Sarah Newman is Assistant Professor of Anthropology and in the College. Newman’s archaeological research asks fundamental questions about how humans have interacted with, impacted, and been influenced by their environments.

Newman’s fieldwork projects apply multidisciplinary approaches to long-term uses and reuses of landscapes in Guatemala and in Jordan. The cross-cultural (and cross-environmental) comparisons between those distinct regions provide a testing ground to develop and refine methodologies for documenting, dating, and analyzing ancient agricultural and hydrological terracing, as well as an opportunity to explore how anthropogenic landscape modifications—some still in use by modern farmers—endure across environmental change, collapse, and abandonment.

Newman also specializes in the analysis of archaeological animal remains. She probes the ecological, historical, economic, and symbolic meanings of animals in Mesoamerica by examining dietary, hunting, and game management practices and their ecological impacts.

For more details on her research and publications, please visit her profile page at the University of Chicago.