preview

I Discovered : A Profound Enthusiasm For Learning About The Lives Of Ancient Peoples That Has Furthered My Determination

Good Essays

After the second year of my undergraduate studies while conducting fieldwork, I discovered a profound enthusiasm for learning about the lives of ancient peoples that has furthered my determination to pursue research and a graduate degree. In the summer of 2015, I already had two years of experience working on the Leon Levy Expedition to Ashkelon, Israel as a volunteer. That year I was chosen to work on a different project; I was part of a small team tasked with excavating the recently discovered Philistine cemetery. During that season and the season that followed, I not only learned about excavating human remains, but I also had the opportunity to study the lives and deaths of the deceased individuals: what they ate, their illness and injuries, their lifestyles, and their relationships with others outside their communities. Even their feelings for each other were sometimes evident. I became fascinated with understanding who the individuals were, what kinds of lives they had, and how they viewed the world, with the last question being the most intriguing. We used the small amount of artifacts buried with the deceased and previous finds from inside the city to paint a picture of their lives, but there is so much still unknown about the context in which the Philistines lived. When I returned to Johns Hopkins University, I maintained my newfound interest in ancient contexts and I began to channel it into my research. Through my classes, I conducted several projects in

Get Access