Jeffrey P. Emanuel

Jeff Emanuel (harvard.academia.edu/JeffEmanuel) is Associate Director of Academic Technology at Harvard University, leading a team of highly experienced instructional technology professionals that researches, develops, implements, and supports digital tools and approaches to teaching, learning, and research (see grants & projects). The Academic Technology team serves the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Harvard University's largest school, and supports over 1,100 faculty, 1,000 researchers, and 10,000 students across Harvard College, the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, and the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.

In 2015, Jeff and a History Department faculty member, Gabriel Pizzorno, co–founded the Harvard University Digital Scholarship Support Group (DSSG), a network that operates in lieu of a Center for Digital Scholarship or Digital Humanities to provide training, research support, and infrastructure development for digital scholarship, as well as to provide faculty, students, and staff interested in incorporating digital methods into their teaching and research with a single point of entry to the many resources available at Harvard.

Jeff is also a member of the Harvard Initiative for Learning and Teaching's University–wide Teaching and Learning Consortium, a network of pedagogy experts that "incubates and refines teaching and learning ideas and initiatives that cross school and disciplinary boundaries," and was co-Chair of the Digital Futures Consortium at Harvard (DFC), a "network of technologists, faculty, researchers, and librarians engaged in the ongoing transformation of scholarship through innovative technology through sharing expertise across the global academic community, facilitating new forms and methods of research, and fostering collaborative projects that bring about field changing developments in scholarship" (see University & department service). An active initiative since 2012, the DFC was sunset in 2019 as a result of the activities and engagement that were its raisons d'être having been successfully incorporated into organizations and activities across the University (including the Digital Scholarship Support Group).

Additionally, Jeff holds an appointment as CHS Fellow in Aegean Archaeology and Prehistory at Harvard's Center for Hellenic Studies, researching naval warfare and the development of maritime technology with a focus on the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean during the Late Bronze/Early Iron Age transition (see books, publications, and conference & workshop papers). He has also served as a member of the Society for American Archaeology's (SAA) Media Relations Committee and the SAA's Gene Stuart Award committee.

Previously, Jeff was a founding member of HarvardX, a presidential initiative at Harvard (led by the Vice Provost for Advances in Learning) that focuses on digital teaching, learning, and research, both on campus and online. He served as Inaugural HarvardX Fellow, Inaugural Senior Fellow, and Senior Project Lead, leading in the design and development of online learning experiences, curriculum, and business and project managenent processes, and receiving the Harvard CIO Council's "Golden Bit Award" in 2013 for "significant contributions to Harvard University's Strategic IT Initiative in Online Learning." He also served as project director for two key software development initiatives, the Open edX/LTI Annotation Tool development project and, in collaboration with Harvard's Library Technology Services (LTS) and Arts & Humanities Research Computing (DARTH), the International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF)-based Shared Canvas/Mirador high resolution image project (see grants & projects). Administratively, Jeff served as founding co-chair of the HarvardX Instructor Experience and Student Experience Committees, as a founding member of the FAS Blended Learning Support Team, and as a curriculum developer and lead instructor on Blended Learning and Flipped Classroom Techniques for the inaugural sessions of the HarvardX/FAS Faculty Academy (see University & department service).

A member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, Jeff conducted his graduate study at Harvard, where he concentrated in Social and Cultural Anthropology and Archaeology and earned the Director's Prize for Outstanding Thesis in the Social Sciences. Prior to this, Jeff studied Classics (with a Classical Archaeology concentration) at the University of Georgia, where he also served as a security leadership fellow with the Center for International Trade and Security, served as a Franklin College of Arts & Sciences Ambassador, and competed in water polo and triathlon. While at Georgia, Jeff was recognized for excellence in scholarship and citizenship, receiving awards for local and international community service from the University and from the Athens–Clarke County Rotary Club, including the Pillar of the Community Award (awarded for "assisting others above and beyond the call of duty"), the Bulldog Vision Award (for "demonstrating outstanding leadership and vision for the betterment of the community"), and the Circle of Excellence Award for international community service. His volunteer service has included establishing a program to teach English to orphaned children in rural South Korea, and being trained to serve as an officer of the Juvenile Court representing underprivileged children in abuse, neglect, and custody cases in Georgia. He also holds an associate's degree in Information Systems Technology from the community College of the Air Force.

Jeff previously served as a Special Warfare operator in the US Air Force. His assignments included a year in Korea (2002) and deployment to Iraq (2003) as a member of a joint special operations task force. He returned to Iraq in 2007 as a civilian journalist, reporting from the front lines for several newspapers, magazines, and websites, including an exclusive report from Samarra that was the cover story of the November 2007 issue of The American Spectator magazine. Additionally, Jeff is founder and managing partner of a web development and digital strategy firm, Lighthouse Strategies & Consulting, and has worked as a consultant, senior project manager, and online content and communication strategist, developing dynamic websites and digital communication strategies for businesses, nonprofits, and academic organizations from the Beltway to the Rocky Mountains.

Organizations

Academic Technology for the Harvard University Faculty of Arts and Sciences

Books

Emanuel, J. P. (2020). Naval Warfare and Maritime Conflict in the Late Bronze and Early Iron Age Mediterranean . Ancient Warfare. Leiden: Brill. Link to publisher Abstract

In Naval Warfare and Maritime Conflict in the Late Bronze and Early Iron Age Mediterranean, Jeffrey P. Emanuel examines the evidence for maritime violence in the Mediterranean region during both the Late Bronze Age and the tumultuous transition to the Early Iron Age in the years surrounding the turn of the 12th century BCE.

There has traditionally been little differentiation between the methods of armed conflict engaged in during the Late Bronze and Early Iron Ages, on both the coasts and the open seas, while polities have been alternately characterized as legitimate martial actors and as state sponsors of piracy. By utilizing material, documentary, and iconographic evidence and delineating between the many forms of armed conflict, Emanuel provides an up-to-date assessment not only of the nature and frequency of warfare, raiding, piracy, and other forms of maritime conflict in the Late Bronze Age and Late Bronze-Early Iron Age transition, but also of the extent to which modern views about this activity remain the product of inference and speculation.

Emanuel, Jeffrey P. 2020. Naval Warfare and Maritime Conflict in the Late Bronze and Early Iron Age Mediterranean (monograph). Ancient Warfare Series, Volume 2; Culture and History of the Ancient Near East, Volume: 117. Leiden: Brill.

Emanuel, J. P. (2017). Black Ships and Sea Raiders: The Late Bronze–Early Iron Age Context of Odysseus' Second Cretan Lie . Greek Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches. Lexington Books. Link to publisher Abstract

The Late Bronze Age ended with a bang in the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean: palaces and empires collapsed, from Greece to Egypt; coastal territories were beset by pirates and marauders; migratory peoples were on the move across land and sea; and geopolitical lines were permanently redrawn – conditions reflected, in many ways, by the world portrayed in Homer’s Odyssey. The notorious ‘Sea Peoples,’ mysterious groups of warriors who were credited by the pharaoh Ramesses III with destroying empires across the Near East at this time, fit into this puzzle in some way, although their exact role continues to be hotly debated. In the Odyssey’s various subplots, Odysseus himself carries out activities that are that highly reminiscent of the Sea Peoples, as he engages in raids and skirmishes while circuitously making his way back from Troy. Though it is presented as a falsehood within Homer’s master narrative, one such subplot, the “Second Cretan Lie” (Odyssey xiv 191–359) is striking in its similarity to the experience of one specific Sea Peoples group, whom Egyptian pharaohs referred to as the ‘Sherden of the Sea’, and whose seaborne attacks they claimed that “none could withstand.”

This book marshals documentary, pictorial, and material evidence to examine Odysseus’ Second Cretan Lie in the context of the Late Bronze–Iron Age transition, with particular emphasis on changes in the iconography of warriors and warfare, social and economic upheaval, and remarkable innovation in maritime technology and tactics. Particular focus is given the hero’s description of his frequent raiding activities, including an ill–fated attempt on the Nile Delta, and on his description of seven subsequent years spent in the land of the pharaohs, during which he claims to have gathered great wealth. Setting the evidence for the Sherden of the Sea against this Homeric narrative demonstrates not only that Odysseus’ Second Cretan Lie fits into the temporal framework of the Late Bronze–Early Iron Age transition, but that there were historical people who actually lived that which Odysseus falsely claims as his own experience.

Emanuel, Jeffrey P. 2017. Black Ships and Sea Raiders: The Late Bronze–Early Iron Age Context of Odysseus' Second Cretan Lie (monograph). Greek Studies: Interdisciplinary Approaches. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.

Articles & Book Chapters

Emanuel, J. P., & Lamb, A. (2017). Open, Online, and Blended: Transactional Interactions with MOOC Content by Learners in Three Different Course Formats. Online Learning , 21 (2), 1-25. Click Here to Download Abstract

During the 2013-14 academic year, Harvard University piloted the use of MOOCs as tools for blended learning in select undergraduate and graduate residential and online courses. One of these courses, The Ancient Greek Hero, combined for–credit (Harvard College and Harvard Extension School) and open online (HarvardX) groups into a single online unit, marking the first time the same instance of a MOOC was used simultaneously by both tuition–paying, credit–seeking students and non–paying, non–credit students enrolled exclusively online. In this article, we analyze and compare the online behavior of students and participants in the three groups that simultaneously participated in The Ancient Greek Hero via the edX platform. We find that, in similar fashion to a traditional learning setting, students enrolled in all three versions of the course engaged the online content in a transactional way, spending their time and effort on activities and exercises in ways that would optimize their desired outcomes. While user behavior was diverse, HarvardX participant engagement tended to be either very deep or virtually nonexistent, while College and Extension School students displayed relatively homogenous patterns of participation, viewing most of the content but interacting mostly with that which affected their overall course grades. Ultimately, we conclude that educators who intend to utilize MOOC content in an effort to apply blended learning techniques to their classrooms should carefully consider how best to incorporate each online element into their overall pedagogical strategy, including how to incentivize interaction with those elements. Further, for MOOCs to have maximum impact, they must address multiple learner motivations and provide participants with multiple modes of interaction with the content and with their peers.

Emanuel, J. P. (2016). Sea Peoples in Egyptian Garrisons in Light of Beth Shean, (Re-) Reconsidered. Mediterranean Archaeology , 28/29 (2015/2016), 1-21. Click Here to Download Abstract

One of the most noteworthy, and most discussed, groups of material finds from Beth-Shean comes from the site’s Northern Cemetery, where the remains of at least 50 clay anthropoid coffins were uncovered in eleven tombs dating mainly to the 13th and 12th centuries BC. Five of these in particular, from Tombs 66 and 90, are unlike anything known from the corpus of anthropoid coffins in Canaan or the greater Egyptian world.

While the view of these coffins as representations of Sea Peoples has fallen out of favour in recent years, this paper argues that this specific coffin group—and site—should be separated from the larger phenomenon of anthropoid coffin burials in Canaan as well as in Egypt and Nubia, and that this iconographic and chronological connection adds to the evidence for a presence of individuals connected to the Sea Peoples’ tradition in the Egyptian garrison at Beth-Shean in the 12th century BC.

Emanuel, J. P. (2016). Maritime Worlds Collide: Agents of Transference and the Metastasis of Seaborne Threats at the End of the Bronze Age. Palestine Exploration Quarterly , 148 (4), 265-280. Click Here to Download Abstract

Primary sources from the end of the Bronze Age have long been read as suggesting a time of chaotic transition, particularly with regard to threats from the sea that the established powers had no means of combatting. While the scale and severity of seaborne attacks seems to have increased in the late 13th century, these were not in themselves new phenomena, as a state of maritime threat seems to have been a constant for coastal polities and mariners in the Late Bronze Age Eastern Mediterranean. However, a combination of internal and external factors in the late 13th and early 12th centuries combined to make these attacks more effective than they had been in the past, and polities more vulnerable to them. These included the rapid spread of improvements in maritime technology, particularly from the Aegean and the Levant, via high–intensity ‘zones of transference,’ as well as an increase in the scale of ship–based combat operations, due in part to the displacement of people during the Late Bronze Age collapse. This paper addresses this in two parts, beginning with the ‘background’ evidence for a constant state of maritime threat in the centuries leading up to the end of the Bronze Age, and concluding with the ‘foreground’ evidence for zones of transference and the transmission of groundbreaking elements of naval technology in the years surrounding the Late Bronze–Early Iron Age transition.

Emanuel, J. P., Morse, C., & Hollis, L. (2016). The New Interactive: Reimagining Visual Collections as Immersive Environments. VRA Bulletin , 43 (2), 1-16. Click Here to Download Abstract

Emerging technologies and shared standards have opened up new avenues for the curation and presentation of data in archives and published research. Among their many benefits, these developments have made collections across archives more accessible, and have vastly improved the visual experience for users. This paper focuses on the next step in applying technical development and standards to digital collections: improving discoverability and providing a visual product that is simultaneously informative and experiential. The cases presented here focus on new approaches in these areas, with an emphasis on the utilization of visual search and discovery across a research archive and the integration of data and image into an augmented reality (AR) experience, with discussion of how these approaches can improve the usability of visual material while broadening the user’s experience from the purely visual into the realm of the immersive.

Emanuel, J. P. (2016). ‘Dagon Our God’: Iron I Philistine Cult in Text and Archaeology. Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions , 16 (1), 22-66. Click Here to Download Abstract

Despite the late date and dubious veracity of the Deuteronomistic history, and despite the Bible’s status as the only Bronze or Iron Age text which indisputably refers to Dagon in a southern Canaanite geographical context, scholars have traditionally accepted 1 Samuel 5:1–8’s portrayal of Philistine cult in the Iron Age I as being centered on this deity and his temple at Ashdod. This study marshals archaeological and historical evidence to assess the level of support for the presence of Dagon in Iron I Philistia, and for a temple at Ashdod as described in the biblical account. Also considered, through comparison with the materially analogous situation in the Bronze Age Aegean, is the critical role that a textual complement to physical evidence (or, in the case of the Philistines, the lack thereof) plays in cultic analysis and pantheonic reconstruction.

Emanuel, J. P. (2020). Augmented Reality and the Harvard Yard Archaeology Project. In Revolution: 2020 Conference on Historical and Underwater Archaeology, Boston, MA, January 8-11 . Presenter in "Harvard Yard Archaeology Forum" session.Abstract

Harvard Yard Archaeology Project is a university museum, academic and community focused effort with special attention to the 17th-century educational institution. Years of investigation in the Yard highlight remarkable artifacts, features, public archaeology, and more recently, digital methods. Project stories contribute to local archaeology and broader significance in the archaeology of colonial institutions, health, and indigenous education. Recent field findings and demonstrations of digital archaeology come together from student contributors and study partners. Examples include GIS data visualization and analysis, 3D imaging, a web-based interpretative and data access platform, and an augmented reality application. The theme of heritage issues on campus and within community archaeology anchors discussion.

Panelists: Patricia Capone (Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University), Diana Loren (Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University), Wade Campbell (Dept of Anthropology, Harvard University), Jeff Emanuel (Academic Technology, Harvard University), Diana Gerberich (Harvard University), Jeremy Guillette (Academic Technology, Harvard University), Christina Hodge (Stanford University), Sarah Johnson (Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University), Nam Kim (Dept of Anthropology, Harvard University), John Stubbs (The Paideia School; and Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University), Paul Tamburro (Dept of Anthropology, Harvard University), Alex McQuilling (Harvard University)

Emanuel, J. P. (2020). Seafaring. In Joint Annual Meeting of the Archaeological Institute of America (AIA) and the Society for Classical Studies (SCS), Washington, DC, January 3-5 . Respondent in session "Imagining Islands, Meditating on Mainlands".Abstract

This workshop will adopt a forum format to explore the construction of island identities in relation to mainland identities in the Iron Age Mediterranean. This topic is the focus of a major new project based at the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, UK. The project involves the archaeological investigation of island identities on Cyprus, Crete, and Sardinia during the period ca. 1100–600 B.C.E., and will culminate in a large-scale exhibition in September 2021.

The aim of this workshop session is to kick-start the project with a radical and open exchange of ideas, adopting a comparative and interdisciplinary perspective to develop new approaches to the topic. It will begin with the presentation of a case study—that of Cyprus and Cilicia. Subsequent speakers will respond to this, and workshop participants will be encouraged to use the example case as a jumping off point to explore other instances and broader implications.

The workshop will be moderated by project’s P.I. and Lead Curator.

Moderators: Anastasia Christofilopoulou, University of Cambridge, and Naoíse Mac Sweeney, University of Leicester

Panelists: Jo Quinn, University of Oxford, Marian Feldman, Johns Hopkins University, Evi Margaritis, The Cyprus Institute, Jana Mokrisova, Birkbeck College, University of London, Louise Hitchcock, The University of Melbourne, and Jeffrey P. Emanuel, Harvard University

Emanuel, J. P. (2019). The Harvard Yard Archaeology Project: From Analog Past to Digital (AR) Future. In Digitorium 2019, Tuscaloosa, AL, Oct. 10-12.Abstract

Since the turn of the millennium, students in the Harvard College course Anthropology 1130 “The Archaeology of Harvard Yard” have participated in a biennial excavation of a portion of Harvard Yard, the center of America's oldest college. The course includes excavation, conservation, analysis, and cataloguing of material finds, many of which are displayed by the Peabody Museum for Archaeology and Ethnology in an exhibit called “Digging Veritas.”

In the 2016 field season, the Peabody Museum and Harvard’s Academic Technology group partnered to integrate digital methods into the excavation process and the course. This began by gathering geospatial and photogrammetric data from the excavation, by building 3D models of the excavation trenches, and by developing and supporting an Omeka site for images and “object biographies” of key finds. This partnership has since focused on the development of an Augmented Reality (AR) application that will help accomplish the public archaeology and cultural heritage missions of the excavation and exhibit by enabling the public – physically at Harvard Yard or around the world – to interact with the excavation and its results, and to learn about the early history of American higher education, including its multicultural nature and the experiences of the students who lived it.

This presentation discusses the purpose of the excavations and the integration of digital methods, lessons learned, and future prospects, and offers a hands-on demonstration of the AR application for use and feedback.

Emanuel, J. P. (2019). Advancing Digital Methodology in Teaching, Learning, and Research: A Networked Approach. In Digitorium 2019, Tuscaloosa, AL, Oct. 10-12.Abstract

Recent years have seen an increase in digital scholarship, in digital methods-related courses, and in the integration of digital components into courses and assignments. At Harvard, the latter has been encouraged through the Digital Teaching Fellow, or DiTF, program, an initiative to support the thoughtful redesigning of courses to support the integration of digital methods and tools into learning objectives and curricula. With no formal “digital scholarship center,” “digital humanities center,” or other formal support structure, the challenge of providing necessary support for these increases in digital methods and tools was met by a group of key role players from around the university.

Beginning as an informal gathering, this supporting cast has developed into the Digital Scholarship Support Group, or DSSG, a decentralized network that strives to foster the acquisition of digital literacy and the use of digital methods and tools in teaching, learning, and research. Its members, which represent multiple disparate departments, centers, and organizations across Harvard, take a “no wrong door” approach to supporting and furthering digital scholarship, working together to provide the University community with a single point of entry to the resources available to them.

A core focus of the DSSG is providing greatly-in-demand training to students, teaching fellows, faculty, and staff. The DSSG’s training seminars focus on the fundamentals of digital scholarship, on the integration of digital tools and methods into pedagogy, and on specific genres of tools and methods (for example, Visualization), and each is re-thought and redesigned based on the feedback of previous participants.

A key DSSG offering is the Digital Teaching Methods seminar. Initially created to train the aforementioned DiTFs, this workshop focuses on the learning goal–based integration of digital tools and methods into pedagogical approaches, providing hands-on introductions in the context of specific pedagogical examples and use cases. Unlike many ‘teaching with technology’–related efforts that focus on specific tools or on the digital genre in general, the DSSG’s approach emphasizes using technology to enhance learning, addressing both the practical mechanics of employing these tools and approaches and the pedagogical needs that they serve.

This presentation focuses on the impetus for the DSSG’s formation and persistence, the iteratively-developed and user-focused nature of its activities, and future prospects in the digital scholarship space, with an emphasis on the pedagogical advances and support made available by the group’s efforts.

Emanuel, J. P. (2019). Entangled Sea(faring): Reconsidering the Connection between the Ships of the Sea Peoples, the Aegean, and 'Urnfield' Europe. In The Entangled Sea: The Mediterranean Sea in Ancient History and Prehistory . University of Manchester, June 12–13.Abstract

The naval battle representation on the walls of Ramesses III’s ‘mansion of a million years’ at Medinet Habu (ca. 1175 BCE) stands as one of the earliest, and certainly most detailed, depictions of ship–to–ship combat. It also depicts the only known vessels of Helladic galley type to be depicted with stem–and–stern avian decoration. As such, they have been called upon as evidence for the inclusion of Central Europeans (‘Urnfielders’) in the Sea Peoples coalition(s), and – more recursively – to bolster the view that the highly schematic designs on the stemposts of Helladic galleys were avian in nature. This paper addresses these conclusions and evaluates the evidence that has been presented for an ‘Urnfield’ connection to the Sea Peoples’ ships, along with some notes on the ostensibly avian nature of Helladic galleys’ finial decorations.

Jeffrey P. Emanuel

Associate Director of Academic Technology, CHS Fellow in Aegean Archaeology & Prehistory, Harvard University

Organizations

Books

Articles & Book Chapters

Conference Papers & Presentations