Assistant Professor of anthropology and geology Suzanne Pilaar Birch had a dilemma. She’d just been offered her grant-funded fieldwork opportunity in Cypress, yet her son’s birth was just three months away. Was it safe? Were their other women scientists who had worked in the field while expecting? She turned to her co-created site, Trowelblazers, that both celebrates past and present archaeologists, paleontologists, and geologists and educates future scientists and the public about their contributions. It now provides a social network, too.

One of Sammantha Holder’s research projects is her bioarchaeological engagement with massed remains of Napoleon's Grand Army soldiers and troop followers who were killed at once by the brutal onset of the Lithuanian weather while attempting an invasion of Russia. This work is featured in Archaeology magazine.

Click here to read the article.

The official blog of SMASH: The Singer-Moye Archaeological Settlement History Project. Investigations of a Mississippian town, in the lower Chattahoochee River valley is updated by Assistant Professor Jennifer Birch, who is running the 2017 field school. Keep up with the team's progress as it happens on the blog itself: http://bit.ly/2sVmjuk

Associate Professor Laura German (center, with flag) has just returned from teaching a course at the International Center for Land Policy Studies and Training in Taoyuan, Taiwan. The one-week course, entitled, “Situating the Local in Land Relations,” was part of a one-month course on Land Policy for Sustainable Rural Development for professionals from 31 countries.

Faculty member Mark Williams now holds emeritus status within the department. He remains director of both the university’s archaeology laboratory and the Georgia Archaeological Site File.

Bioarchaeologist Laurie Reitsema (right) recently shared with Athens community participants the research findings made following the discovery of a local cemetery where slaves had been interred. The project began when the unmarked graves were discovered during the Baldwin Hall reservations in 2015. She shared the DNA results of those individuals whose remains could be tested among the 105 burials. Reitsema said further historical and bioarchaeological work could be done to learn about those buried, but distributed a survey measuring opinions among the listeners.

Colonial and Native Worlds Field School 2017 (section one: 5/8-6/2; section two: 6/5-6/30, or combined)

University of Georgia Anthropology graduate student, Sammantha Holder, sheds new light on the surprisingly complex dietary—and social—diversity among Napoleon’s armed forces. In addition to details on her reconstructive, and tragic, research, this piece offers an excellent overview of how isotope dating analysis is done. This knowledge can be applied in any course, reading, or television show you encounter.

Read More Here.

From the UGA communications team: writer, Elizabeth Elmore; photographer, Dorothy Koslowski

Fourteen students, mentored by anthropology faculty members, presented their original research at the 2017 CURO symposium held at the Classic Center April 3 and 4. The Honors program helms the Creating Undergraduate Research Opportunities (CURO) program each year.