Area of Interest:

Archaeological method and theory, history of archaeology.
Social and gender archaeology.
Archaeology and nationalism, the state, and politics.
Gender and science, women in scientific professions and society.
Old World prehistory, Paleolithic archaeology, Central and Eastern European archaeology.
Prehistoric imagery, theories of symbolic representation.
Stone tool analysis (low and high-power use-wear).

Education:

B.A.  McGill University 1986.

M.A. Yale University 1988.

M.A. U.C. Berkeley 1990.

Ph.D. U.C. Berkeley, 1995.

Professional Background:

I hold a joint appointment in Women's Studies and Anthropology. I teach courses in both units and I direct a Women in Science program housed in Women's Studies.

Research & Activities:

Research Background:

The focus of my archaeological fieldwork centers on Upper Paleolithic in Central and Eastern Europe, where I did my dissertation work on the sites of Dolni Vestonice/Pavlov and Willendorf. I have also conducted fieldwork in Quebec, France, Italy and Slovakia - most recently in Eastern Slovakia at the sites of Nizny Hrabovec and Cejkov. I studied archival and museum collections in France, Israel and Siberia. Having crossed several borders in my life, I maintain an active interest in the historical context of scientific work in general.

One of my major on-going interests that weaves through all my research and teaching is the history of knowledge production, particularly in archaeology and anthropology.  The principal focus of my work is participation and contribution of women and minorities in these fields.

My research has been funded by the American Council of Learned Societies, the Leakey Foundation, the Mellon Foundation, the School for Advanced Research in Human Experience (SAR) in Santa Fe, NM,  the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Canada, the Wenner-Gren Foundation and the University of North Carolina.

Current Research

A historical and theoretical research project tracing the emergence of the "shaman" as a standard figure in anthropological archaeology. Beginning with 17th and 18th century travel reports from Siberia as a part of a colonizing effort by the Russian Empire, the book Traveling Spirits: The History of Shamans and the Prehistory of Gender will address the portrayal of shamans as a universal, masculine category in anthropology and prehistoric archaeology, using both scholarly and popular literature. This research, funded by the American Council for Learned Societies and grants from UNC, takes me to archives and museums in Siberia, Germany, France and the United States. The book is under contract with the University of California Press.

http://research.unc.edu/endeavors/spr2007/shamans.php

http://wunc.org/tsot/archive/sot0614c.mp3/view

Courses taught:

Archaeology of Sex and Gender

European Prehistory

Feminist Anthropologies

Gender and Culture

History and Theory in Archaeology

Introduction to Women's Studies
Laboratory Analysis: Lithics
Women and Science

World Prehistory

Selected Publications: