Donna M. Glowacki (Ph.D. Arizona State University, 2006) is an Associate Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Notre Dame. She has worked with Crow Canyon in a variety of capacities since 1994 including a senior researcher on the Village Ecodynamics Project (VEP) where she lead the Mesa Verde Community Center survey from 2009–2012. She continues to collaborate with Crow Canyon on publications that utilize data from Crow Canyon’s excavations and the VEP.
Donna is an anthropological archaeologist specializing in societal change, regional depopulation & migration, social organization, sustainability, and socio-economic networks using ceramic and compositional analyses. For over 30 years, she has worked extensively in the Mesa Verde region of the Southwest U.S. to better understand Ancestral Pueblo cultural and organizational changes in relation climate change. She has conducted fieldwork at 89 of the largest Ancestral Pueblo archaeological sites in the Mesa Verde region. Her publications include a book, two edited volumes, and 30 peer-reviewed book chapters and articles. Glowacki’s current research in Mesa Verde National Park focuses on how large Ancestral Pueblo village organization changed between 900 and 1290 C.E. at both Spruce Tree House cliff dwelling and the Far View Community, with a particular focus on how their ancient water management strategies were used in adapting to their high desert environment. She is the author of Living and Leaving: A Social History of Regional Depopulation in Thirteenth-Century Mesa Verde (The University of Arizona Press).