relic. It is
something that belonged to a person UM and you know
that person is an ancestor, not like a set of remains.
(02:12):
And so it has given me a ton to think about. UM.
I highly recommend it to everyone. I'm sure there will
still be times that we are doing stuff in Unearthed
and UM we talk about stuff that looking back on it,
I'm like, oh, I might have handled that differently, or
I might have described that differently. But it also before
(02:34):
even getting to this podcast, it has these kinds of
ideas have affected the sorts of work that I want
to talk about. So, like when we were talking about
the community led project to look at UH specifically, genetic
ancestry to indigenous people. Like all of that is is
(02:57):
so complicated for a lot of different endig as communities,
And the project that we were talking about, like it
came from the community. The indigenous community was leading and
guiding a lot of it, and like that's the kind
of work that I'm most interested in talking about when
it comes to um any indigenous community in North America,
(03:18):
but then also communities anywhere that was colonized. Like there's
just a whole layer of you know, like Europeans colonized
this place, and now European archaeologists are coming to do
work without necessarily consulting with the people they're like all
of that. I would really much rather talk about work
(03:39):
that like has that community's involvement and ideally is uh
not like not just something that's like, hey, we're gonna
repatriate this stuff afterward, like not like that, but like
getting that community's involvement, being collaborative with that community from
the beginning, not as like an afterthought. That's definitely shifted
(04:00):
how what kinds of projects and what kinds of excavations
have have been on the show over the last several
installments of an Earth You also UM dovetailed on another
podcast without realizing it because as we record this, an
episode of Criminalia has just come out where we talked
about how many uh fairly recent pardons and apologies about
(04:24):
witch hunts, witch trials and UM executions have happened. Because
our current season is about witchcraft and alchemy and it's
all so much it is horrible torture, awfulness. Um, we
just did an episode where we talked about how how
many of the the events that happened have been apologized
for in recent times, as well as apologies that have
(04:46):
happened throughout the year. So you accidentally, um, you know,
ven diagrammed us, which is great, Yeah it. I did
not put that part about Scotland's apology in the update
because I don't think we've actually ever talked about any
of the witch trials in Scotland specifically. We have lots
of episodes, Yeah, we have episodes about UM which trials
(05:10):
and witch hunts and witch hunters and things like that
UM in other parts of the world, but I think
not Scotland specifically. If we do, I missed it when
I went looking to double check have we ever talked
about this specific thing? I don't think so. Another thing
(05:35):
that you put in this edition of an Earth made
me laugh so hard in my soul. What was it?
And I bet you would never predict what it was.
It was the bit about um the discovery of geese
being domesticated in China much earlier than we thought, because
my first thought was, you can't domesticate a goose. Um.
(06:00):
And I say that because when I was a kid,
we had a farm, we had geese. They're very smart
and wonderful. But my mother, who was a character uh
fancied herself to be like some sort of animal whisperer
m hmm. And we had this one goose named Judy
(06:20):
who was, to put it kindly, mean as hell like.
She was just like I was a little kid at
this point, and Judy would see me and be like,
I'm coming for you, and so like I thought she
was terrifying. But my mom was convinced that she and
Judy were BFFs, and she would like show Judy to
people and be like, oh, this goose hates everyone, but
it loves me. And there was one day where she
(06:40):
had picked it up and was holding it under her arm,
and initially the goose who was a very pretty little thing.
She had this great little weird um gray streak on
her side, like she was otherwise like a you know
that off white white goose color had this gray streak,
so she was kind of distinctive. And my mom was
petting her and talking about how docile and sweet she
us with her, and then at one point Judy had
(07:02):
just had it and turned and essentially mulled my mother.
Oh no, And my mom had like this giant mark
on her neck for like a month because it took
a really long time to heal. But it just made
me chuckle because the phrase domesticated goose isn't real in
my world. That's not to say someone's going to write
us and say I had a goose and it was
(07:23):
very sweet. I'm sure they exist, but having had many
geese growing up, they could be lovely at times, but
you could not trust them. Yeah, they have a reputation
for being ornery. Yes, Like I was on a I
was on a walk the other day through the town
where I live, and I saw a child who looked
(07:45):
five or six years old just chasing some candy geese
around and and their parents was there doing nothing about this,
And I was like this is headed for a disaster.
I was expecting at any moment for one of these
geese to be done and and it did not happen
while I was there, But I was like, never in
a million years but adult me get anywhere near into
(08:10):
the faces of these geese as this child was doing. No.
I my own experience is that geese have more of
a reputation for being sometimes hostile to the human beings
around them, but chickens have more of our reputation for
being hostile to each other. Yes, we also had chickens,
and like that was again. I have certainly seen videos
(08:34):
online of very cute chickens being very sweet, but like
our chickens were not kind to one another. They had
plenty of everything, and they lived in a big like
outdoor space. It wasn't we didn't have like a tiny
you know. It wasn't like they were competing for resources
and it led them to that behavior. They were just
territorial and mean in my experience. Yeah, I wouldn't even
(08:57):
talk about our roosters, which like traumatized two of the
meanest reasters I have ever ever encountered. The most traumatic
UH incident with an animal UH in terms of that
animals treatment of me that I ever had as a kid. Um.
We had some some family friends that lived about as
(09:24):
far in the country as we did, and I was
walking down a path by their house and they had
this mean old tomcat, and mean old tom cat out
of nowhere just clawed the back of my leg from
like thigh to below my knee. And at that point
I knew I wanted a cat more than anything in
the entire world. But I don't think I had managed
(09:46):
to like will that into existence yet. Um. But even
that was not enough to deter you deter me from
the quest to get a cat than I did. I did. Listen.
I still love geese, but I know to keep my distance.
I ran into a group of them when I was
out walking a while back. There's a park that I
(10:09):
was near, and I presumed they had come up from
the pond in that park, and I was just like, hey, guys,
I'm gonna be super cool with you. I'm gonna walk
this way and if you just you keep honking, but
I'm going over here totally fine. Like I think they're
adorable and funny, but like you, I would not get
up in their faces for all of the money on Earth. Yeah. Um.
(10:31):
I was walking to a friend's house one time a
while back, and my my Google Maps directions had me
sort of following this little path into a little wood
and then crossing a bridge over a river. And I
already was like, this looks like a place somebody would
go to get murdered by that river. There was also
just a field of geese between me and there, and
(10:52):
I was like, I gotta get my way through all
these geese. There's no other way to get over this river. Besides,
she's gonna change the song to over the river and
through the geese and it will be like a survival
song and less of a Yeah again, geese very cute
and they're so smart. Yeah, but they unpredictable in my experience. Yeah. Yeah. Um. Literally,
(11:23):
you could say to any of my siblings for me,
the word judy and we will start cackling laughing at
my mother thinking she had a special relationship with this
goose that just embarrassed and mulled her all at one.
Oh No, she was fine. She wasn't like you know
when I say she mulled her. She wasn't disfigured or anything.
But her neck was she had a big, old, big
(11:46):
old goose egg on her neck for a long time.
It got to the point where she had, in her
final lunge, bit my mom and then would not let
go like geese teeth are sharp. Um, So that was Judy, Yep,
I cannot be that. You're right. I never would have
(12:07):
guessed that that was the one that made you laugh
in your soul, deep in my soul, the darkness where
I'm I laugh at my mother and her goose handling ways. Yeah, yeah, Well,
I do recommend I have not listened to the other
seasons of the Sapiens podcast, but I do recommend season four. Um.
(12:27):
Like I said, I've I've learned a lot from it
and it's given me a lot to think about and
the six episodes of it that I have listened to
so far. And I hope everybody has a good weekend
lined up whatever is on your plate. We will be
back with a Saturday Classic tomorrow. We'll be back Monday
with a brand new episode. Hope everybody's doing well. Stuff
(12:55):
you missed in History Class is a production of I
Heart Radio. For more podcasts for I heart Radio, visit
the I heart Radio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you
listen to your favorite shows h m hm
Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
of I Heart Radio, Hello and Happy Friday. I'm Tracy B.
Wilson and I'm Holly Friday. This week we had our
Unearthed episodes for the first three months. It is always
(00:21):
an adventure going through these and this adventure this time
has been informed by another podcast. UM. That podcast is
called Sapiens, a podcast for Everything Human, and this season
of the Sapiens podcast is specifically about how black and
(00:42):
Indigenous people are changing the field of archaeology, which is
something that I have been trying to be more mindful
of while working on these episodes. UM. As of when
we are recording this UM, I think there are six
episodes out in the season. I'm not sure how many
there will be all together. UM. Some of the stuff
(01:04):
that they've talked about is stuff that I have thought
about before and have tried to incorporate into the podcast,
like the kind of language that we talk about when
we talk about the things that are done at archaeological sites.
Like something that has already been on my radar is
making sure that when we're talking about, uh, something related
to an indigenous culture, we're not using different language with
(01:27):
loaded connotations that we wouldn't use something that makes UH,
that would make what we're talking about seems somehow less
or inferior. But then there's also layers that I have
never thought about at all. Like in the first episode
they talk about language, and one of the things that
they talk about is describing the objects that are found
(01:49):
in archaeological sites UM as belongings, because in a lot
of the cultures that we're talking about, that's a person's belongings.
It's not an artifact, it's not a relic. It is
something that belonged to a person UM and you know
that person is an ancestor, not like a set of remains.
(02:12):
And so it has given me a ton to think about. UM.
I highly recommend it to everyone. I'm sure there will
still be times that we are doing stuff in Unearthed
and UM we talk about stuff that looking back on it,
I'm like, oh, I might have handled that differently, or
I might have described that differently. But it also before
(02:34):
even getting to this podcast, it has these kinds of
ideas have affected the sorts of work that I want
to talk about. So, like when we were talking about
the community led project to look at UH specifically, genetic
ancestry to indigenous people. Like all of that is is
(02:57):
so complicated for a lot of different endig as communities,
And the project that we were talking about, like it
came from the community. The indigenous community was leading and
guiding a lot of it, and like that's the kind
of work that I'm most interested in talking about when
it comes to um any indigenous community in North America,
(03:18):
but then also communities anywhere that was colonized. Like there's
just a whole layer of you know, like Europeans colonized
this place, and now European archaeologists are coming to do
work without necessarily consulting with the people they're like all
of that. I would really much rather talk about work
(03:39):
that like has that community's involvement and ideally is uh
not like not just something that's like, hey, we're gonna
repatriate this stuff afterward, like not like that, but like
getting that community's involvement, being collaborative with that community from
the beginning, not as like an afterthought. That's definitely shifted
(04:00):
how what kinds of projects and what kinds of excavations
have have been on the show over the last several
installments of an Earth You also UM dovetailed on another
podcast without realizing it because as we record this, an
episode of Criminalia has just come out where we talked
about how many uh fairly recent pardons and apologies about
(04:24):
witch hunts, witch trials and UM executions have happened. Because
our current season is about witchcraft and alchemy and it's
all so much it is horrible torture, awfulness. Um, we
just did an episode where we talked about how how
many of the the events that happened have been apologized
for in recent times, as well as apologies that have
(04:46):
happened throughout the year. So you accidentally, um, you know,
ven diagrammed us, which is great, Yeah it. I did
not put that part about Scotland's apology in the update
because I don't think we've actually ever talked about any
of the witch trials in Scotland specifically. We have lots
of episodes, Yeah, we have episodes about UM which trials
(05:10):
and witch hunts and witch hunters and things like that
UM in other parts of the world, but I think
not Scotland specifically. If we do, I missed it when
I went looking to double check have we ever talked
about this specific thing? I don't think so. Another thing
(05:35):
that you put in this edition of an Earth made
me laugh so hard in my soul. What was it?
And I bet you would never predict what it was.
It was the bit about um the discovery of geese
being domesticated in China much earlier than we thought, because
my first thought was, you can't domesticate a goose. Um.
(06:00):
And I say that because when I was a kid,
we had a farm, we had geese. They're very smart
and wonderful. But my mother, who was a character uh
fancied herself to be like some sort of animal whisperer
m hmm. And we had this one goose named Judy
(06:20):
who was, to put it kindly, mean as hell like.
She was just like I was a little kid at
this point, and Judy would see me and be like,
I'm coming for you, and so like I thought she
was terrifying. But my mom was convinced that she and
Judy were BFFs, and she would like show Judy to
people and be like, oh, this goose hates everyone, but
it loves me. And there was one day where she
(06:40):
had picked it up and was holding it under her arm,
and initially the goose who was a very pretty little thing.
She had this great little weird um gray streak on
her side, like she was otherwise like a you know
that off white white goose color had this gray streak,
so she was kind of distinctive. And my mom was
petting her and talking about how docile and sweet she
us with her, and then at one point Judy had
(07:02):
just had it and turned and essentially mulled my mother.
Oh no, And my mom had like this giant mark
on her neck for like a month because it took
a really long time to heal. But it just made
me chuckle because the phrase domesticated goose isn't real in
my world. That's not to say someone's going to write
us and say I had a goose and it was
(07:23):
very sweet. I'm sure they exist, but having had many
geese growing up, they could be lovely at times, but
you could not trust them. Yeah, they have a reputation
for being ornery. Yes, Like I was on a I
was on a walk the other day through the town
where I live, and I saw a child who looked
(07:45):
five or six years old just chasing some candy geese
around and and their parents was there doing nothing about this,
And I was like this is headed for a disaster.
I was expecting at any moment for one of these
geese to be done and and it did not happen
while I was there, But I was like, never in
a million years but adult me get anywhere near into
(08:10):
the faces of these geese as this child was doing. No.
I my own experience is that geese have more of
a reputation for being sometimes hostile to the human beings
around them, but chickens have more of our reputation for
being hostile to each other. Yes, we also had chickens,
and like that was again. I have certainly seen videos
(08:34):
online of very cute chickens being very sweet, but like
our chickens were not kind to one another. They had
plenty of everything, and they lived in a big like
outdoor space. It wasn't we didn't have like a tiny
you know. It wasn't like they were competing for resources
and it led them to that behavior. They were just
territorial and mean in my experience. Yeah, I wouldn't even
(08:57):
talk about our roosters, which like traumatized two of the
meanest reasters I have ever ever encountered. The most traumatic
UH incident with an animal UH in terms of that
animals treatment of me that I ever had as a kid. Um.
We had some some family friends that lived about as
(09:24):
far in the country as we did, and I was
walking down a path by their house and they had
this mean old tomcat, and mean old tom cat out
of nowhere just clawed the back of my leg from
like thigh to below my knee. And at that point
I knew I wanted a cat more than anything in
the entire world. But I don't think I had managed
(09:46):
to like will that into existence yet. Um. But even
that was not enough to deter you deter me from
the quest to get a cat than I did. I did. Listen.
I still love geese, but I know to keep my distance.
I ran into a group of them when I was
out walking a while back. There's a park that I
(10:09):
was near, and I presumed they had come up from
the pond in that park, and I was just like, hey, guys,
I'm gonna be super cool with you. I'm gonna walk
this way and if you just you keep honking, but
I'm going over here totally fine. Like I think they're
adorable and funny, but like you, I would not get
up in their faces for all of the money on Earth. Yeah. Um.
(10:31):
I was walking to a friend's house one time a
while back, and my my Google Maps directions had me
sort of following this little path into a little wood
and then crossing a bridge over a river. And I
already was like, this looks like a place somebody would
go to get murdered by that river. There was also
just a field of geese between me and there, and
(10:52):
I was like, I gotta get my way through all
these geese. There's no other way to get over this river. Besides,
she's gonna change the song to over the river and
through the geese and it will be like a survival
song and less of a Yeah again, geese very cute
and they're so smart. Yeah, but they unpredictable in my experience. Yeah. Yeah. Um. Literally,
(11:23):
you could say to any of my siblings for me,
the word judy and we will start cackling laughing at
my mother thinking she had a special relationship with this
goose that just embarrassed and mulled her all at one.
Oh No, she was fine. She wasn't like you know
when I say she mulled her. She wasn't disfigured or anything.
But her neck was she had a big, old, big
(11:46):
old goose egg on her neck for a long time.
It got to the point where she had, in her
final lunge, bit my mom and then would not let
go like geese teeth are sharp. Um, So that was Judy, Yep,
I cannot be that. You're right. I never would have
(12:07):
guessed that that was the one that made you laugh
in your soul, deep in my soul, the darkness where
I'm I laugh at my mother and her goose handling ways. Yeah, yeah, Well,
I do recommend I have not listened to the other
seasons of the Sapiens podcast, but I do recommend season four. Um.
(12:27):
Like I said, I've I've learned a lot from it
and it's given me a lot to think about and
the six episodes of it that I have listened to
so far. And I hope everybody has a good weekend
lined up whatever is on your plate. We will be
back with a Saturday Classic tomorrow. We'll be back Monday
with a brand new episode. Hope everybody's doing well. Stuff
(12:55):
you missed in History Class is a production of I
Heart Radio. For more podcasts for I heart Radio, visit
the I heart Radio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you
listen to your favorite shows h m hm
Stuff You Missed in History Class News
Hosts And Creators
Holly Frey
Tracy Wilson
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