Nathan Shelley

Nathan received a BS degree in Anthropology from Arizona State University in 2016. He then went on to complete his MA degree at Eastern New Mexico University in 2019. His MA thesis focused on site formation of two pit structures in northwestern New Mexico. Nathan’s past fieldwork experience includes working in Arizona, New Mexico, Idaho, and Alaska. His dissertation research will focus on explaining hunter-gather behavioral adaptations to environmental change at the Pleistocene-Holocene boundary in central Alaska. He plans to use a combination of geoarchaeological and geospatial techniques to reconstruct landscape and site use as humans initially dispersed to Beringia and settled the region during the terminal Pleistocene and early Holocene. Additionally, Nathan holds broad research interests in behavioral and natural site formation processes, hunter-gather archaeology, XRF/XRD, lithic analysis, geomorphology, and human mobility. In addition to working in Alaska, Nathan is actively involved in projects in both New Mexico and South America.