Rate My Professor Glenys McGowan

Glenys McGowan's academic interests center on archaeology, with specializations in forensic archaeology, historical burial practices, cemetery preservation, and geoarchaeological analyses. Her key publications include "A method for calculating soil pressure overlying human burials" (Journal of Archaeological Science, 2015, with Jonathan Prangnell), "Identifying a burns victim 150 years after death" (International Journal of Historical Archaeology, 2020, with Prangnell), "Soil temperature calculation for burial site analysis" (Forensic Science International, 2009, with Prangnell), and "The significance of vivianite in archaeological settings" (Geoarchaeology, 2006, with Prangnell). Additional works examine nineteenth-century Australian burial artefacts, such as "'The Truth Will Out': Recycling of Packing Timber to Construct a Nineteenth Century Australian Coffin" (Australian Archaeology, 2009), "Nineteenth-century buttons from the North Brisbane Burial Ground" (Australasian Historical Archaeology, 2011), and "Economy and respectability: textiles from the north Brisbane burial ground" (International Journal of Historical Archaeology, 2013). Recent research involves international collaborations, including "The life and death of cremated infants and children from the Neo-Punic tophet at Zita, Tunisia" (Antiquity, 2024) and "Diachronic change in imperial-era waterproof lining technology: evidence from Pompeii, the Bay of Naples and Rome" (Journal of Archaeological Science, 2025). In recognition of her teaching excellence, she received the 2016 Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences Teaching and Learning Award at the University of Queensland. She has contributed to pedagogical innovation through "Object based learning in the social sciences: three approaches to haptic knowledge making" (Teaching Anthropology, 2022).