People
Lab members and research collaborators.
GeoArches is based at Clemson University’s Baruch Institute. The lab works with research collaborators on Reading Between the Tides at Hobcaw Barony.
Lab members
GeoArches Lab
Reed Goodman leads GeoArches. Caleb Yon and Reade Ward are the lab’s graduate students.
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Reed Goodman
Director · Geoarchaeologist · Environmental social scientist
Reed Goodman studies the cultural and historical ecology of wetlands, coastlines, rivers, and deltas. His research integrates archaeology, sedimentary geoscience, ethnohistory, remote sensing, and environmental social science to examine how communities transform dynamic landscapes and how those transformations reorganize later ecological and political possibilities.
At Clemson University, Goodman leads research on historic tidal rice impoundments and South Carolina coastal wetlands. In southern Iraq, he directs geoarchaeological investigations for the Lagash Archaeological Project, reconstructing the relationships among delta evolution, hydrology, agriculture, and early urbanism.
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Caleb Yon

Caleb Yon driving a boat. Photograph supplied by Reed Goodman / GeoArches. GeoArches lab student
Ph.D. student, Forest Resources · Clemson Department of Forestry and Environmental Conservation
Caleb Yon is a Ph.D. student in Forest Resources in Clemson’s Department of Forestry and Environmental Conservation and a recent graduate of The Citadel. Raised in the Southeast, particularly Anderson and Charleston, he is an avid fisherman and camper with a particular love for the Appalachians. He also serves as a second lieutenant in the South Carolina Army National Guard and as an operations officer in the 1st Battalion, 118th Infantry Regiment.
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Reade Ward

Reade Ward beside a marsh channel. Photograph supplied by Reed Goodman / GeoArches. GeoArches lab student
M.S. student, Forest Resources · Clemson Department of Forestry and Environmental Conservation
Reade Ward is an M.S. student in Forest Resources at Clemson’s Baruch Institute, advised by Skip Van Bloem and Reed Goodman. His research interests include the ecological role of estuarine-influenced rice plantations and the dendrochronology of witness trees across historic Hobcaw Barony. He earned his B.S. at Anderson University, where he served as a resident advisor, student-government senator, and captain of the club disc golf team. Reade enjoys bow hunting, beekeeping, fly fishing, and growing heirloom Carolinian crops.
Students
Graduate research and training
Graduate research begins with a question about how a landscape developed. Students learn to relate field observations to laboratory, spatial, and historical evidence, selecting methods that can address that question and recognizing their limits.
National Geographic project
Reading Between the Tides collaborators
These collaborators work with the GeoArches lab on Reading Between the Tides at Hobcaw Barony.
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Stefanie Whitmire
Reading Between the Tides collaborator · National Geographic project
Co-investigator · Wetland ecology and biogeochemistry · Clemson University
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Skip Van Bloem

Map discussion. Photograph supplied by Reed Goodman / GeoArches. Reading Between the Tides collaborator · National Geographic project
Co-investigator · Forest ecology and tree rings · Clemson University
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Marshall Schurtz
Reading Between the Tides collaborator · National Geographic project
Landscape archaeology
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Carolyn Dillian
Reading Between the Tides collaborator · National Geographic project
Prehistoric archaeology
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Zhixiong Shen
Reading Between the Tides collaborator · National Geographic project
Coastal geomorphology · Coastal Carolina University
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Elizabeth Li
Reading Between the Tides collaborator · National Geographic project
M.S. student · Coastal Carolina University
Partnerships
Working with GeoArches
We welcome inquiries from researchers, land managers, and community organizations with a question that archaeology or historical ecology could help address.
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