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Claire Hodson

Unknown

Areas of interest

  • Foetal and infant growth and development
  • Health, wellbeing and paleopathology of foetal and infant individuals
  • The foetal and infant life course, and the impact of intrauterine experiences on early life
  • Exploring evidence for DOHaD in the archaeological record
  • Social and cultural treatment of the foetus and infant
  • Human identification in forensic contexts, particularly of infants and children
  • Ethical treatment of human remains in forensic and archaeological contexts
  • Forensic archaeological recovery of non-adults.

Research centres and groups

Background

Dr Claire Hodson is a bioarchaeologist and biological anthropologist who has worked in academic and commercial osteology roles in both archaeological and forensic contexts.

In 2020, Claire was awarded a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship for her project Bringing up baby. Claire's research has long been focussed on the foetal, perinatal and infant life course, investigating ways in which growth and health of these individuals was disrupted in past archaeological societies. This fellowship will enable Claire to expand her research and use new methods of skeletal analysis to document the very earliest moments of our lives. Assessing individuals from geographically and temporally diverse populations, this research will investigate foetal-infant mortality, morbidity, and sociocultural treatment, exploring change and continuity in these early life-course experiences between populations. Through skeletal and funerary analysis, this project will establish a comprehensive narrative of fetal-infant life in Britain.

Claire has previously been an adjunct lecturer in Forensic Science, as well as a guest lecturer at several higher education institutions, gaining her Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy in 2018. She has also co-delivered several practical workshops for forensic practitioners, as well as running training courses for local constabularies.

Professional bodies/affiliations

Claire is a member of:

  • British Association for Biological Anthropology and Osteoarchaeology (BABAO)
  • Society for the Study of Childhood in the Past (SSCIP)
  • British Association for Forensic Anthropology (BAFA)
  • Society for the Study of Human Biology (SSHB).

Selected publications

2020

  • Hodson, C. M. 2020: Review of 'Outside Roman London: Roadside Burials By The Walbrook Stream', By Serena Ranieri and Alison Telfer. The London Journal. DOI: 10.1080/03058034.2020.1770998

2019

  • Hodson, C. M. and Gowland, R. L. 2019: Like Mother, Like Child: Investigating perinatal and maternal health stress in Post-Medieval London. In R. Gowland and S. Halcrow (Eds.) The Mother-Infant Nexus in Anthropology: Small Beginnings, Significant Outcomes. Springer: pp 39-64.
  • Hodson, C. M. 2019. Women and children first: Reviews of 'Children and Childhood in Bioarchaeology', Edited by Patrick Beauchesne and Sabrina C. Agarwal, 'Motherhood & Infancies in the Mediterranean in Antiquity', Edited by Margarita Sánchez Romero and Rosa Ma Cid López, and 'The Children of Spring Street: The Bioarchaeology of Childhood in a 19th Century Abolitionist Congregation', By Meredith A. B. Ellis. Antiquity, Vol. 93, Issue 370: 1088-1091: DOI: 10.15184/aqy.2019.96

2017

  • Hodson, C. M. 2017. Between Roundhouse and Villa: Assessing Perinatal and Infant Burials from Piddington, Northamptonshire. Britannia, Vol. 48: 195-219: DOI:10.1017/S0068113X17000137

Publications