James Sugrue

James Sugrue on location at Stonehenge

I decided to study archaeology at Bournemouth University (BU) as I have always been fascinated about how things happened in the past.

I really enjoy being and working outside and I wanted to be able to gain a better understanding of the development of our environment and landscape. I chose BU as I was really impressed by the friendliness of the staff and the range of specialist facilities available.

During my degree there have been lots of fantastic fieldwork opportunities on offer, and fieldwork has played a large part in my degree. My placement was on the excavation of a prehistoric settlement site in Finland, a great experience as I worked with students from around the world. I loved working with the Finns and getting to understand their culture. My placement really helped with my academic work as well, and gave me an insight into the subject I could never have got from books alone.

I also volunteered for five weeks with the Stonehenge Riverside Project where I was out every day surveying the landscape and training and working with other students and volunteers. This linked really well with my dissertation where I analysed new environmental archaeological material from the Stonehenge area. Being part of a major research project has meant that my dissertation work has now been presented at a national conference.

I have really enjoyed my BSc Archaeology degree, and I never expected to be able to cover such a wide variety of subjects. Whether it has been landscape archaeology, material culture or human evolution I think that above all it is the passion that the lecturers at Bournemouth have for their subject that has really inspired me.