Jamie L Clark

Director of Undergraduate Program in Anthropology

Associate Professor

Anthropology: Paleolithic archaeology, human-environmental interaction, hunter-gatherer lifeways, zooarchaeology

I earned a BA in African and Middle Eastern History from Northwestern University and an MA and PhD in Anthropology (Archaeology) from the University of Michigan. Prior to arriving at GMU in 2020, I was a faculty member at University of Alaska Fairbanks.

My research focuses on human-environmental interactions during the Later Pleistocene (~125,000-10,000 years ago). My work is driven by a desire to understand the factors that account for the success and spread of our species relative to the Neanderthals and other archaic human groups. I approach this through the lens of zooarchaeology-- the study of animal remains from archaeological sites. Not only do zooarchaeological data provide information about past environmental conditions, but they also speak directly to human subsistence choices and landscape use. I am engaged in research at a number of sites, including Sibudu (South Africa), Border Cave (South Africa), Mughr el-Hamamah (Jordan), and Sefunim (Israel); this work has been funded by a variety of organizations, including the National Science Foundation, Wenner-Gren, and the Leakey Foundation.

Selected Publications

Slon, Viviane, Jamie L. Clark, David E. Friesem, Meir Orbach, Naomi Porat, Matthias Meyer, Andrew W. Kandel and Ron Shimelmitz. 2022. Extended longevity of DNA preservation in Levantine Paleolithic sediments, Sefunim Cave, Israel. Scientific Reports. 12, 14528. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-17399-2

Stratford, Dominic, Jamie L. Clark, Marine Wojcieszak, Lyn Wadley, Francesco d’Errico, Paloma de la Peña, Christine Sievers, William E. Banks, Thomas Beard, Maryke Horn, Kelita Shadrack, Peter Morrissey, Guilhem Mauran, and Lucinda Backwell. 2022. Geoarchaeology and zooarchaeology of Border Cave, South Africa. initial multiproxy considerations of stratigraphy and site formation processes from the Backwell et al. excavations. Quaternary Science Reviews. 291, 107618. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2022.107618

Schmuck, Nicholas, Jamie L. Clark, Risa J. Carlson and James F. Baichtal. 2022. A Human Behavioral Ecology of the Colonization of Unfamiliar Landscapes. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10816-022-09554-w

Clark, Jamie L. 2019. The Still Bay and pre-Still Bay fauna from Sibudu Cave: taphonomic and taxonomic analysis of the macromammal remains from the Wadley excavations. Journal of Paleolithic Archaeology. 2: 26-73. https://doi.org/10.1007/s41982-019-0021-6