Olivia DrakePhillip Wagoner, professor of art history and chair of the archaeology program, spoke on "Power, Memory, Architecture: Contested Sites on India's Deccan Plateau, 1300-1600," at Penn State University Park campus April 5. Wagoner discussed his upcoming book of the same title, which focuses on the cultural history of the Deccan region of South India (1200-1600), primarily in the historical interactions between the region’s established Indic culture and the Persianate culture that arrived in the early 14th century. Since 1987, Wagoner has been associated with the Vijayanagara Research Project, an international team of scholars in different disciplines dedicated to documentation and…
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David PesciIn an episode of WNPR’s “Where We Live,” Sarah Croucher, assistant professor anthropology, assistant professor archeology, discusses the upcoming dig at Beman Triangle, a site in Middletown, Conn. that was the center of the city’s African American community in the 19th and early 20th century.
Q: Debbie, you’re the administrative assistant for the Archaeology Program, Medieval Studies Program and the Classical Studies Department. Anything else?! A: In October 2010, I was given a promotion and added the responsibility of also working for the English Department and Writing Workshop in the new Downey House operations support system. At times it is a bit challenging, but I am good at managing my time and priorities so the work gets done in a timely fashion. I wear many different hats and wear them well. Q: How many years have you worked for Wesleyan, and in what departments? A: I have…
The Middletown Materials: Archaeological Analysis class (ANTH 227) presented their final projects May 5-7 in the new Cross Street Archaeology Lab. The class was taught by Sarah Croucher, assistant professor of anthropology, assistant professor of archaeology, assistant professor of feminist, gender and sexuality studies. "The class has been doing fantastic work on beginning to reexamine archaeological contexts explored in the late 1970s by Professor Stephen Dyson and students," she says. "They’ve had a tough job as the first class to begin working with this material, but have been making great progress with the artifacts and with working on associated archival…
As an archaeologist investigating 19th century sites in Zanzibar and Tanzania, it was impossible for Sarah Croucher to ignore the thousands of shreds of locally-produced and imported ceramics unearthed every day of excavations. For archaeologists, these materials are vital to interpreting the social history of 19th century Islamic colonialism in East Africa. "Many key questions remain uninvestigated, particularly in regard to how newly shared Zanzibar identities emerged during the 19th Century, which intersected with gender, religion, class and sexuality," Croucher explains. Croucher, assistant professor of anthropology, assistant professor of archaeology, assistant professor of feminist, gender and sexuality studies, has been…
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In Introduction to Archaeology, all students were trash-talking their first assignment. Titled "Understanding Garbage - Research and Analysis," the laboratory project helped students understand ways archeologists collect and analyze data by rummaging through rubbish and taking note of their findings. (more…)