office in Post Hall is an inviting chaos of shards, mended pottery, drawing
boards, graphs, computers, and wall posters. He cleared off a deep armchair
for this reporter, and then perched himself on a tall stool nearby. While
he spoke, student assistants moved in and out as they sorted and labeled
Lecturer in Archaeology at the University of York in England, Perring
is currently Visiting Senior Lecturer (Wittersly Chair) in the Department
of History and Archaeology at AUB. Like so many of this yearís
"new" professors, Professor Perring has a history of association
with Beirut and AUB. Associate Editor of Berytus (the AUB journal
of archaeology published by the Department of History and Archaeology)
since 1997, Perring first came to Beirut in 1993 to work with Solidere
and AUB Professor Helga Seeden in the excavation of Beirutís souk
At AUB this semester Professor Perring teaches a graduate course
in cultural resource management, an undergraduate courses in archaeological
theory and methodology (involving field work in Anjar and Tyre), and another
courses in heritage management in Lebanon. The students, most meetings
in small classes, are energetic and enthusiastic: "I learn a great
deal from them," Perring admitted.
Following his education at the University of Leicester in England,
Dr. Perring served on archaeological projects in London, Milan and Beirut.
His publications, on Roman London, and Italian urban archaeology, town
and country in Britain, and the excavations in the souks of Beirut (co-authored
with AUB Professor Helga Seeden) reflect his compulsive interest in urban
archaeology, and his firm belief in the contemporaneousness of the study
of the past.
Perring's dedication to bringing archaeology alive reverberates
in his very word on the subject. His stated desire is to teach archaeology
in Lebanon as related to living in Lebanon, to being Lebanese. Perring
deplores the tendency of some archaeologists to view the past as ironic,
static; he believes it is necessary to recognize the complexity of the
past and its relation to the present. For him archaeology is endlessly
dynamic. "Things in the past donít just sit there; they rest
within a continuum. People live there."
According to Perring, students need to engage actively in the past,
for archaeology is part of a search for "place, self-identity, sequence".
Describing layers of excavation in the Beirut Central District (BCD),
Perring emphasized the significance not only of the ancient past, but
of the history of the war years of the ë70s and ë80s.
Perring is excited to be working in Beirut with dedicated students
committed to the study of archaeology. Archaeology in Lebanon, he feels,
can be much more dynamic than traditional archaeology in Europe and the
West, which he views as "sorted, written, structured, done".
In Lebanon an enormous wealth of archaeological sites exists, inviting
study; in addition, old sites need to be re-explored.
Perring wishes the exhibition at the National Museum of Beirut
were more dynamic. He would like to see more evidence of the recent war
years; for example, the sniperís post, a nasty gash in the northeast
corner of the Museum, might have been preserved as a reminder of the dynamic
of history. He is judicious in his assessment of Solidere and its relation
to archaeological research. "Solidere wanted to do the best by archaeology",
he stated, but "obviously, it had to do the best by the shareholders
Perring, delighted with his life in Beirut and the endless possibilities
for archaeological research, lives off campus with his wife and three