John M. Marston
Professor of Archaeology and Anthropology
Office: STO 345F, 675 Commonwealth Ave.
(617) 353-2357
marston@bu.edu
Departmental Website: www.bu.edu/archaeology/profile/marston/
Curriculum Vitae
PhD, University of California, Los Angeles, 2010
Areas of interest
Environmental archaeology; Sustainability and resilience; Agricultural risk management; Archaeology of the Mediterranean, Near East, and central Asia; Ecological and social theory; Plant ecology; Archaeological science; Writing pedagogy
Excavations & Field Work
An environmental archaeologist, John M. Marston studies the long-term sustainability of agriculture and land use, especially in the Mediterranean and western Asia. His research focuses on how people make decisions about land use within changing economic, social, and environmental settings, and how those decisions affect the environment at local and regional scales. A specialist in paleoethnobotany, the study of archaeological plant remains, Marston’s contributions to the field include novel ways of linking ecological theory with archaeological methods to reconstruct agricultural and land-use strategies from plant and animal remains. Recent interdisciplinary collaborations focus on comparative study of cultural adaptation to environmental and climate change in the past and present. His current field projects include work at two urban centers in Turkey (Kerkenes and Gordion) and one in Israel (Tel Shimron). Marston’s recent research has been funded by the US National Science Foundation, Council of American Overseas Research Centers, American Philosophical Society, American Research Institute in Turkey, and Boston University.
