Professor and Curator Emeritus Lovis continues his long-standing relationship with the Department of Anthropology. Lovis’ research explores the relationship between human economic adaptation and mobility, and changing Holocene environments in the Great Lakes region, northern England and Europe, primarily among hunter-gatherers and transitional horticulturalists. He brings a fundamentally interdisciplinary approach to this inquiry, primarily in concert with the biological and earth sciences, and is a strong proponent of ethnographic analogy to refine archaeological interpretation of early hunter-gatherers. Analytically, this multidisciplinary perspective includes collaborative experiments on carbonized food residue formation and interpretation of resultant isotope signatures to track the transition from hunting and gathering to horticulture in the Great Lakes, and with colleagues explores the taphonomy of Freshwater Reservoir Offsets and their effect on carbonized residue ages. He harbors an abiding interest in applied theory and method, especially as it relates to research design. Dr. Lovis has substantial experience in public policy, particularly surrounding repatriation nationally and internationally, as well as forensic applications including human remains investigations and law enforcement training.

Dr. Lovis continues his multidisciplinary, multi-institutional research into the formation and preservation of stratified archaeological sites within the dynamic coastal dune settings of Lake Michigan. He and colleagues recently published (2019) a National Park Service Technical Report (No 145) on Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, and collaborates on development of a tree ringed based regional climate model. He continues to engage in research from a decade of fieldwork on Mesolithic sites in Yorkshire with colleagues at The Lithic Microwear Research Laboratory, Leeds, UK, with which he is affiliated. Dr. Lovis has held numerous elected and appointed offices in professional organizations and currently sits on the Anthropology Steering Committee of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, is the recipient of the 2011 Distinguished Career Award from the Midwest Archaeological Conference, and the 2022 Merit Award from the Michigan Archaeological Society. He was Inaugural Editor (2017-2020) for the Midwest Archaeological Perspectives monograph series, co-sponsored by the Midwest Archaeological Conference, Inc. and the University Press of Notre Dame. He continues to lead research and publication efforts on a pre-Columbian mummy repatriated to the Plurinational State of Bolivia.

Professor and Curator Emeritus Lovis continues to work with students, and assists student research in the Archaeological Science and Experimental Archaeology laboratory.

I am research active (2021) as project lead, co-investigator, or collaborator. I am PI on the Hipwater Parkhill Paleoindian Locale Project. I coordinate the interdisciplinary, inter-institutional analysis of a 15th c CE Andean mummy, including an article submitted to Textos Antropologicos, collaboration on maize genetics, and funerary beads. I am lead on National Park Service Technical Report No 145 (2019) on federally managed sites at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, and co-investigator on research exploring northern hemispheric climate drivers for dune activation. I am coauthor on dendrochronological and climate research for northern Lake Michigan including an article in Climate Research, a recent comment in American Antiquity, and am coauthor on a Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology article documenting Cucurbita pepo ssp. pepo from the Detroit River. I am also conducting analysis on a pair of modified wolf jaws from the Saginaw drainage. I continue my carbonized ceramic residue/FRO, and collaborative Mesolithic research, the latter including a recent coauthored book chapter. My independent interests involve detailed analysis of E. Leacock’s field notes from her 1950s work with the Montagnais/Naskapi of Labrador.