Newcastle University

Roles and Responsibilities

I am DPD (Degree Programme Director) for VV41 History and Archaeology.

I maintain the Heritage City website, which helps students from across the University find dissertation and project work centred on historic Newcastle  http://research.ncl.ac.uk/heritagecity/

I am also leader of the Newcastle University branch of the Young Archaeologists Club (a club for children aged 8-16), which is run by myself and student volunteers. www.britarch.ac.uk/yac/branches/newcastle/

Research Interests

I am an Historical Archaeologist in the widest sense of that term. My research crosses traditional frontiers (both temporal and disciplinary) but focuses on colonial material culture, from the early Roman Empire to the eighteenth century. My work explores the material culture of colonial subjects (including indigenous peoples and slaves), and examines the uses that these groups made of ‘foreign’ or imposed material things, as they created new identities in new circumstances. I work mainly in two fields: Romano-British iconography and the archaeology of slavery (looking at the latter in both in the Roman period and between 1660 and 1807). I am currently writing a book called Material Culture of the Middle Passage, looking at the social world of slave ships making the Atlantic sea crossing that took slaves to the New World during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

Webster, J and Cooper, N (eds) (1996) Roman Imperlialism: Post-Colonial Perspectives can be read online at  https://lra.le.ac.uk/handle/2381/9179

Read my 2007 article in British Archaeology, called 'Ringed with the wrecks of slave ships: the Atlantic slave trade' at http://www.britarch.ac.uk/ba/ba94/feat1.shtml

My 2010 paper 'A distant diaspora; thinking comparatively about origins, migrations and Roman slavery' can be accessed at http://www.diaspora.uiuc.edu/news0310/news0310.html#3

Postgraduate Supervision

I am currently supervising PhD candidates working on the historical archaeology of English Civil War defences; 19th century oral history and material culture; 18th century british Loyalist settlers in Canada; and the artefact biography of trade goods on slave ships . I would be very happy to hear from prospective students with interests in either Romano-British or Historical Archaeology (post AD 1500), and particularly in the archaeology of slavery at any period.

Undergraduate Teaching

My principal modules are ARA 2097 Historical Archaeology of the Modern World and ARA 3031 Britain after 1500. I also teach a voluntary writing skills course (WriteRight), which helps students improve their written assessment work. Many Newcastle archaeology students undertake fieldwork training with me, at the Bollihope Common Archaeology Project annual excavations in Weardale, County Durham.

You can download a copy of the 2009/10 Module Handbook for ARA 3031 Britain after 1500 from the teaching resouces page on the Society for Historical Archaeology website at http://www.sha.org/research_resources/syllabus.cfm

I maintain the Heritage City website, which helps students from across the University find dissertation and project work centred on historic Newcastle  http://research.ncl.ac.uk/heritagecity/

Winner of the Vice Chancellor's Distinguished Teacher Award 2011. 

http://www.ncl.ac.uk/press.office/newslink/item/teaching-excellence-rewarded

• Webster J. A distant diaspora: thinking comparatively about origins, migration and Roman slavery. African Diaspora Archaeology Network, 2010. Available at: http://www.diaspora.uiuc.edu/news0310/news0310-3.pdf.
• Webster J. Routes to slavery in the Roman World: a comparative perspective on the archaeology of forced migration. In:Eckardt, H., ed. Roman Diasporas: Archaeological Approaches to Mobility and diversity in the Roman Empire.Portsmouth, Rhode Island, USA:Journal of Roman Archaeology (Supplementary Series),2010, pp. 45-65.
• Webster J. The Unredeemed Object: Displaying Abolitionist Artefacts in 2007. Slavery & Abolition 2009, 30(2), 311-325.
• Webster J. Less beloved. Roman archaeology, slavery and the failure to compare. Archaeological Dialogues 2008, 15(2), 103-149.
• Webster J. Slave ships and maritime archaeology: An overview. International Journal of Historical Archaeology 2008, 12(1), 6-19.
• Webster J. Rome and the 'Barbarians'. In: Alcock, SE; Osborne, R, ed. Classical Archaeology. London: Blackwell, 2007, pp. 401-424.
• Webster J. The material culture of slave shipping. In: Hamilton, DJ; Blyth, RJ, ed. Representing Slavery: Art, Artefacts and Archives in the Collections of the National Maritime Museum. London: Lund Humphries, 2007, pp. 104-117.
• Webster J. The Zong case in the context of the eighteenth-century slave trade. Journal of Legal History 2007, 28(3), 285-298.
• Webster J. Archaeologies of slavery and servitude: bringing ‘New World’ perspectives to Roman Britain. Journal of Roman Archaeology 2005,18 1 161-179.
• Webster J. Historical Archaeology and the Middle Passage. Journal for Maritime Research 2005,submitted .
• Webster J. Art as resistance and negotiation. In: Scott, S., Webster, J, ed. Roman Imperialism and Provincial Art. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003, pp.24-51.
• Scott S, Webster J, ed. Roman imperialism and provincial art. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003.
• Webster J. Creolizing the Roman Provinces. American Journal of Archaeology 2001, 105(2), 209-225.
• Webster, J. A New Roman Britain? Recent Developments in Romano-British Archaeology. American Journal of Archaeology 1999, 103 (1), 121-125.
• Webster, J. At the end of the world: druidic and other forms of revitalization movement in post-conquest Gaul and Britain. Britannia 1999, 30, 1-20.
• Webster, J. Here be dragons! Roman attitudes to Northern Britain. In: Bevan, B, ed. Northern Exposure. 1999, pp. 1-20.
• Webster, J. Resisting traditions: ceramics, identity and consumer choice in the Outer Hebrides from 1800 to the present. International Journal of Historical Archaeology 1999, 3:1, 53-73..
• Webster, J. Mystics or Freedom Fighters?. British Archaeological News 1998, 18, 17-18.
• Webster, J. A negotiated syncretism: readings on the development of Romano-Celtic religion ,. In: Mattingly, D.J., ed. Dialogues in Roman Imperialism. 1997, pp. 164-184.
• Webster, J. Necessary comparisons: a post-colonial approach to religious syncretism in the Roman provinces. World Archaeology 1997, 28 (3), 324-338.
• Webster, J. Text expectations: the archaeology of ‘Celtic’ ritual wells and shafts. In: Gwilt, A. and Haselgrove, C., ed. Reconstructing Iron Age Societies. 1997, pp. 134-144.
• Webster J. Ethnographic barbarity: colonial discourse and ‘Celtic warrior societies’. In: Webster J ; Cooper N, ed. Roman Imperialism: post-colonial perspectives. Leicester: School of Archaeological Studies, University of Leicester, 1996, pp. 111-123.
• Webster J. Roman imperialism and the 'post imperial age'. In: Webster J ; Cooper NJ, ed. Roman Imperialism: post-colonial perspectives. Leicester: School of Archaeological Studies, University of Leicester, 1996, pp. 1-17.
• Webster, J and Cooper, N (eds). Roman Imperialism: Post-colonial Perspectives. Leicester, 1996.
• Webster, J. Rosiers-D’Egletons, St-Etienne-au-Clos, Bussiere-St-Georges. In:Bilan Scientifique de la Région Limousin 1996 . Service Régional de l’Archéologie, 1996, pp. 58-9.
• J. Symonds and J. Webster. Archaeological Assessment at New Stubbin, Rotherham, South Yorks. In: Cumberpatch, C.G., and Whiteley, S., ed. Archaeology in South Yorkshire 1994-5. 1995, pp. 14-15.
• J. Symonds, J. Webster, and T. Cooper , in. Archaeological Assessment at Straightmile, Rotherham, South Yorks. In: Cumberpatch, C.G., and Whiteley, S., ed. Archaeology in South Yorkshire 1994-5. 1995, pp. 16-18.
• J. Symonds, J. Webster, and T. Cooper. Archaeological Investigations at The Corn Exchange, Doncaster, S Yorks. In: Cumberpatch, C.G., and Whiteley, S., ed. Archaeology in South Yorkshire 1994-5. 1995, pp. 19-24.
• M. Parker-Pearson, J. Mulville, T. Roper, H. Smith, N. Sharples, and J. Webster. Archaeological Investigations in South Uist. In:Discovery and Excavation in Scotland 1995 . 1995, pp. 4-5.
• Webster, J. Interpretatio: Roman Word Power and the Celtic Gods. Britannia 1995, 26, 153-162.
• Webster, J. Sanctuaries and Sacred Places. In: Green, M, ed. The Celtic World. London: Routledge, 1995, pp. 445-464.
• Webster, J. Translation and subjection: interpretatio and the Celtic gods. In: Hill, J.D., and Cumberpatch, C., ed. Different Iron Ages Studies in the Archaeology of Iron Age Europe. 1995, pp. 175-183.
• Webster, J. The just war: Graeco-Roman texts as colonial discourse. In: Cottam, S. et al, ed. Proceedings of the Fourth Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conference 1994. Oxford: Oxbow Books, 1994, pp. 1-10.
• Webster, J. Celtic religion in archaeology versus Celtic religion in text. Shadow 1991, 8.2, 1-15.
• Webster J. ‘'Success to the Dobson': paintings and commemorative ceramics depicting British slave ships. Post-Medieval Archaeology 2013. In Preparation.
• Webster J. A dirty window on the past: recent developments in the archaeology of Iron Age religion. In: Ritari, K, ed. Methodological Issues in the Study of Celtic Religion. Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2012. In Press.