Ed is a geoarchaeologist who uses methods and theories developed in the geosciences to study archaeological questions. His training and research is multidisciplinary in nature and straddles the fields of anthropology, archaeology, history, geology, and earth science.
Such work provides data relevant to understanding the chronology and environmental contexts specific to archaeological site occupational histories. Ed has been involved in archaeological projects in Illinois, Indiana, Montana, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Wyoming, as well as in Germany and Tanzania.
He had the opportunity for hands-on experience with Old World lithics, Roman-era artifacts and fieldwork, and cave excavations. These experiences have helped him understand that museum research includes a broad range of scientific disciplines and a wide variety of collections-based questions.
Although much of Ed’s research focuses on early North American hunter-gatherers, he has experience in Native American mound construction methods, chronologies, and taphonomy (the study of differential preservation of or within archaeological sites).
These experiences gave Ed the opportunity to work with a variety of people including Indigenous communities from a wide range of cultures.
I am currently working on a long-term project focused on deciphering the post-glacial geomorphology of Indiana’s White River Valley in order to understand how terrace and floodplain evolution has affected the visibility of late Pleistocene and early Holocene archaeological sites.
My fieldwork includes teaching field schools, studying prehistoric landscape use, geomorphology, lithic tools and archaeological site predictive modeling.
Research interests:
- Geoarchaeology, geomorphology, landscape analysis, settlement distributions, GIS, lithic analysis, Paleoindian archaeology, hunter-gatherers, predictive modeling, fermented foods and beverages.
Geographical areas of specialization:
- North America, American Midwest.
Research Interests:
- geoarchaeology; sedimentation and stratigraphy; deposition and geomorphology in fluvial systems
