UChicago Highlights Derek Kennet’s Class on Ceramic Analysis in Archaeology

September 1, 2026

Students at the University of Chicago are learning archaeology by working directly with the objects archaeologists study.

A recent UChicago News feature goes inside Ceramic Analysis in Archaeology, a course taught by ISAC professor Derek Kennet. Throughout the Spring Quarter, undergraduate and graduate students worked with ancient pottery from ISAC’s collections, examining characteristics such as material, decoration, surface treatment, and manufacturing technique and learning to document objects as archaeologists do in the field. Some of the ceramics they studied date back as much as 5,000 years.

Taking a class inside ISAC and engaging with artifacts from around the world is a dream. Encounters with even the smallest of fragments are capable of providing a wealth of information about their story.

Naomi Elkin second-year UChicago College student

The hands-on course demonstrates how seemingly modest fragments can provide evidence for ancient everyday life. Ceramics can help archaeologists investigate how people prepared and stored food, exchanged goods, developed technologies, and interacted with the wider world. The class also gives students access to ISAC’s extensive collections as a resource for teaching as well as research.

Read the full story “With real artifacts, students piece together the ancient past” at UChicago News.

Fragment of a glazed piece of pottery (D. 8166).

A glazed piece of pottery from the site of Rayy in Iran (ISACM A115027) that students were able to study in the class.

For further information on the pottery from the site of Rayy in Iran, see the following publication.