dr. R (Roy) van Beek

I am Associate Professor in Landscape Archaeology at the departments of Soil Geography and Landscape (SGL) and Cultural Geography (GEO). I study human-landscape interactions over long time scales by means of developing and applying innovative, interdisciplinary methods, and investigate how we can use that knowledge to create future-proof, regenerative landscapes.

In the first stages of my career I mainly worked on Northwest European 'dryland' landscapes. My NWO Veni project 'Deconstructing Stability' focused on landscape dynamics in the coversand landscape of the eastern Dutch Twente region. In more recent work this emphasis has shifted towards wetlands. My NWO Vidi project 'Home Turf' centered on the long-term history of raised bogs in the Pleistocene parts of the Netherlands and adjacent areas. I was Principal Investigator of the JPI-CH project 'WETFUTURES': Wetland Futures in Contested Environments: an inter- and transdisciplinary approach to wetland heritage in the Netherlands, United Kingdom and Ireland.

Currently I am joint leader of the NWA project EARTHWORK. In this research we focus on the application and improvement of OSL techniques in investigations of anthropogenic earthworks in the Netherlands, such as dikes, dwelling mounds and Celtic Fields.