Eline Schotsmans

Eline Schotsmans is a research fellow at UOW and an associate researcher the University of Bordeaux in France. Her research is focused on funerary practices and burial taphonomy and lies at the interface between archaeo-anthropology and forensic sciences. Eline studies funerary practices that alter decomposition rates, such as natural mummification (e.g. desiccation) and plaster burials (lime or gypsum burials). She is interested in the transition from soft tissue to bone at both the macroscopic and microscopic level, and in its taphonomic effects on, and interactions with, the depositional environment. Related to this, she has begun studying alternative burial practices such as terramation (human composting). She also studies inorganic burial inclusions present in burials as a result of either diagenetic processes or funerary practices (e.g. lime, gypsum, or ochre). As an early career researcher, she has studied and worked in Belgium (Free University Brussels), the United Kingdom (University of Bradford) and France (Université de Bordeaux). For each of these positions she has won several prestigious grants and awards such as from the Arts and Humanities Research Council in the UK, the Initiative d’Excellence in France and the EU Horizon 2020 Marie Curie Fellowship between Australia and France. Working in three European countries and Australia helped to broaden her archaeo-anthropological perspective in both a theoretical and empirical way. Eline’s interdisciplinary approach brings a set of skills in archaeology, anthropology, archaeometry and forensic science. Eline addresses archaeo-anthropological problems experimentally by using forensic taphonomy facilities. She runs archaeological and forensic experiments at both the Australian Facility for Experimental Taphonomic Research (AFTER) and the Facility for Research in Experimental and Social Thanatology (REST) in Canada. Next to her archaeological fieldwork, she is regularly consulted on forensic casework. She has a wide range of forensic experience including responses to five aircraft accidents and one terrorist attack. Eline edited two books: (1) The Routledge Handbook of Archaeothanatology (2022) and (2) Taphonomy of Human Remains: Forensic Analysis of the Dead and the Depositional Environment (2017).