Ashley Dumas (Class of 1996)
Ashley Dumas is a Professor of Anthropology at the University of West Alabama, where she has taught undergraduate anthropology and archaeology classes since 2009. She graduated from Â鶹´«Ã½ with a double major in Anthropology and French, after which she worked for three years in cultural resources management at the Center for Archaeological Studies. Her time at South was marked by field and lab work at many archaeological sites along the northern Gulf Coast, as well as an opportunity to participate in excavations in Québec. She went on to pursue a Master’s (2001) and PhD (2007) at the University of Alabama. Her Master’s thesis was a study in archaeological methods as applied to the original Tabasco Brand Pepper Sauce factory in Louisiana. Her doctoral dissertation explored the production and use of salt by precontact indigenous people in southwest Alabama. For that work, she was able to apply some of the research she had done while working at the Center.
Dr. Dumas has continued to explore the importance of salt for premodern societies, a topic which has led to global collaborations and friendships. She has co-edited two books and published several book chapters on the subject. In 2022, she was awarded a Fulbright Specialist grant to introduce the practice of public archaeology to university students in Poland. At UWA, Dr. Dumas also manages the Fort Tombecbé archaeological site, where she puts into practice the French she learned at South and regularly directs an archaeological field school. Dr. Dumas serves on the boards of several archaeological, preservation, and historical societies and will serve a term as President of the Southeastern Archaeological Society (2026-2028).