University of Leicester

Department Member, Archaeology and Ancient History

Other Affiliations: Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Archaeological Prospection and Virtual Archaeology, Archaeological geophysical prospection
University of Nottingham, Archaeology
SUNY Buffalo, Anthropology

Research Associate / Project Manager

About

I am coordinator and project manager for Tracing Networks programme, managing seven linked research projects based at the Universities of Leicester, Glasgow, and Exeter. I contribute to the intellectual framework of the project, and contribute to the design and implementation of the overarching ontology architecture for all Tracing Networks component projects.

Research Interests:

I am interested in human-environment interactions, the formation of cultural soilscapes, soil as material culture, households/communities and the role of soils in archaeological research and past societies. To integrate these themes, I combine geoarchaeology and GIS with landscape and relational practice approaches. Ongoing research in Central and South-east Europe includes the role of environmental change in Neolithic communities, the formation of prehistoric soilscapes, and the development of archaeological soil chemistry for intra-site prospection. In addition, I am exploring new ways to conceptualize and apply soil chemistry to archaeological questions and integrate chemistry as a prospection method.

Other interests include the prehistory of the Great Lakes and Eastern Woodlands of North America, remote sensing, lithic analysis, environmental archaeology, archaeological theory, spatial theory, landscape archaeology and the history and philosophy of archaeology.

Current Research Projects:

“Prehistoric environmental mitigation: agrarian settlements and palaeohydrology in Neolithic Hungary.” The current focus of field research is on the relationship between spatial organisation, environmental change and social change during the transition from the Middle to Late Neolithic (ca. 5500-5000 BC) in the Carpathian Basin, funded by the British Academy.

I am working with the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Archaeological Prospection (LBI ArchPro) to incorporate soil chemistry as part of an integrated archaeological prospection approach. The method is being tested in their Kreuttal landscape case-study.

I am also collaborating with the Bronze Age Körös Off-Tell Archaeology (BAKOTA) project, applying soil chemistry and coring to problems of grave identification in Bronze Age cemeteries with mixed burial types and settlements. And, I continue collaboration with the Körös Regional Archaeological Project.

Previous Research:

I completed my PhD thesis in 2010. Using geochemical, geophysical and stratigraphic data, along with a practice theory approach, I examined the structure of small Late Neolithic agropastoralist settlements and compared them to both larger "tell" settlements and to small settlements from the Early Copper Age. Results of this work are forthcoming in Antiquity, the Journal of Material Culture and the Journal of Archaeological Science. I joined the Körös Regional Archaeological Project (KRAP) in 2005, and have continued collaboration with them.

Contact Information