Background

Lisa Lodwick (1988–2022) was a bright and energetic archaeobotanist. Throughout her (too short) career, she combined systematic, robust laboratory analyses and publications with the clear ambition of advancing the field at an overarching level. Key examples of her endeavours traverse matters of methodological standardization, inclusivity, and open access; and, most explicitly, her 2019 paper on Agendas for Archaeobotany in the 21st Century.

Lisa was widely loved and respected as a person and as a scholar. Her legacy is already supported by a poster award from the Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conference. Moreover, in 2024, the Association for Environmental Archaeology launched a bursary scheme in her name (Wallace 2024). Considering that she was first and foremost an archaeobotanist, the IWGP has decided to launch an award in her honour as well.

The IWGP Lisa Lodwick Award

Conditions

The award targets archaeobotanists who critically reflect upon our field and actively try to address and repair its shortcomings.

More specifically, the following criteria can be considered:

• The individual is working or has worked to improve inclusivity in various ways, including the position of ECR’s, non-European archaeobotanists, and those working outside the university system;
• The individual has sought to improve the way the specialism is positioned in relation to museums, and archaeological or non-archaeological (sub-)disciplines;
• The individual has critically reflected on / evaluated standardisation of commonly applied methods or reasoning.

Target Group

The award is open to nominees from all career stages, age, gender, ethnicity and/or cultural background who have directly or indirectly positively improved enhanced our discipline or access to it. The criteria, as listed above, should not exclude any particular groups. The award is not a career achievement award, nor an award for the most outstanding academic work. However, scholars who could be eligible for awards in those spheres could, for other reasons, be nominated for this award as well.

Process, Award, and Continuation

Nominees can be put forward by anyone, using the Nomination Form. The filled out form must be sent by email to iwgp2025@rug.nl.
The closure date for nomination is 31 January 2024, and the Award will be awarded triennially at the meeting of the International Work Group for Palaeoethnobotany. The winner will be chosen by a rotating jury and will receive a formal certificate alongside a prize of € 500.

The award is supported by the IWGP steering committee, and as initiators and strong believers in Lisa’s legacy, the Groningen Archaeobotany department will guarantee its continuation.

Jury Composition and Role

The jury will always consist of no less than 5, and no more than 7, members selected from the Scientific Committee and Organizing Committee of the associated IWGP meeting. They will act independently and compile the jury report using a standardised form. They will present the award to the winner at the conference.