Tell us a little bit about yourself.
I grew up in Lethbridge, and have never NOT been in school (so this year marks Grade 45 for me). I have always been interested in ancient societies, and I always wanted to be an archaeologist. I still remember the excitement I felt watching Raiders of the Lost Ark for the first time, and my most recent book is named in reference to that film (Readers of the Lost Ark: Imagining the Ark of the Covenant from Ancient Times to the Present.
I started at the University of Lethbridge at the kindergarten that used to be on campus, in a temporary building in the E Parking Lot. It was the kindergarten during the day and the students’ union pub at night. I left Lethbridge for graduate school, but returned in 2003 to start teaching when I was close to completing my PhD. Initially, I had planned to come back only temporarily, to replace my mentor, Walter Aufrecht, who was on a one-year medical leave. But I never ended up leaving. I moved back and forth between Geography, History, and Liberal Education until I settled into the position I have now.
How long have you been at ULethbridge, and what do you do here?
Since 2003. I research and teach archaeology in the Department of Geography and Environment and am currently co-chair of that department. My job entails a wide variety of things, and I like to joke that I’m paid to read things I’m interested in and then get other people interested in them as well. More seriously, though, I am a specialist in the Bronze and Iron Age Middle East, especially the languages, as well as the reception of archaeology, and how different communities create meaning from thinking about the past. I also co-direct two archaeological field schools with my colleague Dr. Shawn Bubel, also a ULeth alumna, in Jordan and at Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Shawn and I were undergraduates together and used to go on ULethbridge field schools as students. So, it is great fun working with her now, leading these field schools as the instructors.
What's the best part of your job?
There are lots of great parts of this job. From a research perspective, there is the satisfaction of seeing a new book that I’ve written come out in print or uncovering the remains of an ancient temple that had been buried for 2,500 years (like we did this summer). From a teaching perspective, there is nothing more rewarding than providing students with life-changing experiences. There are so many of these that we offer in our program, from our first-year class where students who have always wanted to take archaeology “find themselves” in the class, to the excitement that comes from unearthing something that no one has touched for 9,000 years (like we do at Head-Smashed-In), or having them sit on a set of stairs that Lawrence of Arabia used as his desk in Jordan.
What do you enjoy doing outside of work?
It isn’t very easy for me to differentiate between work and non-work, which, in my case, is a good thing. I love travelling, and that comes with the job as an archaeologist. And I’m an avid cinephile, but I’ve ended up writing two books and numerous articles on archaeology in the movies. Even my ever-suffering family can’t get a break from these interests. My daughter Lucy knows more about the Ark of the Covenant than is healthy for a 10-year-old, and her handle on Greek mythology is now much better than mine! And my wife, who teaches in the English department, Dr. Elizabeth Galway, and I are finishing up a SSHRC-funded project on how the ancient world is presented in her area of specialization, children’s literature.