Summary
Chelsea M. Cohen is a historical and underwater archaeologist working as an assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Nevada, Reno. She joined the department after graduating with a Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of Pennsylvania, as well as a B.A. in Anthropology from DePaul University and an M.S. in Maritime Archaeology and Conservation from Texas A&M. Her research focuses on the relationship between British maritime culture, agroforestry and the development of port cities in the 18th-century Chesapeake. Trained in both a historical and maritime archaeology, she combines terrestrial and underwater methods to connect the land and sea. Her ongoing research focuses on the relationship between ship-making, ship-breaking, harbor construction and labor practices in 18th-century Virginia and Maryland, with a specific emphasis on the agency of enslaved, indentured and convict laborers in the development of watery spaces. Her work is strongly interdisciplinary, drawing from archival research, palynology, archaeobotany and urban studies, in addition to both excavation and legacy archaeological data.
Cohen's upcoming work in coastal Maryland looks at the processes of coastal erosion, industrial fishing and heritage tourism as concomitant responses to centuries of landscape change and disruption. She also works as an archaeobotanist to explore the lifeways of enslaved individuals in the South Carolina Lowcountry. Her work has been recognized and supported by the McNeil Center for Early American Studies, the Lewis J. Kolb Society, the Society for Historical Archaeology and the International Congress for Maritime History. She has also benefited from fellowships and training with the Mystic Seaport Museum and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH).
Cohen co-directs (with Sarah Cowie) the Historical Archaeology Laboratory at the University of Nevada, Reno. She encourages potential graduate students interested in similar theoretical or methodological research questions to contact her.
Research interests
- Historical archaeology of the North American Atlantic Maritime and underwater archaeology
- Social theories of race, labor, enslavement and indenture
- Landscape, environmental archaeology and archaeobotany
- Cultural heritage
- Museum anthropology
- Public and community-driven archaeology
Selected publications
Book chapters and edited volumes
- 2023 Assemblage Theory and the Mediative Practice of Ship Hull Reuse. In Contemporary Philosophy for Maritime Archaeology: Flat Ontologies, Oceanic Thought, and the Anthropocene, edited by Sara A. Rich and Peter B. Campbell. Sidestone Press, Leiden.
Book reviews
- 2025 "Kaori Nagai, editor, Maritime Mammals: Ships, Species, Stories." Vistas, Summer 2025.
- 2022 “Richard M. Jones, The 50 Greatest Shipwrecks by Chelsea M. Cohen.” The Northern Mariner/Le marin du nord 32, no. 3 (2022): 421–423.
Courses taught
- ANTH 105: Introduction to World Archaeology
- ANTH 459: Principles of Conservation for Archaeology (Special Topics in Archaeology)
Education
- Ph.D., Anthropology, University of Pennsylvania, 2026
- M.A., Maritime Archaeology and Conservation, Texas A&M University, 2017
- B.A., Anthropology, DePaul University, 2013