Corinne Hofman is professor of Caribbean Archaeology at the Leiden Faculty of Archaeology and the KITLV.

More information about Corinne Hofman

Office days

Corinne Hofman is present at the Faculty of Archaeology on Mondays and Fridays.

Research

I am a professor of Caribbean archaeology with a focus on the Indigenous history and traditional knowledge practices from a long-term perspective.

The indigenous Amerindian past of the Caribbean region is hidden in a vulnerable soil, which is under constant threat of natural disasters, climate change, looting and illegal trade, economic pressures, tourist development, and a lack of heritage awareness. Insufficient effective legislation for the protection of heritage in many of the islands leads to the destruction of archaeological heritage and the loss of knowledge about a crucial episode in global history: the unwritten history of the Indigenous inhabitants, whose descendants were the first to come eye to eye with European colonizers in the Americas.

Until recently, the transformations and responses of Indigenous societies to changing natural, cultural, social, economic, and political environments triggered by European invasion and colonialism were largely unknown. The study of the Caribbean archaeological record and the transdisciplinary research conducted by the ERC-Synergy project NEXUS1492 (2013-2019) has provided fresh insights into these infamous histories and biased narratives by including local and Indigenous voices and perspectives hitherto overshadowed by dominant Eurocentric viewpoints. The CaribTRAILS project, hosted at the Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asian and Caribbean studies (KITLV) and embedded in the Faculty’s research and fieldwork continues to contribute to the objectives and goals of NEXUS1492 with specific emphasis on comparative research, outreach and community engagement.

Through comparative research with regions that have similar colonial histories, CaribTRAILS aims to place Indigenous Caribbean history in a global perspective. The project thereby hopes to contribute to the decolonization of archaeological practice;  human rights of Indigenous peoples and social adaptation to climatic and societal challenges; as well as to issues related to inter-cultural dialogue, social cohesion, and diversity in an increasingly globalized world.

Teaching activities

In 2023-2024 Prof. Corinne Hofman will teach BA (seminar Archaeology of the Americas with focus on the Caribbean and Amazonia), MA (Current issues in the Archaeology of the Americas: The archaeology of climate change in the Caribbean and coastal Americas), and RMA courses (Secret Skills for a Successful Scientist and the RMA weekly thesis seminar Communicating Communities to discuss the current themes in archaeology and heritage of Indigenous peoples in the Caribbean).

Curriculum vitae

Corinne Hofman was Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Archaeology from 2007 to 2013, and Dean from 2013 to 2018. She is professor of Caribbean archaeology with a focus on Indigenous history and traditional knowledge practices of the region. Between 2013 and 2019 she was Corresponding Principal Investigator of the ERC-Synergy project NEXUS1492, together with PI’s Prof. dr. G. Davies (VU, Amsterdam) and Prof. dr. U. Brandes (Uni Konstanz, Germany). The NEXUS1492 exhibition Caribbean Ties has been presented in more than 20 locations in the Caribbean and The Netherlands and is still vividly alive and travelling around. From September 2019, Corinne directs the CaribTRAILS project and since 2021 is one of the three PI’s in the NWO Island(er)s at the Helm project. These projects are embedded in Hofman’s teaching at the Faculty and students participate in internships (Caribbean Ties and museum collection studies in the Caribbean) and in different fieldwork projects led by the Caribbean research team. 

Hofman was awarded the KNAW-Merian prize for ‘Women in Science’ in 2013, the NWO Spinoza prize in 2014, and the Distinguished Lorentz Fellowship in 2018. She is a member of the Royal Holland Society of Sciences and Humanities (KHMW) since 2013, the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences (KNAW) since 2015, the Academia Europaea since 2016, and Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy since 2018. From 2013 to 2018, she was a member of the Netherlands National Commission for UNESCO. In 2022 Hofman was selected as one of the champions for the 10th edition of the EuroScience Open Forum (ESOF). Currently, she is one of the editors of the Brill Series The early Americas and a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Method and Theory, Antiquity Journal and Táboüi.   

Publications