Rebecca Graff
Specialization
Historical archaeology, US urban archaeology (19th- and 20th- century Chicago), modern and contemporary material culture, world’s fairs and expositions, architecture and the built environment, consumerism and consumption, historic preservation, museums and collecting practices, politics of heritage
Education
PhD University of Chicago (2011)
MA University of Chicago (2001)
BA University of California, Berkeley (1999)
Research Interests
Rebecca S. Graff is an Associate Professor of Anthropology at Lake Forest College (PhD and MA, University of Chicago; BA, University of California, Berkeley). As an historical archaeologist with research interests in the 19th- and 20th-century urban United States, she explores the relationship between temporality and modernity, memory and material culture, and contemporary heritage and nostalgic consumption through archaeological and archival research. Her book, Disposing of Modernity: The Archaeology of Garbage and Consumerism During Chicago’s 1893 World’s Fair (2020) was based on an archaeological and archival project focusing on the ephemeral “White City” and Midway Plaisance of the 1893 Chicago Fair and the modern disposal practices seen at the Louis Sullivan-designed Charnley-Persky House. In Chicago, Graff has also excavated the Haymarket Martyrs’ Monument (2016), the Gray-Cloud House (2018), Mecca Flats (2018), Armour Mission and Armour Flats (2023), and the Edith Farnsworth House (2021, 2024). In 2019, she led excavations at the former site of the African Methodist Episcopal Church on the campus of Lake Forest College.
Graff’s work has been supported by the American Historical Association and the National Endowment for the Humanities (SHARP), the Karla Scherer Center for the Study of American Culture (University of Chicago), the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the Greater Midwest Foodways Alliance. In 2013, she won the Kathleen Kirk Gilmore Dissertation Award from the Society for Historical Archaeology (SHA), presented to a recent graduate whose dissertation is considered to be an outstanding contribution to historical archaeology. At the University of Chicago, she taught undergraduate and graduate students as a preceptor and postdoctoral instructor in the Master of Arts Program in the Social Sciences (MAPSS). She returned to Chicagoland in 2014 from a year as a Visiting Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Michigan Technological University’s Department of Social Sciences. In Chicago, Graff directed and co-directed archaeological undergraduate field schools for DePaul University, the University of Chicago, Michigan Technological University, and Lake Forest College. Her research has been published in Historical Archaeology, International Journal of Historical Archaeology, Journal of Community Archaeology and Heritage, Current Anthropology, and in edited volumes from presses including Cambridge University Press and Oxford University Press.
Courses Taught
SOAN 110: Introduction to Sociology and Anthropology
SOAN 200: Chicago Parks
SOAN 205: Archaeological Field School
SOAN 215: Archaeological Field Methods
SOAN 216: Introduction to Archaeology
SOAN 220: Domains of Human Evidence
SOAN 225: Historic Artifact Analysis: Artifacts of Modernity
SOAN 227: Historic Preservation and the Politics of Heritage
SOAN 270: Mapping Chicago
SOAN 318: Archaeology of the Contemporary
SOAN 319: Archaeology of Race, Ethnicity, Class, and Gender
Recent Publications
Ryzewski, Krysta and Rebecca S. Graff. (in press). Confronting Bias and Representation in the Heritage of American Cities: Archaeological Approaches to Urban Renewal in Chicago and Detroit. Current Anthropology.
Graff, Rebecca S. (2024). An Archaeology of Chicago Archaeology: Urban Heritage Dissonances from DuSable to the Mecca Flats. Special Issue: Urban Archaeology of and as Dissonance. Historical Archaeology 58(2): 212-236. https://doi.org/10.1007/s41636-024-00500-z
Graff, Rebecca S. and Shannon Martino. (2024). Excavating Chicago from the Armours to Mies: Notes from the Field. Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology 49(1-2): 225-244. https://doi.org/10.5406/23274271.49.2.07
Graff, Rebecca S. and Pauline Saliga. (2022). The City Beyond the White City: Race, Two Chicago Homes, and Their Neighborhoods 1892–2022 (with Pauline Saliga/SAH), virtual exhibit accompanying physical exhibit. https://www.beyondthewhitecity.org/
Graff, Rebecca S. (2021). White City: The World’s Columbian Exposition in Literature. In Chicago: A Literary History. Frederik Byrn Køhlert, ed. Pp. 58-69. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108763738.005
Graff, Rebecca S. (2020). Disposing of Modernity: The Archaeology of Garbage and Consumerism During Chicago’s 1893 World’s Fair. University Press of Florida and the Society for Historical Archaeology. https://upf.com/book.asp?id=9780813066493
Graff, Rebecca S. (2019). An Ardent Anti-Slavery Tale: Narrating Resistance Through Chicago’s Underground Railroad, 1856-present. Journal of Community Archaeology and Heritage. https://doi.org/10.1080/20518196.2019.1576267
Graff, Rebecca S. and M. E. Edwards. (2018). Fair-as-Foodway: Culinary Worlds and Modernizing Tastes at Chicago’s 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. Historical Archaeology 52(4): 420-437. https://doi.org/10.1007/s41636-018-0103-1
Graff, Rebecca S. (2017). Embers from the House of Blazes: Fragments, Relics, Ruins in Chicago. In Contemporary Archaeology and the City: Creativity, Ruination, and Political Action. K. Ryzewski and L. McAtackney, editors. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198803607.003.0013
Fellowships, Awards, and Grants
2022-2024 Appointed member, Illinois Historic Sites Advisory Council, Illinois Department of Natural Resources and the Illinois State Historic Preservation Office
2022, 2024 Merit Stipend for Extraordinary Accomplishment in Teaching or Scholarship, Hunter Fund for Faculty Support, Lake Forest College
2022 AHA-NEH Grant to Sustain and Advance the Work of Historical Organizations Grant, for the project The City Beyond the White City: Race, Two Chicago Homes, and their Neighborhoods (with Pauline Saliga/Society of Architectural Historians), American Historical Association-National Endowment for the Humanities.
2018 William L. Dunn Award for Outstanding Teaching and Scholarly Promise (Lake Forest College)
2013 Kathleen Kirk Gilmore Dissertation Award, Society for Historical Archaeology (SHA)
2013 American Midwest Foodways Scholar’s Grant, Greater Midwest Foodways Alliance, Culinary Historians of Chicago, and the Julia Child Foundation for Gastronomy and the Culinary Arts
2009 Graduate Student Teaching Award for Excellence in Course Design, The Center for Teaching and Learning, University of Chicago
2008 Scherer Center Dissertation Year Fellowship, Karla Scherer Center for the Study of American Culture, University of Chicago
1998 Phi Beta Kappa, University of California, Berkeley
Links of Interest
The City Beyond the White City: Race, Two Chicago Homes, and their Neighborhoods, 1892-2022
Charnley-Persky House Archaeological Project
The Charnley-Persky House Museum
Society for Historical Archaeology
Detroit 2026: SHA Annual Conference
The Register of Professional Archaeologists
Selected Popular Work
Block Club Chicago, College Students Dig To Uncover Long-Buried History Of Armour Flats And Mission On Illinois Tech Campus. https://blockclubchicago.org/2023/06/08/college-students-dig-to-uncover-long-buried-history-of-armour-flats-and-mission-on-illinois-tech-campus/
CBS Chicago, Archaeology students work to dig up lessons about Bronzeville's past at IIT https://www.cbsnews.com/chicago/news/archaeology-students-dig-iit-bronzeville/
Block Club Chicago, Demolition Court Looms For Chicago’s Last Phyllis Wheatley Home, Which Sheltered Black Women During The Great Migration https://blockclubchicago.org/2021/01/29/demolition-court-looms-for-chicagos-last-phyllis-wheatley-home-which-sheltered-black-women-during-the-great-migration/
Chicago Humanities Festival, Q&A: Archaeologist Rebecca Graff on Jackson Park and the Chicago World's Fair https://www.chicagohumanities.org/media/rebecca-graff-jackson-park-chicago-worlds-fair/
Small Object, Giant Leap (Chicago Humanities Festival) Mecca Flats https://www.chicagohumanities.org/media/rebecca-graff-jackson-park-chicago-worlds-fair/
Chicago Magazine, What’s With Those Artifacts Beneath the Future Obama Center?http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/January-2019/Whats-With-Those-Artifacts-Beneath-the-Future-Obama-Center/
Atlas Obscura, Rediscovering Mecca Flats, a Legendary Chicago Apartment Building https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/history-of-mecca-flats-in-chicago
Chicago Tonight (WTTW), Archaeological Dig Attracts Curious Neighbors, History Buffs https://www.pbs.org/video/archaeological-dig-attracts-curious-neighbors-history-buffs-/
CBS News, Archaeology Students Dig Through Secret Room, Possible Link To Underground Railroad https://chicago.cbslocal.com/2018/07/31/secret-room-underground-railroad/
Chicago Tonight (WTTW): Students Dig For Lost Treasures in the Gold Coast: http://chicagotonight.wttw.com/2015/07/29/students-dig-lost-treasures-gold-coast
WGNtv: Urban dig truly makes trash into treasures for local students: http://wgntv.com/2015/07/28/urban-dig-truly-makes-trash-into-treasures-for-local-students/
CBS: Students Digging Up Historical Artifacts At Gold Coast Site: http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2015/07/28/students-digging-up-historical-artifacts-at-gold-coast-site/
Selected Recent Talks and Posters
2025 “Edith and Mies: Archaeology and Architecture of Chicago and Its Environs.” For the session “Cities on the Move: Reflecting on Urban Archaeology in the 21st Century.” Society for Historical Archaeology (SHA) Annual Conference, New Orleans, LA. January 9.
2023 “Invisible Intentions and the Built Environment of a Detroit Backlot: Archaeological and Creative Interventions at the Mike Kelley Mobile Homestead Site (Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit)” (with Krysta Ryzewski, Jan Tichy, John Cardinal, Casey Carter, Julia DiLaura, Brianna LeBlanc, and Anastasia Woody, Society for Historical Archaeology (SHA)Annual Conference, Lisbon, Portugal. January 6.
2022 “Excavating Archaeology and Architecture at Three Chicago Homesites: The Gray-Cloud House, the Charnley-Persky House, and Mecca Flats.” For the Panel Archaeology of Metropolitan Chicago: Part II (P. Porubcan, P. Bryant, C. Tolmie). Society for American Archaeology (SAA) Annual Conference, Chicago, IL. April 2.
2022 “Chicago’s Wastelands” (with Catherine Fennell). For the Panel Making Ground: The Archaeology of Waste Landscapes (J. Gardner, M. Edgeworth, J. Benjamin). Society for American Archaeology (SAA) Annual Conference, Chicago, IL. March 31.
2021 “Chicago’s (Re)moving Monuments” (with Morag Kersel). A Live+Virtual Walking Tour of Jackson Park for #pilgrimCHAT: The Contemporary and Historical Archaeology in Theory Conference, November 9.
2021 “Mecca Flat Blues: Architecture, Archaeology, and Urban Renewal.” Archaeology of Urban Dissonance Panel. Society for Historical Archaeology Annual Meeting, Virtual Conference, January 9.
2020 “Can the ‘City on the Make’ Slow Down for Archaeology?: Remarks from Chicago.” Society for Historical Archaeology Annual Meeting. Boston, MA.