Above: Just a few of more than one thousand obsidian artefacts sourced from Lusakert-1 cave

I am a Marie Curie Experienced Research Fellow in the University of Sheffield's Department of Archaeology as part of the EU-funded New Archaeological Research Network for Integrating Approaches to Ancient Material Studies in the Eastern Mediterranean (or "NARNIA") project. I earned my doctorate in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota, where I was subsequently a lecturer in the Department of Anthropology and a postdoctoral research associate in the Department of Earth Sciences. I am also the current president of the International Association for Obsidian Studies, which is affiliated with the Society for American Archaeology.

I am particularly interested in natural resource access, exchange, and use at varied scales (from the supra-regional to household levels) as well as organisation of space, context of production, and human-environment-landscape interactions. My interests also include the development of cities and states, hunter-gatherer mobility and interactions, technological choices, geographical gateways, landscape and environmental archaeology, experimental and phenomenological approaches, and material culture in general. My principal focus is Southwestern Asia, including Northern Mesopotamia (Bronze Age), the Eastern Mediterranean (Bronze Age), and the South Caucasus (Palaeolithic Period to Bronze Age). I have also sought to develop local projects, including studying obsidian exchange and native copper technology in the American Midwest and identifying activity areas at British Isles archaeological sites.

Below: Non-destructive sourcing of Armenian obsidian artefacts in the field laboratory

Updated: December 2012