Dr. Erin Halstad McGuire

Bio

I have been teaching at UVic since 2010. In my teaching I aim to help students develop transferable skills relating to research, project design, team work and technologies relevant to anthropology and archaeology.

Anti-racism and decolonisation are important to my teaching philosophies. Moreover, I am interested in how students learn, and so strive to consistently further my knowledge in learner-centred theories and strategies for accessible teaching.

In 2016, I was honoured to become the first recipient of UVic’s Excellence in Teaching for Experiential Learning Award. Since then, I have also received the Social Sciences Teaching Excellence Award (2021), the Harry Hickman Alumni Award for Excellence in Teaching and Educational Leadership (2021-22), and the West Coast Teaching Excellence Award (2022-23).

In addition to ANTH 100: Introduction to Anthropology, I teach courses on the archaeology of death (ANTH397), Viking archaeology (ANTH398), and medieval archaeology (ANTH361). The Heritage and Historical Archaeology field course (ANTH367) has been based at the Jewish Cemetery in Victoria. Students in this course have been recording the cemetery for the Synagogue. From time to time, I also offer courses through the UVic Medieval Studies Program.

Interests

• funerary rituals and mortuary archaeology
• gender identities
• migrant identities
• experimental archaeology
• medieval North Atlantic and the Viking Age
• historical archaeology
• teaching and learning in undergraduate education
• universal design for learning

Courses

• ANTH 100, Introduction to Anthropology
• ANTH 361, Archaeology of Medieval Europe
• ANTH 367, Heritage and Historical Archaeology Field Course
• ANTH 397, Viking Archaeology
• ANTH 398, Archaeology of Death

Current projects

 Victoria Jewish Cemetery digital documentation project

Selected talks

• Dead (Wo)men Do Tell Tales: The Archaeology of Death (Public lecture for UVic on the Peninsula, 1 Feb 2024)
• Migrant identities, mortuary citations, and power in Scandinavian Scotland (19th Viking Congress, Universities of Liverpool, Bangor, and Lancaster, 26 Aug 2022)
• Whim rules the child: The archaeology of childhood in Scandinavian Scotland (Assumption University, Archaeological Institute of America Lecture, 27 Sep 2021)
• High-stakes Assessment of Students' Performance: Approaches to Summative Assessment Online (LSTI Assessment Workshop, 25 Nov 2020)
• Teaching On(the)line (LTSI: Let’s Talk About Teaching Conference Key Note, 10 Aug 2020)
• Lessons from the Frontline: Survival Strategies for Teaching Mid to Large Size Classes (UVic Faculty of Social Sciences, 5 Jun 2020)
• Resisting Alt-Right Appropriations of Viking Life and Lore (Viking Life and Lore: UVic Medieval Studies Workshop, 1 Feb 2020)
• Making Material Culture: Experimental Archaeology and Experiential Learning (Hands-on History: Creating Experience in the Classroom: American History Association, 5 Jan 2020)