Geoarchaeology at the University of Kansas

So enough activism for awhile, though I received some encouraging remarks and great advice from my boss, who to my surprise, is very supportive of my educational movement (see previous post).

Now, as you may recall, I hopped on a plane and flew out to the University of Kansas for a graduate school visit on December 1. My visit was amazing and I have never been treated so well! I got in the evening of the first and stayed with two graduate students who were very helpful in telling me what the professors, students, classes, and funding situations were like. I would recommend for every prospective grad student to do this!!!!!

The next morning, my potential geoarchaeology advisor, Rolfe Mandel, picked me up at 8:30 and took me out to breakfast. Rolfe and I hit it off pretty well over bagels as he and I sort of mapped out a masters thesis for me right then and there. The best part was that we bonded over our distrust of a certain geoarchaeologist's methods. Rolfe and I, I think, have a lot in common in the practical way we think about things, in what we get excited about, and how we like to keep busy and active in a variety of projects and disciplines--his being geology, geography and anthropology.

Photo credit: Rolfe examines soil; the hat is a really good look for him.

I examine dune sediments on San Salvador Island; my hat is definitely not as cool.

Rolfe then ushered me over to the Kansas Geological Survey where I met more grad students and several of the geophysicists. Though they are focused mainly on seismic, that have a lot of equipment including a total field magnetometer with GPS, and a resistance meter, both excellent for geoarch and archaeological applications. There is so much KU's anthro department could be doing with this equipment, esp. at the Kanorado site! This hopefully, is where I'll come in.

Later in the morning I met with Department Chair Jim Mielke (who just so happens to know my field school prof. Bob Riordan), visited the collections, and went to a brown bag talk by the two grad students who I stayed with. During the brown bag, I also met archaeologists John Hoopes and Jack Hofman. Jack then took me to get coffee so we could chat. We had an excellent conversation about grad school, prospects for the Kanorado site, and my archaeology merit badge clinics. He left me feeling very encouraged and excited about applying to Kansas.

So everything looks good. Rolfe is really the key for me at Kansas as he is the link between the geologic and archaeologic world. Every other summer he offers a Geoarcaheology field school, something that I haven't found anywhere else. When not working on soils at Kanorado, he works on the geomorphology here at Hopewell Culture National Historical Park, and has also done some really interesting work on Cypurs--Mediterranean Geoarchaeology, yes! I think it's great that he and I have a connection with that part of the world, but I'm ready to settle down in the plains and do geoarchaeology and hopefully geophysics at Kanorado!

But the one question I have is what will it be like studying anthropology and geology in the state of Kansas? What's the big deal about evolution there?

I shall explore this topic in my next post...