Robert W. Preucel Named Sally and Alvin V. Shoemaker Professor of Anthropology

Robert W. Preucel, the Gregory Annenberg Weingarten curator-in-charge of the American Section at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, has been named the Sally and Alvin V. Shoemaker Professor of Anthropology. This chair is designated for a School of Arts and Sciences faculty member who is also a curator at the Penn Museum.

Preucel, a Penn graduate who holds a master's degree from the University of Chicago and Ph.D. from the University of California, Los Angeles, has research interests that include archaeological theory, semiotics, cultural heritage, indigenous knowledge, and ancestral Puebloan cultures. He is the author of Archaeological Semiotics (2006) and the editor or co-editor of several volumes including Contemporary Archaeology in Theory: The New Pragmatism (2010) and Archaeologies of the Pueblo Revolt: Identity, Meaning, and Renewal in the Pueblo World (2002).

Preucel returned to teach at his alma mater in 1995 after serving on the faculty of Harvard University. In addition to his curator duties, he is the chair of the Department of Anthropology; the Gregory Annenberg Weingarten curator-in-charge of the American Section at the Penn Museum; and the director of the Penn Center for Native American Studies. In addition, he is a resource faculty member for the Latin American Cultures Program and has a secondary appointment at the Graduate School of Education.

The Sally and Alvin V. Shoemaker Professorship was established in 1989 by the Shoemakers in recognition of their strong commitment to the liberal arts at Penn and Sally Shoemaker's service to the University Museum. Al Shoemaker, W'60, Hon'95 has served Penn as a member and chairman of the University's Board of Trustees. In 1994, he received Penn's Alumni Award of Merit.