A mind preview of how things will look or work in the 1000 years to come makes me realize that some of the common thing used today may be out of the use or in the most advanced form in the future. In that case, therefore the little and neglected items such as remotes, watches, and chalkboard may be a reliable source of information describing how people lived in the 21st
century. In the same aspect, some forgotten items such as pagers and payphone would be a reference on the milestone in the communication sector. In essence, all sectors including technology would have advanced to high defined status. That said, the future archaeologists will, therefore, have so much to reference on regarding the civilization in the 21st century. Consequently, this paper seeks to analyze different items which are projected to be a point of concern for the future archaeologists. In the same respect, the paper seeks to acknowledge the process and insight that the future archaeologist will use to preserve and interpret the 21st-century artifacts.
The Concept of Artefacts
Ideally, artifacts entail objects which have been subjected to transformation due to the advancement in object's uses as well as its relevance to human. In that respect, they seek to give a historical overview regarding a culture, moment in history as well as the profile of civilization in a certain society. In essence, therefore a preview of the artifact would give evidence and clues regarding evolution that has happened in the society regarding lifestyle, craftsmanship as well as the use of the advanced tools in daily endeavors. For instance, studying the current form of a smartphone in the future would give information on how human changing needs and advancement in technology contributed to continuing adding features in the phone.
The Artefact Selected
The increasing need advancement in technology has put questions on the practicability of certain items or actions in the future. Handwritten documents seem to me to be the next point of reference in years to come. The trend in society including online library and digitized books provides an interesting insight regarding the future of the hand-written material. Ideally, hand-written letters and other documents popularity in all sectors seem to be diminishing. The pace at which the technology is bringing change, therefore, indicates that in 500 hundred to the popularity of written material would have disappeared significantly.
Artifact Preservation
For the artifacts to meet the future purpose, they need to be preserved accordingly. Therefore, an archaeologist has the biggest task in making sure that the information encrypted in the artifacts meet the desired purpose. The approach to be used in preserving the artifacts has been an increasing debate due to the intrinsic value of these materials (Bee, 2008). In this line of argument, the preservation should consider the originality which will prevent the artifacts from the physical decay. In support of this Bee (2008) argues that the preservative measures such as the reproduction of the document may fail to present the originality and the intended purpose of the material.
In another account digital preservative technique has been appraised as relevant measures to reduce wear and tear and in the same respect increase user access of the artifact. Those in support of this insight indicate that the concerns of the user of the artifacts are centered on the information carried by the material and not the medium of this information (Bee, 2008). Therefore, basing our thoughts on this line of argument the digitized form would still serve the same purpose as the original format of the material. In this case, the hand-written materials can be stored in the digitized format to increase their access for future archaeologists. Additionally, digitizing their preservation will prevent them from tear and wear thus increasing their access to the users.
Digitized preservation of materials as future artifacts has been stressed to rely on transformation and incoming needs in the society. In support of this Bee (2008) such transformations should be centered the content communicated rather than the concentration of the material things. However, Budd and Harloe as cited by Bee (2008) most user care about the information therefor give significant deal about the format of the material. On the contrary, some scholars stress that the library should be a source of information as their priority then the format should be thought later (Bee, 2008). In this case regarding hand-written materials, the struggle should be on how their information will be accessed providing less worry on the format at which this information should be accessed.
Interpretation of Artefacts
Hand-written documents seem to provide information to the future generations on how life was before the high defined technologies. In social terms, the hand-written materials will provide the uniqueness of different arts and handwritings across different societies. Besides, the handwritten text will act as a profile indicator of the milestone taken by the telecommunication sectors. The milestone would be from the simple written later being transferred to and from post offices to the use of email and digital from one person to the other. Just like in the case of Scrolls, hand-written documents will give insight on how the technology have changed the readability and editing of information from different sources.
The information regarding hand-written concepts will offer to allow people to get ideas on various developments that have transpired in the communication sector. For instance, these materials could not be edited as the reader reads as it is with the case of digitized text. It will also show the future generation how information could not be edited without owners editing the whole text due to the originality of the handwriting. Regarding education, the handwritten document will give insight into the relevance of the material used prior to the use of digitized writing materials.
Another artistic relevance of the hand-written materials as future artifacts is the concept of font and customization of texts. This will help in the appreciation of the digitized information due to their ability to support the different format and user desired font and customized. The interpretation of the handwritten documents as dependent on the user's unique handwriting will also allow the future generation to appreciate the customized writings brought about by technological advancement.
Conclusion
Artifacts form relevant sources of information that can be used to trace a historical fact or cultural items that were somewhat salient to the day-to-day human activities. In this respect, this discussion has selected the use of the handwritten material as an interesting fact which will draw the attention of future archaeologists. The attention is projected due to increased use of digitized writings projecting the diminishing future of the hand-written materials. The storage of this information has been another interest of the study which has been highlighted to rely on the content of the information rather than the medium used to convey this information.
References
Bee, R. (2008). The importance of preserving paper-based artifacts in a digital age. The library quarterly: information, community policy, 78(2), 179-194.
