SAŠA ČAVAL
Saša Čaval is a Marie Skłodowska Curie Research Fellow at the University of Reading, UK focusing on the study of medieval funerary heritage in the Western Balkans. Saša gained her PhD from the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia and secured a position of a lecturer in 2014/15 at the Department of Anthropology and Stanford Archaeology Centre, Stanford University, USA. Her research focuses on the archaeology of religion with regional foci spanning south-eastern Europe and the Indian Ocean.
Her investigations centred on the Western Balkans and studied the role of medieval architecture and the integration of elements of power into sacred landscapes. She is especially interested in the application of astronomy as a tool to understand the expression of beliefs within past societies and in spiritual & social relationships of medieval communities to their landscape in SE Europe. She expanded her research to incorporate anthropological as well as archaeological perspectives in a study of identity construction, using religion and religious expression by descendent communities on formerly colonised island enclaves; with Mauritius as a principle case study. She is a founding member of the MACH project (Mauritian Archaeology and Cultural Heritage, PI: dr. Krish Seetah, Cambridge university, UK / Stanford university, USA).
Saša has obtained an extensive fieldwork and research experience in her native Slovenia, on the Adriatic islands and inland, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in the Venetian lagoon in Italy, at Kom Lolla and Deir el-Bahri, Luxor, West Bank, Egypt and in the central Yucatan peninsula, mainly focusing at the religious ‘topographies’.
COLLABORATORS
Prof. SRDIĆ LJUBICA, National Institute for the Protection of Historical, Cultural and Natural heritage, Banja Luka, Republic of Srpska, Bosna and Herzegovina
VRUČINIĆ LJILJANA, National Institute for the Protection of Historical, Cultural and Natural heritage, Banja Luka, Republic of Srpska, Bosna and Herzegovina
assist. prof. MILOSAVLJEVIĆ MONIKA, Department of Archaeology, University of Belgrade, Serbia
assist. prof. CIANCIOSI ALESSANDRA, Department of Archaeology, Ca’Foscari University, Venice, Italy & Marie Skłodowska Curie Fellow, University of Amsterdam, Netherlands / Stanford University, USA
GRAHEK LUCIJA, Institute for Archaeology, Scientific-Research centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Ljubljana, Slovenia
assist. prof. SEETAH KRISH, Department of Anthropology, Stanford University, USA
assoc. prof. PLUSKOWSKI ALEKS, Department of Archaeology, School of Archaeology, Geography and Environmental Sciences, University of Reading, UK
BANERJEA ROWENA, Department of Archaeology, School of Archaeology, Geography and Environmental Sciences, University of Reading, UK
FRY ROB, Department of Archaeology, School of Archaeology, Geography and Environmental Sciences, University of Reading, UK
assist. prof. FREGEL ROSI, Department of Genetics, Faculty of Sciences, University of La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain
REED KELLY, Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, UK
DEFORCE KOEN, Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences, OD Earth and History of Life, Brussel, Belgium
Prof. PEKIĆ RADMILO, Department of History, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Priština, Kosovo
PARTICIPANTS
Left to right: Jelena Radmilović (BIH), Monika Milosavljević (SRB), Krsto Iković (BIH), Eleanor Phillips (UK), Merijam Ananda Babić (SLO), Uroš Zajc (SLO), Vito Andželović (SLO), Lanah Hewson (UK), Olivia Arkley (UK), Giada Bucciol (ITA)
Left to right: Nicole Salazar (USA), Bryanna Godfrey (USA), Hoden Ahmed (UK), Maria Mineto (I), Annie Spencer (UK), Florencia Botta (UK, Argentina) , Tessa Blaikie (UK), Kaja Pavletič (SLO), Arman Kassam (USA)
Left to right: Kelly Lau (UK, Hong Kong), Elvina Norvaisaite (UK, Lithuania), Nicole Salazar (USA), Tiffany Zhang (USA, Hong Kong), Hoden Ahmed (UK), Bryanna Godfrey (USA), Arman Kassam (USA), Jovana Dželetović (SRB, BIH) / Annie Spencer (UK), Tessa Blaikie (UK), Florencia Botta (UK, Argentina), Cooper de Nicola (USA)