Tyler Jo Smith and Dylan Rogers teaching on-site at Dodona, Greece, spring 2019.
As one of the longest standing interdisciplinary programs and majors at UVA, the Interdisciplinary Archaeology Program is a joint venture with core faculty and graduate programs based in the departments of Art and Anthropology. In recent years the number of Archaeology majors has steadily grown, and students frequently double major in Art History, Anthropology, Biology, Environmental Science, History, and Classics. These accomplished students annually receive honors such as Phi Beta Kappa, Harrison Undergraduate Research Awards, Global Internships, and our program’s own Marker-Childs-Pugsley award for fieldwork. Many recent graduates have entered competitive graduate programs in the USA and abroad, or begun careers in Cultural Resource Management, cultural property law, and medicine.
As we bid farewell over the last few years to several recently retired colleagues - John Dobbins (Art), Jeff Hantman and Steve Plog (Anthropology) – we have welcomed Dylan Rogers (UVA PhD 2015), a specialist in water structures and ancient identity, as a Lecturer in Roman Archaeology to the Art Department, and Sonia Alconini as a Professor of Anthropology specializing in ancient Pre-Columbian societies and GIS. Given the collaborative nature of archaeology, it is not surprising that our faculty work directly with UVA students in the field and the lab, including as part of the Kotroni Archaeological Survey Project (Natasha Dakouri-Hild, Art), the Later Zanzibar Archaeology Project (Adria LaViolette, Anthropology), Mapping Byzantine Athens (Fotini Kondyli, Art), Complex Societies in Southeast Turkey (Pati Wattenmaker, Anthropology), Kerameikos.org (Tyler Jo Smith, Art), and Monticello Archaeology (Fraser Neiman, Director). In Spring 2020, we awarded Virtual Fieldwork Fellowships and Digital Internships to current and graduating majors. This highly successful pilot program allowed students to gain field experience and professional training after the cancellation of so many fieldwork projects due to Covid-19.
As we embark upon a new semester we are planning for our Archaeology Brown Bag workshops to take place on Zoom. Please join us and bring a friend! For more information about Archaeology on Grounds and our sponsored events visit: http://archaeology.virginia.edu/.
Tyler Jo Smith, Program Director
Archaeology Program alumna Delaney Mitchell excavating a human skeleton while on field school in Poland, summer 2017.
Gathering of faculty and graduate student alumni at the annual meeting of the Archaeological Institute of America, Washington DC, January 2020: Natasha Dakouri-Hild, Carrie Sulosky Weaver, Tyler Jo Smith, Stephanie Layton Kim, Renee Gondek, Fotini Kondyli.