Since 2022, Ruben Morales Forte and I have been conducting a slow archaeology program with the heritage community of Dolores, Guatemala. This project stems from co-working with Dolores grassroots archaeologists who invited us to their community. Three years of ethnography have allowed us to interview 52 community members about their rapport with archaeology and their hopes for their cultural heritage. Through this process, we have formed relationships with not only community members, but also with three local institutions: (1) the archaeology museum; (2) an archaeological survey program; and (3) the mayor’s office.

Our slow approach and sustained rapports have been somewhat surprising for the community, but the resulting heart-centered relational web was well worth it. After four years, our Phase 1 is complete and we are ready for the archaeological Phase 2 of the program.

The unusual ethnoarchaeological nature of this program has represented a barrier for securing meaningful funding. Conversely, ethnographic work is fairly unexpensive. And while this research has been incredibly rewarding, it would be hard to conduct for either graduate students or scholars working at research-intensive universities.

Yet, we believe our slow approach is promising and has paved the way for a truly community-led excavation program.

In ‘The Slow Professor,’ Berg and Seeber argue that embracing Slow can help reduce stress, improve research and teaching, and aid in resisting university corporatization. But Slow principles are difficult to put into practice. In this paper we reflect on encounters with animals that serve as embodied metaphors for business-as-usual versus Slow approaches to research and collaboration. In particular, we discuss what we felt and learned from a female moose and her calf, who presented themselves outside the museum windows as we hosted a workshop for Tsattine women and girls. The moose reminded us that adopting Slow principles is not only a matter of individual intentions, but also requires holistic support from the beings around us. For Victoria, the hadaa (moose) created a sense of trust and peace, affirming that we had brought the women and girls together to learn from each other in a good way. The experience was sacred, and reminded her that the workshop was also ceremony. Jessica experienced a profound sense of connection that is difficult to describe. The moose inspired her to reflect on emotionality, spirituality, presence, pace, the need for ceremony, and how archaeological methods and interpretations might change if we acknowledge animal persons.

Avataq Cultural Institute was established in 1980 to protect and promote the cultural heritage of Nunavik Inuit. Inuk archaeologist Daniel Weetaluktuk played a foundational role in documenting Nunavik archaeology and advocating for the active involvement of Nunavimmiut in research. Following his passing in 1981, Nunavik Elders mandated Avataq to develop an archaeology program to protect and preserve archaeological heritage for Nunavik Inuit. The department was created in 1985, marking 40 years of activity in 2025.

Over this period, Nunavik has undergone significant local and regional changes, including expanding infrastructure and increased autonomy of regional organizations. Earlier research collaborations involved communities and academic institutions, with Avataq acting as a bridge and logistical support. While this brought research funding, it sometimes brought conflicting priorities. Today, Avataq’s role is to provide archaeological services according to community and regional needs and wishes. Regional funding opportunities have allowed Avataq to build independent community-driven research initiatives; one such project currently underway builds upon work started by Weetaluktuk more than 45 years ago.

By maintaining control over research quality and data stewardship, Avataq ensures that archaeological and historical knowledge production contributes to the broader objective of reconstructing Nunavik’s past, with results disseminated at regional and local scales.

The Tłı̨chǫ strive to be “strong like two people,” which means that they work to bring together people from diverse perspectives to build a toward the future collaboratively. In this presentation, I detail our process to build out a strong like two research methodology, which unites traditions, communities, Elders, youth, researchers, and language as kindling from which to ignite a fire for teaching and learning. Built from participatory action research, grounded theory, collaborative research paradigms, and Tłı̨chǫ traditional values, a strong like two research methodology unites people of different backgrounds under a common purpose. Further, it equips research team members with the confidence they need to go out and seek knowledge, returning to the group for collaborative interpretation. While our approach requires the investment of time to establish the fundamentals of a project prior to jumping into direct research questions, this slow start leads to greater relationships, more impactful research practices, and heightened efficiency within a program that centers Indigenous values

Grad student projects take place over short periods of time and might not be what one thinks about when they think of “slow” research. However, our masters' projects are an extension of nearly a decade's worth of community-based work in Medina County, Texas. In this paper, we reflect on our experiences of being stewards of our supervisors (Dr. Patricia G. Markert) community relationships, while also creating our own community connections through participating in community events, and interactions that extend beyond our research into our daily life. One of the projects uses photogrammetry and oral history interviews to understand German-Texan experiences during World War Two as well as the architecture of two settler homes in Quihi, Texas. The other project surveyed St. Dominic's cemetery in D’Hanis, Texas to study how 19th century headstones reflect identity, social, cultural, and artistic trends of the time. In both projects, community members participated in the collection of data and provided vital information. We conclude by reflecting on the ways that our experiences with the community not only shaped and influenced our research but also helped shape us as researchers.

In this presentation, we address a critical and underexplored challenge in heritage preservation: how to ensure that digital representations of cultural heritage remain intelligible and accessible over extremely long time-frames—ranging from 100 to 10,000 years. In the digital realm, bit rot, technological obsolescence, and the loss of contextual information have replaced climate change and human-caused destruction as existential threats to cultural memory. Longtermism is a philosophical perspective that emphasizes our ethical responsibility to positively shape the far future. This perspective intersects with digital heritage through a shared commitment to safeguarding cultural heritage for future generations.  As heritage plays a crucial role in cultural awareness, identity, and revitalization in many parts of the world, its loss would have significant consequences for future societies. We introduce the concept of “reconstructive preservation”—a novel approach that treats digital objects not as static archives, but as artifacts that can be reinterpreted and reconstructed by people in the far future, even if they survive only in degraded form. In addition to advocating for the development of frameworks for the long-term stewardship of digital heritage data, we encourage archaeologists to consider how their work may remain meaningful and impactful beyond their own lifetimes.