About
I am a master's student in Anthropology with over 8 years of experience in professional archaeology, including many projects with local communities. My archaeological experience includes working in 13 different states in the US (most recently in Oregon), as well as Tanzania, East Africa. The most rewarding work I have done has probably been working with Navajo communities on Navajo Nation land in New Mexico and Arizona. I believe that history and the past are powerful things, and that as humans we have a right to have a say in our own heritage - no one person owns the past, we all do! With this belief, I have made community engagement a focus of my work and career goals as an archaeologist and anthropologist. Specifically, I am interested in using ethnography - or cultural anthropology - to further understand what different people think should be done with archaeological sites and other historic areas. As scientists, I think it is our duty to use rigorous methods and theory to understand people's thoughts and feelings (instead of just assuming we know what people want out of us, or haphazardly conducting interviews with no outlined methods), because otherwise we abandon the scientific method which we were all educated to follow. I believe this philosophy & approach could be applied to many different kinds of science, but I chose to use my experience working with the public and doing archaeology to address this issue in my own field!
Joined
March 2016
