This course is intended to provide an introduction to archaeological methods and theory in a Mediterranean context, focusing on the contemporary landscape. The class will cover work with museum collections (focusing on the holdings of the Penn Museum), field work and laboratory analysis in order to give students a diverse toolkit that they can later employ in their own original research. Each week, invited lecturers will address the class on different aspects of archaeological methodology in their own research, emphasizing specific themes that will be highlighted in readings and subsequent discussion. The course is divided into three sections: Method and Theory in Mediterranean Archaeology; Museum collections; and Decolonizing Mediterranean Archaeology. The course is designed for new AAMW graduate students, though other graduate students or advanced undergraduate students may participate with the permission of the instructor.

This seminar will prepare students for participation in the excavations at the site of ancient Lagash, modern Tell al-Hiba, in southern Iraq that are scheduled to take place in the fall semester. The topics to be considered are introduction to the recording methods, use of equipment, review of the ceramic sequence, methods of recording, drawing, photography. Permission of the instructor required for participation in the class.

The Museum Internship in the spring consists of a research project with Penn Museum collections based on a proposal designed and approved during the fall AAMW Proseminar. It is offered to, and is a requirement for, first-year AAMW graduate students only.

Independent Study

Independent Study

Pedagogy

Pedagogy

Independent Study

This course introduces students to theory and methodology of the geospatial humanities and social sciences, understood broadly as the application of Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and spatial analysis techniques to the study of social and cultural patterns in the past and present. By engaging with spatial theory, spatial analysis case studies, and technical methodologies, students will develop an understanding of the questions driving, and tools available for, humanistic and social science research projects that explore change over space and time. We will use ESRI's ArcGIS software to visualize, analyze, and integrate historical, anthropological, and environmental data. Techniques will be introduced through the discussion of case studies and through demonstration of software skills. During supervised laboratory sessions, the various techniques and analyses covered will be applied to sample data and also to data from a region/topic chosen by the student.

This seminar series explores many media and kinds of Roman private and public things, images and monuments (and, sometimes, ancient texts about them) in a range of physical and cultural settings, through an interdisciplinary lens. Special topics range between ca. 400 BCE and 800 CE, from the Hellenistic/ Republican age into the Empire and Late Antiquity, using multiple methodological and theoretical approaches to explore the global Mediterranean world, and its interaction with its neighbors in space and time. Modern archaeologies and the museum institution receive critique. The query "what is Roman about Roman art" continually recurs.