Archaeology has long been an important part of BGC’s curriculum, and its range has expanded over the past several years. Faculty study past human life in Africa, China, the Mediterranean and Eurasia, and North America. The subfields of archaeology in which we work draw from and intersect with other disciplines, including anthropology, art history, classics, and history. What unites us is our commitment to multidisciplinary and collaborative work that utilizes an array of material traces in combination with other sources, such as documents and oral histories, to expand our understanding of people in the past, particularly groups neglected or misrepresented in written histories. We are also deeply interested in the relationships between the past, present, and future, and the power and complex implications sites and artifacts have as cultural heritage.

Courses in this area provide students with instruction in archaeological method and theory; hands-on artifact analysis; critical approaches to history, heritage, material culture, and ecology; and archaeological digital technologies, visualization, museum display, collecting, and collections management. Courses explore topics such as ancient craft and technology, culture contact and change, community and identity, foodways and medicine, trends and tastes in material culture, trade and material exchange, and local archaeology. BGC’s MA Travel Program has offered fieldwork experience at the sanctuary of Apollo in Despotiko, Greece. Faculty-student collaborations have included the Excavating the Empire City Summer School for Undergraduates, as well as Focus Exhibitions, such as Design by the Book: Chinese Ritual Objects and the Sanli tu and its accompanying publication and symposium. BGC has brought innovative archaeological scholars to campus for fellowships, symposia, and talks. Three recent symposia will have books published in BGC’s Cultural History of the Material World series: Exhibiting Africa; Finding the Future in the Past; and Revealing Communities.