More of a ‘Sieg Heil’ Than a Question…

Just after insurrectionists attempted to take over the Capitol last week, a professor of archaeology did the Nazi salute during a plenary session at the Society for Historical Archaeology’s virtual meeting.

“Sieg heil, you,” said Robert Schuyler, associate professor of archaeology at the University of Pennsylvania, raising his hand in the Nazi salute, as seen in a clip of the incident circulating on social media.

Schuyler, who was in plenary’s virtual audience, targeted panelist Liz Quinlan, a Ph.D. candidate at the University of York in Britain, after she declined to entertain questions from him about society membership rates. She deemed the questions unrelated to her comments on creating accessibility documents for the conference, according to a public account of what happened from independent bioarchaeologist Kristina Killgrove. Quinlan had not finished her remarks but Schuyler continued to interrupt her.

“I’m sorry, but I have freedom of speech and you’re not going to tell me that it’s not the place for me to bring this up,” Schuyler said prior to his salute.

Schuyler, who did not respond to a request for comment, was apparently accusing Quinlan of being dictatorial for not letting him speak during her own plenary. Giving administrators the Nazi salute, with similar intent, cost an assistant professor of business at Housatonic Community College in Connecticut his job in 2019.

Schuyler’s comments, directed at a younger, female colleague on the same day as the historic siege on the U.S. government -- where some rioters wore pro-Holocaust slogans -- are arguably more shocking.

While the incident happened Wednesday evening, it was not widely known until over the weekend. On Saturday, Kathleen D. Morrison, Schuyler’s department chair, tweeted, “I just found out about this, and I’m appalled at this behavior. As department chair, I will do my very best to address this. This is not acceptable and not representative of Penn anthropology. My apologies on behalf of the department. Please know that we take this seriously.” Morrison also said she was seeking additional information about what happened from those present.

Quinlan, the panelist involved, said on Twitter, “I really appreciate the support I'm getting from people from all corners of my field, and I want everyone to know that I am okay and I have been moving forward with grievance processes with various institutions.” Via email, she said that she was "pleased so far with the action being taken by the SHA," and "cautiously hopeful about the Penn anthropology department taking action."

"Schuyler was attempting to equate my request for him to not derail the plenary session with a generalized oppression of opinions, as a Nazi may do," Quinlan added. 

Killgrove also tweeted, "As archaeologists, we need to stridently condemn what Dr. Schuyler did in this video. There is no excuse for these intimidation tactics, and the fact that he used them on January 6 against a colleague who had just laid bare her precarious identity in this field is horrific.”

Barbara Heath, president of the SHA, said in a statement that the organization received a formal complaint on Friday that a member violated the society’s conference code of conduct and standards of behavior, as well as its statement of ethical principles.

“Our policy explicitly bans harassment including any behavior by an individual or group regardless of gender, gender identity and expression, age, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, race, ethnicity, religion (or lack thereof), or any other category,” said Heath, a professor of anthropology at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. “The SHA will not tolerate harassment in any form at any SHA-sponsored events.”

Heath said the video session will be reposted today, minus the offensive content, and promised that future problems will be addressed in a timelier manner. With this being “our first virtual SHA conference, we are continuously learning and improving our process and we want to reinforce our commitment to making SHA a welcoming environment for all.”

Regarding Schuyler, Heath said, “There is no place for such behavior in the SHA. We will continue to work hard to build a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive space for all of our members.” She did not respond to request for comment about Schuyler’s future with the group.

Edward Liebow, executive director of the American Anthropological Association, said that his organization belongs to a cultural heritage coalition with SHA, among others groups, and that Schuyler is a member of the AAA.

Like the society, he said, “we consider his behavior at the virtual panel to have been harmful, disrespectful and unprofessional.” The association’s leaders “just became aware of this incident,” he said Sunday, and they are consulting with the SHA.