Dr Maaike de Waal is Assistant Professor at the Field Research Education Centre of the Faculty of Archaeology.

More information about Maaike de Waal

Research

Maaike de Waal is a specialist in island and coastal archaeology, as well as in landscape archaeology. Since her 1994 and 1995 field investigations at La Désirade, she has been investigating pre-colonial habitation and exploitation of small islands and islets in Caribbean. This interest has been deepened by the possibility to carry out a systematic and highly intensive survey project in the eastern part of Guadeloupe (the Pointe des Châteaux peninsula, the island of La Désirade and the nowadays uninhabited islets of Petite Terre) as part of her PhD research. This project allowed the study of pre-colonial organization and interaction of this micro-region through the investigation of settlement patterns and archaeological landscapes. De Waal has specialized in archaeological prospection and in the study of ceramics, especially those from the Late Ceramic Age in the Lesser Antilles. In addition, she has focused on studying inland sites (Barbados), and on creating archaeological predictive maps (e.g. Sint Eustatius, 2013 and Saba, 2015).

Curriculum vitae

Maaike de Waal graduated in 1996 with two MA degrees at Leiden University (“ Archaeology and Culture History of the America’s” and “Prehistory of North-Western Europe”). She completed a PhD in Caribbean Archaeology at the same university (2006). Her dissertation, entitled “Pre-Columbian social organisation and interaction interpreted through the study of settlement patterns. An archaeological case-study of the Pointe des Châteaux, La Désirade and Les Îles de la Petite Terre micro-region, Guadeloupe, F.W.I.” was based on a four-year project she designed and which was granted by the Leiden Faculty of Archaeology.

Subsequently, as archaeologist at RAAP Archeologisch Adviesbureau in Leiden, de Waal was responsible for several surveying, auger testing and test excavation projects at prehistoric, Roman, Early and Late Medieval and sub-recent sites in the Netherlands. From 2008 – 2010, as lecturer in archaeology at the University of the West Indies in Barbados, she was responsible for the creation of an archaeology minor in the Department of History and Philosophy. Later in 2010 she worked as lecturer in archaeology at Saxion Next University of Applied Sciences in Deventer (the Netherlands).

From 2010 onwards, de Waal is co-owner of ARGEOgraph, an archaeological company that offers archaeological and geodetic products and services for archaeological applications in the Netherlands and in the Caribbean. In 2012-2013 she worked as team manager of the 10 person prospection team of RAAP Archeologisch Adviesbureau in Leiden. Since 2013, de Waal has worked as assistant professor and as coordinator of the Honours College at the Faculty of Archaeology of Leiden University. Since 2018, she was also appointed as coordinator of the Writing Lab and as lecturer Academic Skills in the same faculty. In 2016-2017 she was research fellow at the University of the West Indies, Barbados.

Since 2021, she is working as assistant professor, focusing on applied archaeology, most notably landscape and prospection archaeology. She is head of the Field Research Education Centre of the Faculty of Archaeology at Leiden University, and as such responsible for the fieldschools and internships of this faculty and for some of the courses for the Master Applied Archaeology (e.g., the course Prospective Archaeology).

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Activities