Laura Steele
Research  |  2020-21

Argentina

Fulbright US Student Research Award Recipient

Research Project Title: "Foodways, Community and Identity in Spanish Colonial Argentina: An Archaeological Approach"

Laura Steele Laura Steele received a Fulbright Research Award in Argentina. She is a PhD student in Anthropology. Ms. Steele's project will address how Indigenous communities on the margins of an empire actively navigated the dramatically changing world around them and maintained their identity through their foodways. Laura is interested in the long-durée of Indigenous communities as they persisted and renegotiated their identities along the imperial-borderland. This proposed project will establish a comparative case study to complement the work done in the north and examine how, over two centuries, the more mobile and less complexly organized southern Indigenous people, navigated Spanish imperialism that began in the mid-16th century. She has received strong support from Dr. Adolfo Gil and Dr. Gustavo Neme, researchers at the Argentinian National Scientific & Technical Research Council for her research project. Her faculty mentors include Dr. Carla Sinopoli, Dr. Emily Jones, Dr. Keith Prufer, and Dr. Les Field.