Dr. David Friesem is a senior lecturer of environmental archaeology at the Department of Maritime Civilizations at the University of Haifa and a research member of the Haifa Center for Mediterranean History and the Recanati Institute for Maritime Studies. He combines field archaeology, geoarchaeology, ethnography, and social theory in order to study the often missing small-scale perspective of human-environment interactions. His research examines human ecology, technology, and social interactions in order to reconstruct how the physical, social and perceptual environment intersect. His current projects in the Eastern Mediterranean examine human-environment interactions during the Palaeolithic, the emergence of complex societies and the origins of farming and urban societies. David is also the head of the Laboratory for Environmental Micro-History.

The Laboratory for Environmental Micro-History aims to study human-environment relations at a multi-scalar level. Using archaeology, geoarchaeology, history and social anthropology, our research investigates the interactions between humans and their physical, social and perceptual environment. The lab’s cross-disciplinary team integrate field excavations (inland and underwater) with microscopic analysis of the archaeological record and the paleo-environment as well as carrying out ethnographic work and historical analysis. Current research at the lab includes the study of early Homo Sapiens and Neanderthals, the transition to farming and the Neolithic revolution, landscape change during the Bronze and Iron Age and cultural encounters across the Mediterranean in the Hellenistic-Roman period.