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Professor of Digital Humanities, Department of History, University of South Florida

I am Professor of Digital Humanities with the Department of History of University of South Florida where I direct the Institute for Digital Exploration - IDEx (www.usfidex.com). Classicist by training, I later specialized in Classical Archaeology with a focus on field methods in archaeology and a focus on ceramics studies. More recently, I enthusiastically embraced archaeological science and computer science in my research. I did this because many of the historical questions in which I am interested have no written texts whereby we might shed light on the problem. The application of the hard sciences to those questions therefore allowed me to attempt to explore old unanswered research questions and to conceive new ones which were previously unapproachable. This turn in my training and research has led me to the philosophical position I occupy today, which I might characterize as a body with three souls: Archaeologist, Archaeological Scientist and Digital Archaeologist.
As an Archaeologist, I excavate, catalogue, document, study and publish ancient material culture; as an Archaeological Scientist, I use geology, chemistry and physics to date, characterize, preserve and analyze that material culture; and as a Digital Archaeologist, I use 2D and 3D digital imaging techniques to document, interpret and disseminate it on a global scale. Therefore, my research activity moves onward along those three parallel tracks having a common geographic denominator.
In the field of Digital Archaeology, I apply 3D Digital Imaging techniques for the documentation, interpretation and global dissemination of endangered, inaccessible or neglected archaeological heritage with projects in Sicily, Malta and Florida, including archaeological sites and museum collections. At IDEx, I foster undergraduate and graduate research offering internship and formal training in the state-of-the-art software and hardware for 3D Scanning, Digital Photogrammetry and 3D Modeling applied to Archaeology and Cultural Heritage.

Experience

  • 2019–present
    Associate professor, University of South Florida
  • 2016–2019
    Assistant professor, University of South Florida

Education

  • 2007 
    University of Torino, Italy, Ph.D. Archaeology