When Jo Bell talks about her career as an archaeologist, she sees it as something different and wastes no time at getting to the passion of her pursuit. "It's not a job, it's a vocation," Ms Bell says, having no real need to eschew the classical romantic notions about archaeology. "And it is a vocation because you are dealing with cultural heritage that has remained relatively unbroken up to today. "You cannot separate the archaeology from First Nations culture and community, which is why the people I work with are not just 'the people I work with'. "I have built up rapport with traditional owners; they are now my friends." Ms Bell operates from her company Jo Bell Heritage Services' office in Violet Town but predominantly does fieldwork north of the Great Dividing Range and along the Murray region. She is qualified in indigenous Australian prehistory and non-indigenous historic archaeology, with an Honours degree in Archaeology and Cert IV in Training and Assessment and has enjoyed more than twenty years professional experience in heritage management. She enjoys a very good reputation in her field and is well-known for her good work practice, something that she says is more fulfilling and purposeful than following a traditional academic path. "I am not into writing papers for example; people ask 'why don't you do a PhD?' "There is a place for that in our society but it's not something I aspire to. "I'm really grass roots." Ms Bell spoke at the Euroa Library on Thursday 7 August as part of the First Thursday discussion sessions held each month, where she covered her fields of research that also include stone artefact analysis, cultural heritage management, and heritage training. She used the session to show some different types of stone and artifacts, including replica stone tools. "We also talked about some different types of cultural places that people would most often see, such as scar trees and scattered artifacts out in the field when they are bushwalking for example." Ms Bell said the Australian archaeological community was currently focused on legislative change. "It has been like that for a while; currently we have state-based legislation which does not necessarily go far enough in some states, so there is a really big call to have very strong Commonwealth legislation. "That was a big thing at the AAA (Australian Archaeological Association) conference last year." The first legislation for protecting indigenous culture came to Victoria in 1972 with the Archaeological and Aboriginal Relics Preservation Act. Commonwealth legislation in 1984 was written with a specific section that pertained to Victoria and stronger legislation enacted in 2007 has also seen amendments since its coming into law. Ms Bell believes this is not enough to preserve Australia's pre-European history and culture. "What I really like to get across to people is that there is a lot of aboriginal cultural heritage, and we all have a responsibility to look after it," she said. "We all have to be responsible humans, because cultural heritage is being destroyed every day, with or without a permit. "And it's huge but not addressed - have we not done enough damage already in the last two centuries and more?"
