Daniel Sayers Associate Professor and Department Chair, Anthropology Department of Anthropology

Degrees: PhD, Historical Archaeology (Anthropology), College of William & Mary
MA, Anthropology, Western Michigan University
BA, Philosophy and Anthropology, Western Michigan University
Book Currently Reading: Some favorite authors, Fiction or otherwise: Jack Kerouac, J.P. Sartre, F. Dosteovsky, Marx, Bertrand Russell, John Dominic Crossen, W.E.B.Dubois, Elaine Pagels, Peter Singer, James Bamford, David Harvey, Berke Breathed, Charles Bukowski, Carl Sagan, Pat McManus, and Allen Ginsberg. Current read: A Man Called Intrepid, William Stephenson
Bio: Trained in philosophy, anthropology, history, and archaeology, Dr. Sayers is a Historical Archaeologist who works in the United States. Currently, his Great Dismal Swamp Landscape Study is exploring the social and economic history and world of resistance communities that thrived in the swamp interior from 1607 up through the Civil War. The project includes several scholars from around the U.S. Dr. Sayers is also principal investigator in and co-developer of the Great Depression Undocumented Labor Project, an archaeological program centered on transient laborers and hobos in 1920-1950 America--it particularly explores issues surrounding landscape, resistance, environment/ecology, and class consciousness. Additionally, Dr. Sayers has proposed and developed an animal emancipation perspective and agenda for historical archaeology, he is elaborating original marronage theories and perspectives, he is engaged in the politics of the "Underground Railroad", and, he continues his work the 19th century transition to agrarian capitalism in the Midwest and beyond. Dr. Sayers works with many undergraduate and graduate students in all of these projects and research areas.

See Also: Anthropology Department
For the Media: To request an interview for a news story, call AU Communications at 202-885-5950 or submit a request.; AU Experts

Teaching

Spring 2018

ANTH-531 Topics in Archaeology: The Homeless and the Home

Fall 2018

ANTH-235 Early America:The Buried Past

Partnerships & Affiliations

Society for Historical Archaeology
Member
US Fish and Wildlife Service
In Partnership
Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture
In Partnership

Scholarly, Creative & Professional Activities

Research Interests

My primary interests, in no particular order, include: political economy; landscapes; alienation; Diasporae and exile; marronage, Maroon communities, and the Underground Railroad; labor and commodities; defiance and resistance; animal emancipation/rights and archaeology; Marxian-existentialist perspectives; community systems and structure; hobos, the Great Depression, and labor transience; politics of archaeological resource stewardship; capitalist transformations/transitions; archaeological research modeling and and some methods areas (e.g., excavation, survey, and modes of data recordation); race/racism/racialization; and, historical archaeology as social justice and world-transformational praxis.

Grants and Sponsored Research

2010-2013, NEH, "We the People" Collaborative Grant (RZ-51219-10), Great Dismal Swamp Landscape Study (Project Director with collaborators: Sue Taylor, Kathryn Benjamin, Will Moore, Nina Shapiro-Perl, Chuck Goode, Carolyn Finney, Dan Lynch, and Brent Morris).

2004-2007, Canon National Parks Science Scholars Doctoral Dissertation Grant.

Honors, Awards, and Fellowships

2013, Distinguished Alumnus, Department of Anthropology, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, Michigan.

2012, Keynote Speaker and Co-Ribbon Cutter, US Fish and Wildlife Service Public Historical Interpretation Pavilion Official Opening, February 24, Suffolk, VA.

2008, College of William and Mary Distinguished Dissertation in the Social Sciences Award.

Films/Documentaries

2018

Escape to the Great Dismal Swamp

Smithsonian Channel

Andreas Gutzeit, Producer and Director, Story House Productions

https://www.smithsonianchannel.com/shows/escape-to-the-great-dismal-swamp/0/3456593

2017

City of Lost Slaves

Andreas Gutzeit, Director, Story House Productions

zdf-enterprises.de/en/catalogue/international/zdfefactual/history-biographies/city-of-lost-slaves

2016

Landscape of Power: Freedom and Slavery in the Great Dismal Swamp.

Nina Shapiro-Perl, Director with Co-Producer Beth Geglia

vimeo.com/121135328

Selected Publications

Recent Public Work

Sayers, Daniel O. 2018, A Modest Firearms Proposal, The Doctor T.J Eckleburg Review

https://eckleburg.org/a-modest-firearms-proposal-by-daniel-o-sayers/

Sayers, Daniel O., 2017, Guest Columnist, "The Shepard House Has Alot to Teach Us".

www.battlecreekenquirer.com/story/opinion/columnists/2017/05/28/guest-column-shepard-house-has-lot-teach-us/339881001/

Sayers, Daniel O., 2016, The Mail, Underground Railroad. New Yorker

www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/03/the-mail-from-the-october-03-2016-issue

Recent Books

Sayers, Daniel O. (2014). A Desolate Place for a Defiant People: The Archeology of Maroons, Indigenous Americans, and Enslaved Laborers in the Great Dismal Swamp. University Press of Florida, Gainesville. (Second, paperback edition, 2016).