Senior Lecturer of Archaeology
Areas of Interest
Paleoecological reconstructions of Plio-Pleistocene hominin sites; Habitats and diets of early Homo; African Middle and Later Stone Ages; Reconstructing exchange and movementnetworks; Local paleoenvironments and climate; Hunter-to-herder transition in sub-Saharan Africa; Adaptive radiation of platyrrhines during the Miocene; Stable isotope analyses; Geospatial analysis and modeling.
Excavations and Fieldwork
Joshua Robinson is an archaeologist with research interests in the paleoecological context of Plio-Pleistocene biological and behavioral adaptations of the human lineage. His research appliesmulti-proxy ecological and geospatial methods to study how past habitats affected hominin diets, evolution, and movements. Robinson has conducted research on the paleobiology of early Homo at Hadar and Ledi-Geraru in Ethiopia as well as field and museum work on the Middle to Later Stone Age transition in Kenya, Ethiopia, Zambia, and South Africa. Using spatially and temporally complex datasets, he seeks to reconstruct paleoecosystems in an effort to assess how changing climatic and habitat contexts intersected with behavioral and demographic changes in socio-ecologically linked adaptive cycles. In addition to this work, Robinson also has interests in the adaptive radiation of platyrrhine primates in Argentine Patagonia during the Miocene. He has conducted paleoecological research on the Pinturas Formation and is a co-PI of a recently funded Leakey Foundation grant (2025-2027) for new field work in the Collon Cura Formation.
Representative Publications
Robinson, Joshua R., Ignacio A. Lazagabaster, John Rowan, Margaret E. Lewis, Lars Werdelin, Christopher J. Campisano, & Kaye E. Reed. 2025. Palaeoecology of the Pliocene large carnivore guild at Hadar, Lower Awash Valley, Ethiopia. Journal of Human Evolution, 202, 103653. DOI: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2025.103653
Kirkpatrick, Andrew G., Ignacio A. Lazagabaster, Joshua R. Robinson, John Rowan, Christopher J. Campisano, Kaye E. Reed, Jessica R. Scott, & Peter S. Ungar. 2025. Dental microwear of bovids from the Pliocene-Pleistocene transition in the lower Awash Valley, Ethiopia. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, 670, 112932. DOI: 10.1016/j.palaeo.2025.112932
Smail, Irene E., Amy L. Rector, Joshua R. Robinson, & Kaye E. Reed. 2025. Pliocene climatic change and the origins of Homo at Ledi-Geraru, Ethiopia. Annals of Human Biology, 52(1), 2462255. DOI: 10.1080/03014460.2025.2462255
Robinson, Joshua R. 2023. A context for connectivity: Stable isotope insights to habitat heterogeneity in the late Pleistocene and Holocene of southern Africa. Journal of Paleolithic Archaeology, 6, 34. DOI: 10.1007/s41982-023-00160-0
Robinson, Joshua R. 2022. Investigating Isotopic Niche Space: Using rKIN for stable isotope studies in archaeology. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory, 29, 831-861. DOI: 10.1007/s10816-021-09541-7
Robinson, Joshua R. 2022. Investigating habitat heterogeneity of Late Pleistocene archaeological sites in eastern Africa from stable isotopes. Historical Biology, 34:4, 674-693. DOI: 10.1080/08912963.2021.1942465
Robinson, Joshua R., John Rowan, W. Andrew Barr, & Matt Sponheimer. 2021. Intrataxonomictrends in herbivore enamel δ13C are decoupled from ecosystem woody cover. Nature Ecology & Evolution, 5, 995-1002. DOI: 10.1038/s41559-021-01455-7
Robinson, Joshua R., & John D. Kingston. 2020. Burned by the fire: Isotopic effects of experimental combustion of faunal tooth enamel. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 34(A), 102593. DOI: 10.1016/j.jasrep.2020.102593
Robinson, Joshua R. 2019. A Holocene paleoenvironmental record based on ungulate stable isotopes from Lukenya Hill, Kenya. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 28, 102016. DOI: 10.1016/j.jasrep.2019.102016
Du, Andrew, Joshua R. Robinson, Ignacio A. Lazagabaster, John Rowan, and Anna K. Behrensmeyer. 2019. Stable carbon isotopes from paleosol carbonate and herbivore enamel document differing paleovegetation signals in the eastern African Plio-Pleistocene. Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology 261:41-52. DOI: 10.1016/j.revpalbo.2018.11.003