Eleanor Harrison-Buck is an associate professor of anthropology at the University of New Hampshire. She received both her M.A. and Ph.D. in Archaeological Studies from Boston University. Since 2011 she has directed the Belize River East Archaeology (BREA) project in Belize, examining over 10,000 years of history and human-environment interaction in the Lower Belize River Watershed. Her work focuses on the ancient Maya and colonial periods, and her research interests include social identity, material relations, political economy and power. As a theoretically-oriented archaeologist, her research engages relational perspectives, Indigenous ontologies and local knowledge to provide new ways of thinking about pre-Hispanic and colonial material culture. She has authored numerous articles and book chapters and is the co-editor of the book Relational Identities and Other-than-Human Agency in Archaeology (University Press of Colorado, 2018). Working with local partners she spearheaded the development of the Crooked Tree Museum and Cultural Heritage Center that opened in 2018, which features the results of BREA investigations on the deep history of the lower Belize River Watershed.
Email: e.harrison-buck@unh.edu

Marieka Brouwer Burg is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Vermont. She earned her PhD from Michigan State University where she conducted landscape-based, paleoenvironmental research and geospatial analyses focused on hunter-gatherer land use strategies in the Post Glacial Netherlands. Since 2011, Marieka has served as the GIS specialist and co-lab director on the BREA project; her research has focused on using geospatial analyses to understand human-environment relationships from the Archaic through Contact periods. She is currently the PI of the NSF-sponsored project “Investigating Adaptive Strategies in Variable Environments” (NSF Award 2120534), which is evaluating a wide range of hyper-local adaptations and the localized impacts of climate change during the Archaic period. This research, ongoing in collaboration with Dr. Harrison-Buck, focuses on multiple ecological zones in and around Crooked Tree Island in northern Belize through multidisciplinary means, including paleoecological analyses, surveys and test excavations, materials and geospatial modeling, and radiometric dating.
Email: mbrouwer@uvm.edu

In 2012, David Buck completed his doctoral degree in Interdisciplinary Ecology at the University of Florida and is currently the Associate Director of the Shoals Marine Laboratory, jointly managed by Cornell University and the University of New Hampshire. On the BREA project, David directs the archaeological reconnaissance and leads our paleoecological research, examining the different habitats and human-environment interactions to better understand the paleoenvironments and past subsistence practices along the Belize River and its tributaries.  He offers his expertise in understanding the many aquatic ecosystems (wetlands, rivers, cenotes, and pools) that abound in the BREA study area and the fisheries and other resources these water bodies provide for both the past and present occupants.
Email: David.buck@unh.edu

Jessica Craig is a Full-Time Instructor at Central New Mexico Community College in Albuquerque. She earned her PhD in anthropology from the University of Kansas. Her dissertation research focused on ritual behavior at the site of San Bartolo, Guatemala, in the time leading up to the Maya collapse. Her research interests include ceremonial practice, social memory, landscape archaeology, and ceramic analysis. Craig joined the BREA team in 2016. She has served as Operation Director and Director of Excavations on the project. As a faculty member at CNM, she has helped to launch the college’s new Latin American Studies program and the study abroad program in Guatemala.
Email: Jcraig15@cnm.edu

Adam Kaeding received his Ph.D. in Archaeological Studies from Boston University in 2013, with a specialization in Maya cultural survival under the circumstances of Spanish colonialism in Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula. He has experience excavating, surveying and mapping precontact Native American, Early American, and British and Spanish Colonial sites in the U.S.; Prehispanic and Colonial Maya sites in Guatemala, Belize and Mexico; and Middle Bronze Age -Greek/Roman occupation in Northern Syria. He is a Senior Archaeologist and Archaeology Manager at The 106 Group in Saint Paul, MN. On the BREA project, he serves as the Survey co-Director and also directs the historical archaeology on the project, documenting British and Spanish Colonial period sites in the study area.
Email: AdamKaeding@106group.com

Dr. Satoru Murata received a B.S. in Physics from Kyoto University in Japan, a B.A. in Anthropology from State University of New York, Stony Brook, and a Ph.D. in Archaeological Studies from Boston University, with a specialization in Maya archaeology. He has participated in the Belize River East Archaeology (BREA) project since the project began in 2011.His interests include ancient craft production and technology, as well as modern technology employed in the field of archaeology, such as GIS, remote sensing, and data visualization. For the BREA project, he leads the survey and mapping components and has recently become involved in mapping and 3D visualization through the use of Total Station Data (TDS)and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), otherwise known as drones.
Email: satorumurata@gmail.com

Brian Norris serves as lead consultant on survey for the BREA project, establishing the protocol for the GPS and Total Station mapping components of the project.  He oversees field survey techniques, documentation procedures and land records research.  He is involved in survey reconnaissance activities and advises on other project logistics. He has an MBA from Husson University, a BS in Surveying Engineering at the University of Maine and an AAS degree for Land Surveying/Forestry from Paul Smiths College of Arts and Sciences. Norris is a Registered Professional Land Surveyor and former Vice President at the James W. Sewall Company where he was responsible for a wide variety of geospatial engineering and mapping projects serving government, forestry, energy, commercial and private sectors. He presently serves as a consultant on a wide range of international and domestic projects, providing expertise in land surveying, mapping, and geospatial applications in forestry, engineering, and archaeology.
Email: 333bnorris@gmail.com

Lori Phillips is currently an archaeology Ph.D. student working with Dr. Erin Thornton at Washington State University. Her research interests include stable isotope analysis, zooarchaeology, and the ancient Maya. Before coming to WSU, she worked on archaeological projects in both South Africa and Central America, but her current research is based in the Maya region. Her M.A. thesis focused on turkey husbandry at the Postclassic site of Mayapán (Yucatan, Mexico) through integrated zooarchaeological and isotopic analyses. As part of a member of the BREA project, her dissertation research is using stable isotope (carbon, nitrogen, and sulfur) and zooarchaeological analyses of faunal assemblages from the Belize River watershed to explore ancient Maya aquatic resource use, specifically how use may have changed during periods of environmental and population stress.
Email: lori.phillips@wsu.edu

Astrid Runggaldier holds a PhD in Mesoamerican archaeology from Boston University. Her interests lie in the rise of the institution of kingship among the Maya and the development of social complexity in early states. Her material culture studies include ancient Maya architecture and household archaeology, examining social memory and the relationship of people and place in urban communities. On the BREA project, she serves as Laboratory co-Director and conducts research on the Preclassic period, the residential components of settlements, and the small finds from excavations. In addition to working with members of the BREA Project, she serves as the Assistant Director for the Mesoamerican Center at UT Austin, manages UT’sArt and Art History Collection ofPre-Columbian artifacts and ethnographic textiles from the Americas, and teaches undergraduate classes in the Department of Art and Art History.
Email: astrid@austin.utexas.edu