Dr. Shawn Lambert

Broad Research Interests

• Community-Engaged Archaeology
• Mississippian Archaeology
• Historic Archaeology
• Ceramic Style and Grammar
• Iconography
• Remote Sensing
• Organic Residue Analysis
• Compositional Analysis

Research Interests

I am a community-engaged archaeologist who has a passion for working with and advocating for the many stakeholders and communities who have meaningful historical and cultural associations to the archaeological sites in Mississippi and the greater southeast region. Much of my work researches the various ways in which objects and people move through the landscape through time and space and how the meaning of objects change as they interact with these different people, places, and things, especially with living communities today. Some of most recent work is working with Caddo Nation of Oklahoma members to understand the rise of social complexity of Cahokia, the largest mound center north of Mexico, through the study of the making and distribution of Early Caddo ceramics at Cahokia and beyond. Locally in Mississippi I work with descendants to understand early-to-late 19th century historic plantation sites and beginning non-destructive archaeology projects at Mississippian Mound sites, such as the Winterville Mound site, located just north of Greenville, MS. In the last two years, I have also been working with the Department of Natural Resources to investigate the organization and history of late Archaic and Mississippian period shell ring sites along the coast of South Carolina using remote sensing techniques. 

Recent Publications

2025 Ford, Paige, Shawn P. Lambert, Grant Stauffer, and Chase Kahwinhut Earles
Learning the Craft: Evidence of Early Caddo Apprenticeships at Cahokia. American Antiquity.

2024 Sanger, Matthew C., Shawn P. Lambert, D. Miller Shane, Mark Hill, and Tiffany Raymond (accepted, in press)
Copper Use in the Lower Southeast North America before Agriculture. In From Hard Rock to Heavy Metal: Metal Tool Production and Use by Indigenous Hunter-Gatherers of North America, edited by Matthew C. Sanger. Berghahn Books.

2024 Lambert, Shawn P., D. Shane Miller, Matthew C. Sanger, Olivia Baumgartel, Madeleine Hale, and Hector Neff, Laure Dussubieux
Copper on the Mississippi Coast: Assessing Provenance of a Copper Bead at the Claiborne Site (22HA501) through LA-ICP-MS Compositional Analysis. Journal of Archaeological Science 53(2024):1-11.

2023 Colaninno, Carol E., Shawn P. Lambert, Emily L. Beahm, Morgan D. Tallman, Carl G. Drexler, and Clark H. Sturdevant
Going Beyond the Field: Documenting Practices Field Schools Directors Implement to Promote Supportive and Inclusive Field-based Pedagogy. Southeastern Archaeology

2023 Lambert, Shawn P., and Paige A Ford
Understanding the Rise of Complexity at Cahokia: Evidence of Nonlocal Caddo Ceramic Specialists in the East St. Louis Precinct. American Antiquity. 88:361- 385.

2023 Lambert, Shawn P., Debbie Cosey, and Aaron Patton
Public Archaeology, History, and Life at Concord Quarters. Community Archaeologist 2023(1):16-25.

2023 Lambert, Shawn P. and Carol E. Colaninno
Bending the Trajectory of Field School Teaching and Learning through Active and Advocacy Archaeology. Humans 3(1):10-23.

2022 Stauffer, Grant, Brett T. Giles, and Shawn P. Lambert (editors) Archaeologies of Cosmoscapes in the Americas. American Landscape Series, Oxbow Book, Oxford.

2022 Lambert, Shawn P., Jeri Redcorn, Chase Earles, and Timothy K. Perttula Decolonizing in Practice: Renaming of an Ancestral Caddo Ceramic Type. Caddo Archaeology Journal 32:5-10.

2021 Giles, Bretton T. and Shawn P. Lambert (editors)
New Methods and Theories for Analyzing Mississippian Imagery. University of Florida Press, Gainesville.

2021 Colaninno, Carol E., Emily L. Beahm, Carl G. Drexler, Shawn P. Lambert, and Clark H. Sturdevant
The Field School Syllabus: Examining the Intersection of Best Practices and Practices that Support Student Safety and Inclusivity. Advances in Archaeological Practice (9) 4:366-378.

2021 Lambert, Shawn P.
Motifs in Motion: An Iconographic Evaluation of Spiro Engraved Production and Distribution between the Northern and Southern Caddo Areas. Caddo Archaeology Journal 31:76-89.

2021 Lambert, Shawn P., Timothy K. Perttula, and Nelish Gaikwad
Production Matters: Organic Residue Evidence for Late Pre-Columbian Datura- Making in the Central Arkansas River Valley. Advances for Archaeological Practices 10(2):149-159.

2020 Colaninno, Carol E., Shawn P. Lambert, Emily L. Beahm, and Carl G. Drexler Creating and Supporting a Harassment- and Assault-Free Field School. Advances in Archaeological Practice 8(2):111-122.