Jennifer L. Immich graduated in 2014 from the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities with a PhD in Anthropology. Prior to completing her doctorate, Jennifer received her BA in History with minors in Anthropology and Geography from the University of Wisconsin – Eau Claire. The interdisciplinary nature of her undergraduate studies, focusing on medieval historical archaeology and GIS training led Jennifer to pursue a PhD blending these skillsets. Along the way, Jennifer concurrently completed two masters’ degrees in Anthropology and Geographic Information Systems (MGIS) to facilitate her dissertation work on a spatial approach to the siting of timber castles in Ireland. Through a combination of archaeological landscape survey and GIS, Jennifer’s fieldwork led to the classification revision of 18 timber castles in her study area which has lasting ramifications on the interpretation of colonialism in 12-13th century Ireland.
The GIS Teaching Fellows position at Middlebury College appealed to Jennifer as the perfect opportunity to blend her archaeological training and GIS data collection skills in a new upper-division methods course. Jennifer previously led advanced undergraduate University of Minnesota students in landscape archaeology and GIS application to assist in the collection of her dissertation field dataset in Ireland. However, she felt the skills her students used could be developed into a larger course with a closer connection between fieldwork and computer work. Thus, Geog 329: GIS for Historical Landscape Studies was developed. Students in this course learn how to collect historical landscape data in the field, then import those data into a GIS to create maps illustrating and analyzing past and present landscapes. Keeping with the tradition of community engagement at Middlebury College, the field site is Addison County, Vermont.