Who I am
I am a bicultural archaeologist, studying the intersection of migration, kinship, placemaking, and resilience of Maya peoples via isotope geochemistry and ancient DNA. I am currently a postdoctoral research scholar in the Department of Anthropology and the Bioarchaeology & Stable Isotope Research Lab at Vanderbilt University.
My research program focuses on how places are made and remembered. In close collaboration with Maya communities in north Belize, I explore Maya persistence and resistance, re-evaluating popular narratives of decline, collapse, and abandonment. Using stable isotope geochemistry, I examine diet, movement, and how pieces of Ancestors’ bodies were removed and reburied to create place. Combing isotopic and genomic data, I consider kin-making practices to assess how memory transcends time and space to link individuals, communities, and generations.
In addition to my academic research, I am also highly proficient in leadership, community engagement and outreach, project management, grant proposal writing, budget management, public speaking, and disseminating complex information to general audiences.
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