Northern Illinois University
Department of Anthropology
College of Liberal Arts and Sciences

Professor Bardolph is an anthropological archaeologist and specialist in paleoethnobotany, the analysis and interpretation of archaeological plant remains to provide information about the relationship between people and plants in the past. Her research broadly focuses on foodways, agricultural production, social life, political change, culture contact, gender, identity, and labor in the ancient world. She employs a comparative, cross-cultural approach and has conducted field and laboratory research in multiple regions, including the Midwestern United States (the area of her current field project), Peru, Mexico, and the Caribbean, to examine the sociopolitical dynamics that underpin human-ecological interactions in New World agricultural societies. She also is interested in the ethical dimensions of archaeological practice and conducts reflexive work on discipline sociopolitics and gender equity issues.

Honors Faculty Fellow (2021-2022)

As an Honors Faculty Fellow, Professor Bardolph will teach a seminar on Indigenous Illinois in spring 2022 in the University Honors Program. The Honors Faculty Fellowship program identifies faculty eager to teach innovative, exciting seminars of interest to highly-motivated students from across the university.

Selected Publications

Wilson, G., D. Bardolph, D. Esarey, and J. Wilson (2019) Transregional Social Fields of the Early Mississippian Midcontinent. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory (in press).

Bardolph, D. (2018) Controlling the Narrative: A Comparative Examination of Gendered Publishing Trends in the SCA and Beyond. California Archaeology 10(2):159–186.

Brown, K., J. Timbrook, and D. Bardolph (2018) “A Song of Resilience”: Exploring Communities of Practice in Chumash Basket Weaving in Southern California. Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology 38(2):143–168.

VanDerwarker, A., D. Bardolph, and C.M. Scarry (2017) Maize in Mississippian Beginnings. In G. Wilson (Ed.), Mississippian Beginnings, pp. 29–71. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, Gainesville.

Bardolph, D., and A. VanDerwarker (2016) Sociopolitics in Southeastern Archaeology: The Role of Gender in Scholarly Authorship. Southeastern Archaeology 35(3):175–193.

VanDerwarker, A., D. Bardolph, K. Hoppa, H.B. Thakar, L. Martin, A. Jaqua, M. Biwer, and K. Gill (2016) New World Paleoethnobotany in the New Millennium (2000-2013). Journal of
Archaeological Research 24(2):125–177. (A)

Bardolph, D. (2014) A Critical Evaluation of Recent Gendered Publishing Trends in American Archaeology. American Antiquity 79(3):522–540.

Bardolph, D. (2014) Evaluating Cahokian Contact and Mississippian Identity Politics in the Late Prehistoric Central Illinois River Valley. American Antiquity 79(1):69–89.

VanDerwarker, A., G. Wilson, and D. Bardolph (2013) Maize Adoption and Intensification in the Central Illinois River Valley: An Analysis of Archaeobotanical Data from the Late Woodland through Early Mississippian Periods (A.D. 400-1200). Southeastern Archaeology 32:147–168.