Annual Report

Date  10th October 2023 

Film Screening ‘Period. End of Sentence’ by director Raya Zehtabachi 

Location McDonald Institute Seminar Room

Notes This was followed by a group discussion on the themes of the film and our own experiences in the field 

Date  13th November 2023 

Film Screening ‘Have you seen the arana’ by Sunanda Bhat  

Location McDonald Institute Seminar Room 

Notes Followed by a discussion with the filmmaker the next day 

28th November 2023 

‘Amid the Villus: the story of Palaikuli’ by Sumathy Sivamohan 

McDonald Institute Seminar Room 

Followed by a discussion with the filmmaker on Zoom about the themes of the film and the process of filming in remote locations 

Date 3rd-5th January 2024

Session Big Dig Energy - Gendered practices and internalised patriarchy in archaeological fieldwork in West Asia 

Notes 

Mou Sarmah and Afifa Khan attended the BANEA conference held at the University of Glasgow from 3-5th January 2024. 

Two papers were presented: 

1. Summarising the themes of the SAWIF sessions (risk assessments, women’s experiences in fieldwork, gendered work etc.) 

2. SAWIF ‘White Paper on hiring practices and recruitment’ (see below).

SAWIF members collectively worked on a white paper over the course of multiple sessions in Michaelmas Term 2023 that addressed systemic issues in the recruitment and retention of women, especially those from minority backgrounds in academia, particularly in Cambridge. The white paper is targeted to be given to University HR, departments and other parties hiring for academic or research positions.  

The white paper lays out problems with the lack of diversity in all types of positions in academia, as well as challenges in retaining women from underrepresented groups in the academic pipeline. The white paper proposes suggestions to address structural imbalances at different stages of the academic lifecycle, from recruitment through to post-hire. Suggestions include those mentioned by the University of Cambridge Diverse Recruitment Framework (https://www.race-equality.admin.cam.ac.uk/diverse-recruitment), but go into further detail, such as those related to the wording and advertisement of job adverts, post-hire, continued staff development and suggestions to combat ‘the leaky pipeline’ in academia. 

7th and 8th March 2024:
SAWIF collaborated with the Garrod seminar series organisers, the Pitt-Rivers seminar series organisers, and the PalMeso seminar series organisers to host an event for International Women’s Day at the Department of Archaeology. The event consisted of morning talks by invited speakers given by women at various stages of their careers. In the afternoon, lightning talks and a poster session were organised to showcase the work of students and early career researchers in our department. The event was featured on the Cambridge Archaeology website: https://www.arch.cam.ac.uk/news/international-womens-day-2024 

We organised informal coffee sessions to plan future meetings, discuss fieldwork plans and ideas to broaden the membership of the group.  

Date 29th May 2024

Session McDonald Institute Seminar Room

Notes Coffee with members and plans to increase membership  

Date 12th of July 2024 

Session Newnham College 

Notes Coffee with regular members and new members from Anthropology and Geography

Date 30th of July 2024 

Session McDonald Institute Seminar room 

Notes Coffee with members and discussing next year plans