Description: One of three co-organizers of the Zooarchaeology Interest Group since 2025.

"The Zooarchaeology Interest Group (ZIG) is one of ten interest groups offered to SAA members. ZIG focuses primarily on disseminating information and fostering a community in which members interested in zooarchaeology and related disciplines can participate. Regardless of academic or professional standing (Bachelor’s, Master’s, Doctorate, Professor, RPA, etc.), all members are invited to partake and network." (SAA, 2024)

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/395584533965846/

Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/zig-saa.bsky.social

Photo: ZIG logo, credit Jonathan Dombrosky (2024)

Description: Co-chair of the ZIG-sponsored "Fantastic Beasts and How to Resolve Them: Navigating Difficult Assemblages and Other Challenges in Zooarchaeological Practice" symposium at the 2026 SAA Meeting in San Francisco.

Abstract: While “fantastic beasts” belong to myth and legend, zooarchaeologists still encounter very real, often “beastly” challenges in the course of their research. Common obstacles include difficulties with assemblage size and condition (e.g., small sample sizes, poor preservation), working with heritage collections (e.g., documentation, methodological standardization), accessing materials and expertise, obtaining funding, dealing with negative results, and more broadly, balancing the interests of diverse stakeholders. This solution-oriented symposium invites zooarchaeologists to share the challenges they have faced in their own work and discuss approaches they found successful. By fostering an open, communal discussion, we aim to identify common obstacles and exchange potential solutions to taming these “beasts” in zooarchaeological work.

Photo: symposium flier, created in Canva

Description: Co-chair of the ZIG-sponsored "Animal Matters: Ethics in Zooarchaeology from Discovery to Display" symposium at the 2025 SAA Meeting in Denver.

Abstract: Increasingly, ethics are at the forefront of conversations in archaeology; however, the discussion of ethics in zooarchaeology has been comparatively limited, especially in larger, communal spaces like the SAAs. This symposium aims to bring these conversations into focus through the discussion of practical and theoretical ethics in the subdiscipline. Possible topics include the ethics of destructive sampling, live animal actualistic studies, obtaining and curating collections, pets as comparative materials, the emotional experience of the analyst, relational ontologies, anthropocentric versus animal-centric viewpoints, and the broader comparison of animal versus human remains. This session seeks to incorporate diverse and intersectional perspectives to open a dialogue on the current status of ethics in zooarchaeology and directions for the future.

Read our summary of the session in the ICAZ Newsletter (Volume 25, no. 2): https://www.alexandriaarchive.org/icaz/publications-newsletter

Photo: symposium flier, created in Canva

Description: The outreach program is run by graduate students and "provides presentations on a variety of anthropological topics (e.g., archaeology, human evolution, California prehistory). We participate in events during UC Davis Picnic Day and Archaeology Month as well as offer group presentations upon request. We would especially like to invite elementary and high school students in the greater Sacramento area to visit the department for an introduction to anthropology and a private viewing of related collections." (UC Davis Department of Anthropology, 2024)

Website: https://anthromuseum.ucdavis.edu/outreach-program

Photo: the result of atlatl throwing and presenting information on Archaeology to middle school students, photo credit NCS-PACT (2024) and the Anthropology Outreach Program Instagram (2021)

Description: Our team of UC Davis first-year anthropology students competed for the first time in the 2024 SAA Ethics bowl and won!

"The Ethics Bowl is a debate competition...where teams from different universities compete by debating solutions to the ethical dilemmas archaeologists face in our day-to-day lives. Each year, hypothetical cases are developed using real-life experiences and suggestions from academic, CRM, and avocational archaeologists around the world. Ethics Bowl teams then formulate and defend reactions and solutions to these ethical dilemmas using their academic knowledge of numerous ethical guidelines and laws, as well as their personal research and fieldwork experiences." (SAA, 2024)

Article on our win from UC Davis Letters & Science: https://lettersandsciencemag.ucdavis.edu/news-noteworthy/uc-davis-anthropology-team-wins-first-place-ethics-bowl

Photo: the UC Davis ethics bowl team after winning the competition, Ethics Bowl flier (SAA, 2023)

Description: The Petersfelstage (Petersfels days) are a two-day biannual public archaeology celebration hosted at the Magdalenian cave site of Petersfels (Engen, Germany). I presented information on the faunal remains from the last ~100 years of excavation and their value for interpreting human subsistence practices (in German).

Information and Interview: https://www.suedkurier.de/region/kreis-konstanz/engen/speerschleudern-wie-zur-eiszeit-zahlreiche-besucher-erleben-bei-petersfeldtagen-hautnah-geschichte;art372438,11295417

Photo: presenting information on the fauna of Petersfels at the University of Tübingen booth, photo credit Helene Kerle (2022)