The School of Archaeology is keen to attract and support high-quality early career research. The School regularly hosts British Academy Postdoctoral Fellows, Leverhulme Early Career Fellows, Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellows and Newton International Fellows.
BRITISH ACADEMY POSTDOCTORAL FELLOWS:
Dr Charlotte Diffey is a current Fellow, researching 'Plants and Power: The Social Dynamics of Urban Food Production at the Late Bronze Age City of Hattusha', with Prof. Amy Bogaard as mentor.
Dr Huw Groucutt conducted research on 'The Cultural Dimension of Neanderthal-Homo Sapiens Admixture at the Gateway to Eurasia', from 2016 to 2019, with Prof. Michael Petraglia as mentor. He went on to become a research group leader at the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology, on the project Extreme Events in Biological, Societal and Earth Systems.
Dr Rachael Kiddey conducted research on 'Migrant Materialities: The Material Culture of Forced and Undocumented Migrants in Europe', with Dr Lambros Malafouris as mentor, from 2018 to 2022. Following this project, she went on to a Teaching Associate post in Heritage Studies at the Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge.
Dr Samantha Neil conducted the research project 'Reconstructing Lifeways During the Mesolithic and Neolithic in North-west France', with Prof. Rick Schulting as mentor, from 2020 to 2023.
Dr Shyama Vermeersch conducted resarch for a project titled: 'Farming and the rise of wealth inequality in the southern Levant during the Bronze (3,600-1,550 BCE) and Iron Ages (1,550-332 BCE)', with Dr Amy Styring as mentor.
Dr Jade Whitlam's research project, 'Farming before Agriculture: Investigating Variability in Plant Management and Consumption by Western Asia’s Earliest Cultivators', was undertaken from 2018 to 2021 with Prof. Amy Bogaard and Prof. Mike Charles as mentors. Jade went on to a Departmental Lectureship post in the School of Archaeology, University of Oxford.
LEVERHULME EARLY CAREER FELLOWS:
Dr Jacqueline Ortoleva's project 'Sounds of Silence', funded by the Leverhulme Trust (2025-2028) investigates how sound may have informed the designation and continuity of Etruscan landscapes. See the project website here for further detail.
Dr Paul Albert conducted the research project 'Lake Suigetsu and Volcanic Ash, The Key to Synchronising Palaeoclimate Archives', from 2015 to 2018, with Prof. Victoria Smith as mentor. He was then awarded a Future Leaders Fellowship at Swansea University College of Science, studying volcanic ash deposits in marine sediments to improve predictions of future eruptions and their impact.
Dr Lorena Becerra-Valdivia won a Fellowship to research 'The Role of Abrupt Climatic Shifts in the Initial Settlement of South America', with Prof. Christopher Bronk Ramsey as mentor. Lorena moved to the University of Bristol's Department of Anthropology and Archaeology as a Senior Research Associate in 2024.
Dr Tom Brughmans conducted research on 'MERCURY: Simulating the Roman Economy', from 2017 to 2019, with Prof. Andrew Wilson as mentor. He went on to a Marie-Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship at the Faculty of Physics of the University of Barcelona, developing innovative network science methods for archaeological research in general and for the study of the Roman economy specifically.
Dr Jane Kershaw’s research project on 'Britain’s Viking Silver Hoards: An Archaeological Analysis of the Sources and Uses of Silver in Scandinavian Britain (850–1050 AD)', was undertaken from 2017 to 2019, with Prof. Helena Hamerow as mentor. She went on to become Principal Investigator on an ERC Starting Grant at the School of Archaeology in Oxford, with the project Silver and the Origins of the Viking Age.
Dr Danielle McLean carried out a research project on 'Volcanic Ash for Synchronising Archaeological and Climate Records in Northwest Africa' from 2021 to 2024, with Prof. Victoria Smith as mentor. She went on to hold an AHRC Catalyst Award at the School, from 2024 to 2026.
Dr Alexander Weide conducted research on 'Co-Evolution of Social and Agricultural Practices at the Dawn of Farming' from 2021 to 2024, with Prof. Amy Bogaard as mentor. He went on to become Assistant Professor in Environmental Archaeology at the Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge.
MARIE SKŁODOWSKA-CURIE FELLOWS:
Dr Cecilia Dal Zovo's project is 'TRAILS: Tracing Rock Art, Embedded Landscapes of Movement, and Cosmovisions in the Gobi Altai Mountains (Mongolia)', with Prof. Chris Gosden as mentor.
Dr Carolyne Douché conducted research on the project 'GRAMADIF: Do grains make the difference? Plant economies during the development of urban societies in Mesopotamia' from 2022 to 2024, with Prof. Mike Charles as mentor. Carolyne will take up post as a Researcher Coinvestigator on a John Fell Fund grant at the School in 2024-25.
Dr Tanya Dzhanfezova conducted the research project 'Mapping Intentionality: Demonstrating Innovation in Neolithic Pottery Uptake in the Eastern Balkans' from 2018 to 2021, with Mr Chris Doherty and Prof. Amy Bogaard as mentors. She went on to be Associate Professor in Neolithic and Bronze Age Archaeology at St Cyril and St Methodius University of Veliko Tarnovo, Bulgaria.
Dr Juanjo García-Granero conducted the research project 'An Innovative Approach for the Study of Culinary Practices in Past Societies (CUISINE)', from 2017 to 2019, with Prof. Amy Bogaard as mentor. He then commenced a 3-year 'Juan de la Cierva-incorporación' fellowship at the Institució Milà i Fontanals, Spanish National Research Council Barcelona, from January 2020.
Dr Gül Sürmelihindi conducted the research project ‘AQUEA: Ancient Aqueduct Carbonate Deposits as a High-Resolution Archive for the Environment and Archaeology’ from 2021 to 2023, with Prof. Andrew Wilson and Dr Christopher Day (Dept of Earth Sciences) as mentors. She has since returned to a research post in Germany funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG).
Dr Andrés Teira-Brión conducted the research project 'MILLET: Old crops for new insights: agricultural systems of broomcorn and foxtail millet cultivation in Iberia' from 2022 to 2024, with Prof. Amy Bogaard as mentor. He went on to a role as archaeobotanist at Museum of London Archaeology (MOLA).
Dr Tingting Wang's project 'ARCHCROP: Crossing Paths: Millet, Wheat and Cultural Exchanges in the Inner Asian Mountain Corridor, China', with Dr Amy Styring and Prof. Amy Bogaard as mentors.
Dr Alexander Weide conducted the research project 'NICHE - Investigating the Ecology, Composition and Exploitability of Wild Cereal Habitats in Relation to Agricultural Origins in the Near East' from 2019 to 2021, with Prof. Amy Bogaard and Prof. Mike Charles as mentors. He went on to take up a Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship at the School of Archaeology.
NEWTON INTERNATIONAL FELLOWS:
Dr Teresa Fernandez-Crespo conducted research on 'Identity, Social Inequality and Violence in Late Neolithic/ Early Chalcolithic Southwest Europe' from 2018 to 2020, mentored by Prof Rick Schulting. Her project involved using sequential sampling of dentition to trace the early life histories of Late Neolithic to Bronze Age populations in north-central Spain. On completion of her Fellowship, she took up a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship at the Laboratoire Méditerranéen de Préhistoire Europe Afrique (LAMPEA) at Aix-Marseille University, and is currently a Senior Researcher at the University of Valladolid, Spain.
Dr Russell Kapumha undertook the research project 'On missing links and bridging gaps: The Archaeology of Kubiku, a Zimbabwe culture site in Masvingo, south eastern Zimbabwe' from 2021 to 2023, with Prof. Shadreck Chirikure as mentor. He is currently a Researcher on the ERC-funded New Bantu Mosaics project at the School (2024 onwards).
Dr Scott Blumenthal held a British Academy Newton International Fellowship here in 2015-17, for the project Oxygen isotopes in primates and implications for early hominin ecology, followed by a Postdoctoral Fellowship in the School 2017-18. Professor Julia Lee-Thorp acted as his mentor. He is currently Assistant Professor at the University of Oregon
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JUNIOR RESEARCH FELLOWSHIPS AT OXFORD:
Other independent postdoctoral Fellowship opportunities at Oxford are Junior Research Fellowships, which are provided and hosted by Colleges. Recent and current Research Fellows working in the field of archaeology include:
Dr Tom Maltas (Career Development Fellow in European Archaeology at Keble College), is researching Agriculture and the Origins of Urbanism in Western Anatolia.
