Dr Ania Kotarba
Academic Level C
Dr Ania Kotarba was born in Kraków, Poland where she was educated in Archeology, Ancient History, Anthropology and Comparative Religion Studies at the medieval Jagiellonian University. In 2009 she obtained her MPhil there on the relationships between Cyprus, Egypt and the Eastern Mediterranean in the Iron Age. Whilst pursuing her undergraduate degree she sojurned for an exchange programme to the University of Warsaw and later spent a year of her Masters programme as an ERASMUS student at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece where she extended her portfolio to Ancient Art History.
Ania holds a PhD (DPhil) degree from the Oxford University in the UK where she was based at the Oxford Centre for Maritime Archaeology (OCMA) in the School of Archaeology. Her PhD research used tools such as geoarchaeology, geophysics, maritime archaeology, historical archives, spatial analysis and sedimentological techniques with an aim to explore major ancient ports of trade — with a case study site of Berenike Troglodytica on the Red Sea coast of Egypt — and associated infilled harbour basins around the coasts of the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. The results of this thesis lead to a better understanding of human adaptations to — and interaction with — the natural environment of the Red Sea (including sea level change in the Ptolemaic and Roman periods) and to elucidate mechanisms of farâ€�distance maritime trade in the Early Historic (Preâ€�Islamic) period within the wider Mediterranean-Indian Ocean protoglobalised world.
Dr Kotarba has previously held a post of a Lecturer in Archaeology and Ancient History at Macquarie University, Sydney and a Lecturer in Archaeology at the University of Wollongong.
PhD (2015) The University of Oxford, UK, School of Archaeology, Oxford Centre for Maritime Archaeology
“The Port of Berenike Troglodytica on the Egyptian Red Sea: a Landscape-based approach to the study of its harbour and its role in Indo-Mediterranean trade.”
MPhil (2009) Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland, Institute of Archaeology
“Recognising multiple connections between Cyprus and the Near East in the Iron Age based on a multi-faceted study of oriental influences in decoration of bronze elements of horse harnessing, carts and chariots from the Royal Tombs in Cypriot Salamis.”
Teaching Awards:
2016 and 2017 Outstanding Contribution to Teaching and Learning (OCTAL) Nomination Vice-Chancellor’s Award for teaching staff member
Research Awards:
2018 Macquarie Emerging Scholars Award
2012 Cecelia Connelly Memorial Scholarship in Underwater Archaeology from the Women Divers Hall of Fame (USA) ‘recognizing outstanding contributions to the exploration, understanding, safety and enjoyment of our underwater world’
Recent research Grants:
2018 Chief Investigator (CI). Sustainable Past of maritime Kiribati?: Historical and ethnographic adaptations of Kiribati people to a changing natural environment.
Global Challenges Fund, University of Wollongong
2017–2020 CI. Coastal Cultural Landscapes of the Saudi Red Sea: Landscapes and Environments of late Holocene Red Sea ports of trade,Saudi Arabia.
Saudi Geological Survey [not used in 2018 due to permit issues]
GeoQuest Seed Grant [not used in 2018]
Centre for Archaeological Science Small Strategic Grant [not used in 2018]
2016-2017 CI. Geoarchaeological and environmental research of the fluvial landscape of SEB area in Mahastangarh, Bangladesh.
French Ministry of Foreign Affairs
2013–2010 CI. Landscape survey in Berenike, Egypt
The Ministry of Education of the Republic of Poland scholarship
2012 CI. Geophysical (GPS) survey of the site of Berenike in 2013, Egypt
The Griffith Egyptological Fund from the Faculty of Oriental Studies, The University of Oxford
2012 Named on the grant. Levallois tradition Epigons in the Middle Nile Valley. The latest Middle Palaeolithic settlement in Affad Basin (Northern Sudan)
The Polish National Centre of Science
2011 CI. Geomorphologial survey in the vicinity of the ancient trade centre of Muziris, India
Thomas Whitcombe Green Fund, Craven Committee, The University of Oxford
2011 CI. Study of seafaring, shipbuilding and navigation on the Malabar coast, India
Anderson Fund, Society for Nautical Research
2011 CI. Geoarchaeological survey of the ancient port of Pattanam, India
Hugh Chapman Memorial Fund, Roman Studies
Teaching
Ania currently teaches within the Archaeology and History programme at Flinders and is actively involved in research projects in Egypt, Lebanon and East Africa. She is also developing research and student exchange programmes with a number of Mediterranean countires and will spend some of the 2019 as a Visiting Professor at Universita di Roma Tor Vergata in Italy.
Expert Member
International Scientific Committee on Archaeological Heritage Management (ICAHM)
Australia-New Zealand Joint Working Group on Risk Preparedness for Cultural Heritage
International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS Australia)
Advisory Boards Member
Centre for Ancient Cultural Heritage and Environments (CACHE), Macquarie University, Sydney
Affiliated Fellow
Centre for Archaeological Science (CAS), University of Wollongong
Australian National Centre for Ocean Resources and Security (ANCORS), University of Wollongong
Ania is very active in the filed of Cultural Heritage protection, conservation and management and acts as an expert member of ICAHM (The International Scientific Committee on Archaeological Heritage management), ICOMOS Australia (International Council on Monuments and Sites) and Australia-New Zealand Jpoint Working Group on Risk Preparedness for Cultural Heritage under the patronage of the Blue Shield. She was Australia's representative on the International ICOMOS Emerging Professionals Working Group.
Ania acts as a key heritage advisor on an Independent Panel of Environmental and Social Experts for the World Bank-funded Bisri Dam project in Lebanon.
She is on an Advisory Board for the newly created Centre for Ancient Cultural Heritage and Environments.
Ania is an active reviewer for the UNESCO World Heritage Nominations Committee and World Monuments Fund.
Dr Kotarba's extensive archaeological and heritage experience have been gained on sites in the Near and Middle East: Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, U.A.E., Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Oman, Turkey; in South Asia: India and Bangladesh; in Africa: Sudan, Kenya, mainland Tanzania, Mafia Archipelago, Zanzibar archipelago, Madagascar, Lesotho; in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea: Greece, Italy, Montenegro, Ukraine; on numerous sites in the Northern and Western Europe including Belgium, UK and Poland; and recently in the Pacific region including in Australia, NSW and the Republic of Kiribati, Micronesia, Remote Oceania.
- Africa
- Archaeology
- Ancient History
- Classics
- Coastal and Maritime Archaeology
- Cultural Heritage management
- Cultural Heritage Protection
- East Africa in medieval period
- Greco-Roman Egypt
- Middle Eastern and North Arfican Archaeology
- Periplus Maris Erythraei
- Underwater Cultural Heritage legislation
- World Heritage sites
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