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ABOUT
I'm currently an assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Michigan where I am also a curator of historical and contemporary archaeology, as well as ethnology, in the Museum of Anthropological Archaeology (UMMAA). In March 2025, I co-founded UM's Center for Community Archaeology & Heritage (CCAH), which focuses on supporting community partnerships in archaeological and heritage research. I support a number of ongoing research projects but my longterm fieldwork is based in Quintana Roo, Mexico where I help facilitate a community heritage initiative called the Tihosuco Heritage Preservation and Community Development Project. Most recently, I've joined the Woodlawn Cemetery Restoration Project here in Michigan, a descendant and community-driven initiative focused on the reclamation of a Second Great Migration era Black cemetery in Ypsilanti.
In my scholarship, I draw on techniques from across anthropology, archaeology, and history to investigate the durabilities of colonialism and other forms of political violence, and how they inform present day political consciousness and imaginations of the future. I'm committed to operationalizing public history to meet social justice needs, to working collaboratively with local communities, and to envisioning a praxis of heritage as liberation. You'll also see my work published and presented under the name Tiffany C. Cain.
After finishing my PhD in Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania, I held a Cotsen Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Society of Fellows for the Liberal Arts at Princeton, where I also lectured in the Anthropology Department and Humanities Council. I received my BA in archaeology and MA in Anthropology from Stanford University.
Beyond academics, I love traveling, being outside, cooking, reading black and indigenous speculative fiction, making crafty things, and family time. And, I'm a big fan of this guy.
