My research focuses on Archaic period hunters and gatherers in the Green River Valley of Kentucky. These sites are commonly referred to as the Green River Shell Mound Archaic (SMA), although many contain little to no shell. Many of these sites were initially excavated during the WPA era in the 1930s and 1940s by William S. Webb and others. I am interested in taking these collections and implementing isotope chemistry to further study the paleoenvironment. Currently I am looking at unexcavated shell middens in Henderson County, Kentucky. I am also interested in further examining gender and sex relations as related to subsistence strategies in the egalitarian hunter-gatherer groups, focusing mainly on hunting, fishing, and shellfish gathering, by looking at secondary indicators such as human-dog pair burials and the presence of auditory exostoses. 

Department of Anthropology, University of Kentucky, Advisor: George Crothers