My research primarily focuses on the material culture of Egypt and Sudan. Most of my work concentrates on New Kingdom funerary material, though I have also worked with earlier and later Egyptian and Nubian material, both from cemeteries and settlements. My research has a strong theoretical focus. I am especially interested in postcolonial theory, decolonial theory, colonisation through objects, social stratification and power, relations of production, consumption patterns, and how inequalities determine the expression of identities through material culture.

My recent projects include residue analysis of 18th Dynasty canopic jars and kohl containers from Lower Nubia. Analyses of these objects are progressively revealing local patterns of use of Egyptian funerary objects imported to Nubia during the New Kingdom colonial period. I am currently preparing this research for publication and expanding upon  its results to carry out further analysis of samples from Upper Nubia. I am also expanding my previous kohl project into a larger comparative analysis of Kerma Period/New Kingdom kohl containers from Nubia, aiming to understand how these objects were conceived and used locally before and during the Egyptian colonisation of Nubia. I am also currently exploring the application of digital methodologies to Egyptian and Nubian New Kingdom material. All these projects are essentially collaborative, which is something I greatly enjoy.

I am currently co-directing, with Ikhlas Abdellatif, a research project on the 18th Dynasty tomb of Djehutyhotep, chief of Tehkhet (Debeira, Lower Nubia). Due to the flooding of Lower Nubia, the tomb chapel has been relocated from Debeira and reassembled in the courtyard of the Sudan National Museum in Khartoum. The project aims to (1) document the tomb's architectural and artistic features in Khartoum using state-of-the-art techniques, in conjunction with legacy data from excavations in the 1950s; (2) record and study the burial assemblages from the tomb, including scientific analyses; (3) produce a 3D reconstruction of the monument and its archaeological contexts; (4) disseminate knowledge on Djehutyhotep and promote community-led activities towards decolonisation. The project will result in the first all-encompassing publication of this important tomb.

I am Assistant Director of the Sanam Temple Project in north Sudan. At Sanam, I have previously excavated and am currently investigating a Napatan Period faience production workshop located at the rear of the main stone temple. The products of this workshop probably ended up in mortuary contexts of the Napatan Period. I am currently planning, with Kathryn Howley, director of the project, new excavation in the production areas of the temple to determine the full extent of activity carried out at the site.

I am also engaged in fieldwork in Luxor, Egypt, where I have excavated in a series of tombs ranging from the Old Kingdom to the late New Kingdom. These tombs  were reused from the Third Intermediate Period to the Ptolemaic Period. In Egypt, I have also worked at the Great Aten Temple and one of the non-elite cemeteries in Akhenaten's capital, modern-day Amarna. Other fieldwork in Sudan include excavations at a large Kerma cemetery in Ginis East, which served a relatively wealthy provincial community within the Kerma empire of the Middle Bronze Age. I am currently writing up preliminary analises of material from this cemetery for publication and will be contributing later to its final publication.

I am currently in the process of publishing my PhD research, which consists of a fresh interpretation of the role of foreign objects in local contexts in New Kingdom colonial Nubia.

Collaborators

• Dr Kate Spence (Cambridge)
• Dr Ikhlas Abdellatif (National Corporation for Antiquities and Museums of Sudan)
• Dr Kathyn Howley (NYU)
• Prof Julia Budka (LMU Munich)
• Dr Kate Fulcher
• Prof Jonas Bergquist (Uppsala University)
• Ludmila Werkström (Gustavianum Museum, Uppsala University)
• Emma Hocker (Gustavianum Museum, Uppsala University)
• Dr Leonardo Impett (Cambridge Digital Humanities)
• Dr Claudia Rodrigues-Carvalho (The National Museum, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro)
• Prof Violeta Pereyra (University of Buenos Aires)
• Dr Oliva Menozzi (University of Chieti and Pescara)
• Dr Carl Walsh (Barnes Foundation)
• Dr Manuela Lehmann
• Dr Frederik Rademaker (British Museum)
• Prof Marcos Martinón Torres (Cambridge)
• Caterina Zaggia (Cambridge)