Dr Louise Iles
BSc, MSc, PhD
School of History, Philosophy and Digital Humanities
Wenner-Gren Hunt Fellow
Full contact details
School of History, Philosophy and Digital Humanities
Minalloy House
10-16 Regent Street
Sheffield
S1 3NJ
- Profile
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I joined the University of Sheffield in 2016 as a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at the Department of Archaeology, mapping the development of early iron production in sub-Saharan Africa. I am now a Wenner-Gren Hunt Fellow, completing a writing project that explores gender, knowledge, innovation and participation in African iron metallurgy.
My BSc, MSc and PhD were obtained from the Institute of Archaeology, UCL, and during this time I also took part in the graduate attachment scheme of the British Institute in Eastern Africa, spending six months in eastern Africa working on various research projects. My PhD thesis examined the trajectory of iron production in western Uganda.
After my PhD, I was a Marie Curie Research Fellow at the Department of Archaeology, University of York, with a year's secondment to the School of Anthropology, University of Arizona, where I had the privilege of working in Professor David Killick's lab. My research explored the iron metallurgy of the Pare Mountains, northern Tanzania, with a particular emphasis on environmental impact.
- Qualifications
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- 2011- PhD – University College London
- Research interests
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My research focus is the iron metallurgy of sub-Saharan Africa. I've led research projects in Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania, but have worked on metal assemblages from around the world, including Mali, Togo, India, Cambodia, the UK and China.
I have a particular interest in the networks through which technology spreads, the use of plants in metal technologies, and the role of gender in technology - research challenges which I explore using a combination of archaeological, ethnographic and archaeological science approaches.
Current collaborations
- Iron metallurgy in Bassar, Togo: Early Iron Age and Late Iron Age technologies- Philip de Barros (Palomar College) David Killick (University of Arizona)
- Iron objects of Munsa and Ntusi, Uganda- Peter Robertshaw (California State University) Andrew Reid (University College London) Funded by the British Institute in Eastern Africa, and the British Society for the History of Science
- Professional activities and memberships
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- Fellow of the Royal Anthropological Institute
- Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
- Selected Publications
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Journal Articles
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- Iles, L. 2020. Exploring the impact of iron production on forest resources: estimating fuelconsumption from slag. Science and Technology in Archaeological Research
- de Barros, P., Iles, L., Frame, L. & Killick, D. 2020. The Early Iron Metallurgy of Bassar, Togo: furnaces, metallurgical remains and iron objects. Azania: Archaeological Research in Africa 55: 3- 43
- Iles, L. 2018. Forging networks and mixing ores: rethinking the social landscapes of iron metallurgy. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 49: 88-99
- Iles, L., Heckmann, M., Lang, C., Stump, D. and Lane, P. 2018. Iron production in North Pare, Tanzania: archaeometallurgical and geoarchaeological perspectives on landscape change. African Archaeological Review
- Iles, L. 2018. Forging networks and mixing ores: rethinking the social landscapes of iron metallurgy. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 49: 88-99
- Iles, L. 2016. The role of metallurgy in transforming global forests. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 23: 1219-1241
- Iles, L. and Lane, P. 2015. Iron production in second millennium AD pastoralist contexts on the Laikipia Plateau, Kenya. Azania: Archaeological Research in Africa 50: 372-401
- Gurdasani, D., Carstensen, T., Tekola-Ayele, F., Pagani, L., Tachmazidou, I., Hatzikotoulas, K., Karthikeyan, S., Iles, L. et al. 2015. The African Genome Variation Project shapes medical genetics in Africa. Nature 517 (7534): 327-332
- Iles, L. 2014. The exploitation of manganese-rich ‘ore’ to smelt iron in Mwenge, western Uganda, from the mid second millennium AD. Journal of Archaeological Science 49: 423-441
- Iles, L. 2013. The development of iron technology in precolonial western Uganda. Azania: Archaeological Research in Africa 48: 65-90
- Iles, L. 2009. Impressions of banana pseudostem in iron slag from eastern Africa. Ethnobotany Research and Applications 7: 283-291
- Iles, L. and Martinón-Torres, M. 2009. Pastoralist iron production on the Laikipia Plateau, Kenya: wider implications for archaeometallurgical studies. Journal of Archaeological Science 36: 2314-2326
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Chapters
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- Iles, L. 2017. African iron production and iron-working technologies: methods. In: T. Spear (ed.) Oxford Research Encyclopedia of African History. New York: OUP
- Iles, L. 2015. Iron production in Uganda: memories of a near-forgotten industry. In: H. Orange (ed.) Reanimating Industrial Spaces: conducting memory work in post-industrial societies. Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press, 158-175
- Iles, L. and Childs, S. T. 2014. Ethnoarchaeological and historical methods. In: B. Roberts and C. Thornton (eds.) Archaeometallurgy in Global Perspective: methods and syntheses. New York: Springer, 193-216
- Iles, L. 2014. The use of plants in iron production: insights from smelting remains from Buganda. In: C. Stevens, S. Nixon, M. Murray and D. Fuller (eds.) The Archaeology of African Plant Use. San Francisco: Left Coast Press, 267-274
- Iles, L. 2013. Applying ethnographic presents to archaeological pasts: the relevance of memories of iron production in western Uganda. In: J. Humphris and Th. Rehren (eds.) The World of Iron. London: Archetype, 281-287
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