2025-2026 Public Lecture Program

for the

TOLEDO SOCIETY,

the local chapter of the

ARCHAEOLOGICAL INSTITUTE OF AMERICA (AIA)

  All lectures are illustrated, non-technical, free, and open to the public.

All lectures are co-sponsored by the Toledo Museum of Art.

[last updated 11 August 2025]

       

1.     6:30 pm, October 10 (Friday), 2025 


Speaker: Andrew Roddick, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Anthropology at McMaster University (Ontario, Canada) 


Lecture: “A High Altitude ‘Big Bang’: The Development of the Tiwanaku ‘State’ in the Lake Titicaca Basin, Bolivia”

Synopsis: The site of Tiwanaku, located on the edge of Lake Titicaca in the high plains or “altiplano” of the Bolivian Andes, has intrigued archaeologists for over a century. In recent years, however, we have seen an explosion of research at both Tiwanaku (475-1100 AD), and neighbouring earlier Late Formative (300 BC-475 AD) sites. I have been part of these efforts for almost 25 years, contributing to a more nuanced perspective to the environmental and historical processes prior to Tiwanaku. In this talk, I discuss some of the recent research on this Late Formative Period and our current understanding of Tiwanaku. I argue that while some of these social changes were gradual, there was a “big bang” – an explosion of politics, new economies, and creative endeavors - around the end of the 4th century AD. I present some of the current explanations for this “big bang” and discuss some of the processes that lead up to the first city in the highlands of Andean South America, and touch on current understandings of its downfall.


Venue: the Little Theater at the Toledo Museum of Art

 

2.    6:30 pm, November 21 (Friday), 2025


* * * 4th Annual Mohamed El-Shafie Memorial Lecture on Ancient Egypt * * *


Speaker: Sarah Schellinger, Ph.D., Lecturer in Art History at the Ohio State University of California (Columbus, OH)

 

Lecture: “Nubia and its Neighbors: Identifying Cultural Connections in Kushite Art and Architecture”

 

Synopsis: As with most civilizations in the ancient world, Nubia had contact with its neighbors, particularly Egypt, the Aksumite Empire, and the broader Mediterranean World. These connections can be seen through the adoption and adaptation of foreign elements by Nubian artisans in both their material culture, such as stelae and funerary art, and architecture, such as palaces, temples, and tombs. This lecture will illustrate how the Napatan (ca. 800 – 300 BCE) and Meroitic (ca. 300 BCE – 350 CE) kingdoms incorporated foreign decorative elements into their architecture while also expressing their culture in its own right.


Venue: the Little Theater at the Toledo Museum of Art


  3.     6:30 pm, December 19 (Friday), 2025


* * * 12th Annual Dorothy M. Price Memorial Lecture on Ancient Art * * *


Speaker: Sonya Rhie Mace, Ph.D., Curator of Indian and Southeast Asian Art at the Cleveland Museum of Art (Cleveland, OH)

 

Lecture: "Buddha’s Nativity and First Steps in the Art of Early South Asia”

Synopsis: The life story of the historical Buddha includes the vivid scene of a miraculous birth from his mother’s side. He then was able to take seven steps that prove his superhuman abilities, even as an infant. In the region of Gandhara, in present-day Pakistan, numerous examples of the scene adorned sacred Buddhist sites beginning in the second century CE. Farther south in peninsular India, however, during the time when the Buddha was not depicted in human form, the birth scene may also have been avoided. Narrative relief sculptures previously identified as scenes of his Nativity may be more accurately understood as depicting his first steps, just after the moment of his birth.

 

Venue: the Little Theater at the Toledo Museum of Art


4.     6:30 pm, January 16 (Friday), 2026     


* * * 1st Annual Robert Finkel Memorial Lecture on Archaeology and Ancient Art * * *


Speaker: Matthew Canepa, Ph.D., Professor of Art History and Archaeology at the University of California (Irvine, CA)  

 

Lecture: “Between the Hellenistic and Iranian Ecumenes”

 

Synopsis: This lecture focuses on the role of luxury material in shaping and contesting elite identities in the lands of the former Achaemenid Persian Empire and its Central and Southern Asian borderlands and littorals after Alexander the Great. It will focus on the formation of new, competing traditions of luxury under the Persian empire’s rivals and successors, centering particularly on the new Seleucid and Arsacid dynasties of Iran, well represented in the collection of the Toledo Museum of Art. It will examine how their intertwined and competing traditions of precious drinking vessels and royal display agonistically produced a new Iranian court culture that participated in both the Hellenistic and Iranian ecumenes.   


Venue: the Little Theater at the Toledo Museum of Art


5.     6:30 pm, February 13 (Friday), 2026     


Speaker: Christina T. Haperin, Ph.D., Professor of Archaeology at the Université de Montréal (Quebec, Canada)  

 

Lecture: “Resiliency and Changing Political Dynamics at the Ancient Maya City of Ucanal, Guatemala’”

 

Synopsis: The end of the Classic period in the Southern Maya Lowlands is known as a time of political collapse and site abandonment. Not all settlements, however, were abandoned and some even prospered during the Terminal Classic period (ca. 810-1000 CE). This talk presents new archaeological data from one of these prospering settlements, the ancient city of Ucanal, the capital of the K’anwitznal kingdom. Research at the site by the Proyecto Arqueológico Ucanal documents an early 9th century fire-burning event at the Maya site of Ucanal and argues that it marked a momentous moment in not only the political history of the kingdom, but in the political transition between the Late Classic (ca. 600-810 CE) and Terminal Classic period in the Southern Maya Lowlands. The fire-burning rite involved the destruction of an earlier dynastic line, in which the contents of a Late Classic royal tomb were taken out and burned. Although this momentous event was seemingly an ending, it was really just the beginning. This talk outlines the ways in which the K’anwitznal polity reinvented itself in the Terminal Classic period. In particular, it examines new types of public buildings, new interregional connections, and new ceremonial practices that would become the foundations of later Postclassic (ca. 1000-1521 CE) practices.


Venue: the Little Theater at the Toledo Museum of Art

 

6.     6:30 pm, March 13 (Friday), 2026     


* * * 28th Annual Kurt T. Luckner Memorial Lecture on Ancient Art and Archaeology in Museums * * *


Speaker: Allison Sterrett-Krause, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Classics and Director of the Archaeology Program at the College of Charleston (Charleston, SC)  

 

Lecture: "Ancient Mediterranean Glass: Windows into the Greek and Roman Worlds"

 

Synopsis: As museum visitors, we marvel at well-preserved examples of Greek and Roman glass, but what can these items reveal about the cultures and people who created them? We’ll explore what these beautiful glass objects can tell us about technological change, religious rituals, luxury, and daily life in the ancient Mediterranean.


Venue: the Little Theater at the Toledo Museum of Art 

7.     6:30 pm, April 10 (Friday), 2026 


* * * National AIA 'Society Choice' Lecturer * * *


Speaker: Ashley Lemke, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin (Milwaukee, WI)

 

Lecture: “A Deep Dive into Deep Time: Archaeology Underwater”


Synopsis: The phrase “underwater archaeology" conjures notions of shipwrecks, ships lost at sea, and the dramatic catastrophes that sank them; however, the archaeology underwater can also reveal details about ancient landscapes that contain a record of past human occupations. Many of these sites are on the earth's continental shelves where vast stretches of shallow, coastal lands were exposed at the end of the last Ice Age. These once dry landscapes supported life for plants, animals, and humans for thousands of years. Learn about these ancient submerged sites, the role they play in the global archaeological record and what unique data they have about the past. The talk will provide a general overview and the focus on 9,000 year old submerged sites in the North American Great Lakes.

Venue: the Little Theater at the Toledo Museum of Art 

8.     6:30 pm, May 15 (Friday), 2026  


Speaker: Maggie Popkin, Ph.D., Professor of Art History at Case Western Reserve University (Cleveland, OH)

 

Lecture: “I Came, I Saw, I Collected: Travel Souvenirs from the Roman Empire”

Synopsis: Souvenirs are a mainstay of modern tourism, but the phenomenon has ancient roots. This lecture examines souvenirs commemorating cities and monuments from the Roman Empire, from the great Lighthouse of Alexandria to Hadrian's Wall in Britain. In a time before mass media and mass literacy, these mementos had extraordinary power to shape how people envisioned Rome's empire and its cultural heritage.


Venue: the Little Theater at the Toledo Museum of Art



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 For more information on the Toledo Society's lecture program contact:

 

James A. Harrell, Lecture Program Co-coordinator for the AIA-Toledo Society 
(phone: 419-530-2193; e-mail: james.harrell@utoledo.edu)