I am an anthropological archaeologist whose scholarship examines foodways and histories of landscape stewardship through time. Much of my work focuses on understanding the relationships between cultural keystone species and past people, with a goal of using archaeological methods and data to support people and places today. I use paleoethnobotanical, geoarchaeological, and computational tools to answer these questions. My interests in human-environment dynamics extend to understanding past built environments. I also have research interests in the architectural signatures of past Columbia-Fraser Plateau places and employ feminist, Indigenous, and agency-focused lens’ to reframe past and present discussions on regional household archaeology and non-residential past structures.
Alyssa Colan comes to Oregon State University from Phoenix, Arizona, with a decade of experience in Cultural Resource Management as a professional archaeologist. Her work in the Southwest has included data recovery, survey, construction monitoring, report writing, and laboratory management, with a focus on the archaeology and cultures of the Phoenix Basin. She is pursuing her M.A. in Applied Anthropology at Oregon State. Her research explores gender archaeology, particularly the identification of gendered spaces in the Pacific Northwest, using soil analysis to better understand daily life in the past and to uncover the environmental contexts of these spaces. Alyssa’s hobbies include watching anime, playing Dungeons & Dragons, PC gaming, hiking, reading, and spending time with her best buddy, a bearded dragon named Calcifer.
Brian Cox is currently a Masters student at Oregon State University. Brian is interested in the long-term relationships that people form with plants and the landscape around them. Brian’s hope to employ macro and micro-botanical analyses of ancient plants within frameworks of historical ecology and ethnoecology to deepen our understandings of people’s interactions with plants through time, with a goal that this information can support equitable and just resource management.
Paris Franklin is a PhD student and cultural resources management (CRM) archaeologist. She received her B.A. in Anthropology from Pacific Lutheran University in 2018 and her M.A. in Anthropology from the University of Wyoming in 2023. Paris has participated in and led various archaeological projects around the American West. Her research interests include collaborative and Indigenous-centered archaeology, human-plant interactions, and lithic technology. Paris is always trying to learn new skills that improve her understanding of the past in order to help communities in the present meet their goals. Paris is also passionate about teaching anthropology at the undergraduate level.
Grace Hunt is an undergraduate studying Zoology at Oregon State University. She is interested in zooarchaeology and currently is aging archaeological salmonids through growth ring analysis of vertebrae for her Honors College Thesis. In addition to zooarchaeology, Grace is interested in fisheries and conservation management in the Pacific Northwest.
Loren Lombardo is an MS student in applied anthropology. They are interested in utilizing paleobotanical and geoarchaeological methods as well as ancestral knowledge to understand Indigenous land stewardship and environmental variability.
Former Students
Aaron Gaswick completed a Bachelor's of Science in Anthropology with the Archaeology option at Oregon State in 2025. He is interested in the Peopling of the Americas, Precontact Archaeology of the Pacific Northwest, Paleoethnobotany, and Experimental Archaeology. Aaron was the Treasurer of the Archaeology Club at Oregon State and in his free time he likes to go hiking, camping, or to knit with his cat. He now works as a paleoethnobotanist.
