Matthew T. Boulanger

Bio

Matthew T. Boulanger is an anthropological archaeologist whose work focuses on material culture and the physico-chemical characterization of artifacts. His scholarship combines evolutionary theory, physical geography, landscape ecology, middle-range research, and geoscience in the study of human behavior. His projects have looked at the geographic distribution of mound centers in the Central Mississippi River Valley, the effects of rapid social change among a Native American community living on the peripheries of the three colonial powers in the New World in the mid-1600s, and the morphological and phylogenetic analyses of Paleoindian projectile points from eastern North America. He has longstanding interests in science communication and confronting pseudoscience as it relates to archaeology. Boulanger’s work has appeared in various peer-reviewed journals, as well as the Texas Standard, Dallas Morning News,  BBC – Earth, Washington Post, Newsweek, American Archaeology, and Science NOW.

At SMU, Boulanger serves as the Director of the Archaeology Research Collections (ARC) and leads the XRF Laboratory. Prior to coming to SMU, he worked six years in private-sector cultural-resource management in the U.S. Midwest and Northeast.  For 10 years he was a Senior Research Specialist at the Archaeometry Laboratory of the University of Missouri Research Reactor.  He has performed archaeological fieldwork in the U.S. Midwest and Northeast, Central Europe, and Andean South America.  He has been a research-team member for projects in in Asia, Africa, Australia, Europe, South America, and North America.

On a personal note, he has one well-behaved Keeshond named Circe.  When he is not writing or reading, he keeps himself busy reading science fiction novels and riding his motorcycle, but not at the same time.

Research Interests

Archaeometry • Paleoindian and Contact Periods • Landscape Ecology • Evolutionary Theory •  Eastern North America 

Courses Taught

Anthropology: A Four-Field Approach • People of the Earth • North American Archaeology • Fantastic Archaeology and Pseudoscience • Laboratory Methods in Archaeology: Lithics Analysis • Special Topics in Anthropology: Lithics • Statistics in Anthropology • Laboratory Methods in Archaeology: Lithics Analysis