Gabriel Wrobel
Assistant Professor of Anthropology
Department of Sociology and Anthropology
P.O. Box 1848
University, MS  38677-1848

Phone: 662-915-6544
Office: Leavell 209
E-mail:



Biography:
I moved to Oxford and began teaching at the University of Mississippi in 2002 as a visiting professor and was promoted to assistant professor in 2004 after completing my dissertation at Indiana University.  My dissertation research focused on the use of dental traits to determine genetic relationships between ancient Maya populations.  My research specialty is bioarchaeology, which uses biological data from skeletons to test archaeological hypotheses.  While most of my research has focused on ancient Maya contexts in Belize, I have also worked in the American Southeast and in Egypt at the site of Hierakonpolis where I discovered among other things the world's oldest known hairpiece! (see "The Archaeology of Vanity").  I play cello in the community orchestra and enjoy traveling whenever possible.

Research:
Currently, I am a co-director of the Belize Valley Archaeological Reconnaissance Project and supervise excavations focused on rockshelters in the Caves Branch River Valley in Central Belize. This research is conducted as part of a summer archaeological fieldschool through the University of Mississippi Study Abroad program in conjunction with the Belize Institute of Archaeology.  The excavations and analyses conducted so far show that Ancient Maya communities used these sites for various ceremonial and mortuary purposes over a span of approximately 2000 years.   Furthermore, the changes over time in the rituals performed at these rural rockshelters closely parallel other transitions evident at larger urban ceremonial centers throughout the Maya region.  For this reason, these sites are important in characterizing the effects of large-scale sociopolitical transformations on ancient Maya communities.  The data derived from small rural agrarian contexts such as these rockshelters will provide a different perspective than that of the larger urban centers at which most archaeological investigations are focused.

Publications:

Wrobel, Gabriel (Nov 2007) Issues Related to Determining Burial Chronology by Fluoride Analysis of Bone from the Maya Archaeological Site of Chau Hiix, Belize. Archaeometry 49(4).

Metcalfe, Jessica Z., Christine D. White, Fred J. Longstaffe, Gabriel Wrobel, and Della Collins Cook (in press) Hierarchies and Heterarchies of Food Consumption: Stable Isotope Evidence from Chau Hiix and the Northern Belize Region. To appear in Latin American Antiquity.

Danforth, Marie Elaine, Gabriel Wrobel, David Swanson, and Carl Armstrong (in press) A Model Growth Curve for Juvenile Age Estimation Using Diaphyseal Long Bone Lengths among Ancient Maya Populations. To appear in Latin American Antiquity.

Danforth, Marie Elaine, Keith P. Jacobi and Gabriel D. Wrobel (Nov 2007) Health and the Transition to Horticulture in the South Central U.S. In Ancient Health: The Skeletal Indicators of Economic and Political Intensification, edited by M. N. Cohen and G. Crane-Kramer. Gainesville: University of Florida Press.

Wrobel, Gabriel, James Tyler, and Jessica Hardy (2007) Rockshelter Excavations in the Caves Branch River Valley. Research Reports in Belizean Archaeology, Vol. 4, edited by John Morris and Jaime Awe, pp. 187-196. National Institute of Culture and History, Belmopan, BZ.

Andrea Cucina, Vera Tiesler, and Gabriel D. Wrobel (2005) Afinidades Biologicas y Dinamicas Poblacionales Mayas Desde El Preclasico Hasta El Periodo Colonial. Los Investigadores do la Cultura Maya 13, Tomo 2: 560-567.

Wrobel, Gabriel (2004) The Benefits of an Archaeology of Gender for Predynastic Egypt. In Ungendering Civilization, edited by K. A. Pyburn. New York: Routledge Press, pp. 156-178.

Wrobel, Gabriel, Marie Danforth, and Carl Armstrong (2002) Estimating Sex of Maya Skeletons by Discriminant Function Analysis of Long Bone Measurements from the Protohistoric Maya Site of Tipu, Belize. Ancient Mesoamerica 13: 255-263.

Wrobel, Gabriel (2001) Deeds of the Disturbers: Mortuary Practices at the Predynastic Cemetery HK43, Hierakonpolis, Egypt. Nekkhen News, Vol. 13, pp. 11-12.


Courses Taught:
Anth102:  Introductory Archaeology and Physical Anthropology
Anth304:  Biological Anthropology
Anth308:  Archaeology of Death and Burial
Anth390:  Bioarchaeology Abroad
Anth391:  Archaeological Field Session Abroad
Anth504:  Human Osteology
Anth607:  Graduate Seminar in Biolocultural Anthropology