Tomomi Fushiya holds a BA from Waseda University (Tokyo, Japan) and a MA in Managing Archaeological Sites from University College London, with a dissertation focusing on developing a methodology towards local community involvement in site management. She has worked on site assessment and management projects, conservation training programmes and excavations with different international institutions in Japan, US, UK, Lebanon, Egypt and Sudan, before she started her PhD research in 2015 at Leiden University.

Her main research interests are public archaeology, heritage management, cultural landscape, heritage education and cultural heritage studies. She focuses on the roles of archaeology, local integration into archaeological practices and heritage management, and use of different media and collaborative approaches for engagement, promotion and interpretations of archaeological heritage in Egypt and Sudan. Her PhD research comprises a case study of the relationship between archaeology and local communities in the modern Nubian region of northern Sudan, in order to elaborate an alternative approach to archaeological ‘heritage’ that foregrounds local context.  

The archaeological site of Amara West, a pharaonic Egyptian settlement in Nubia, plays a central role in her PhD. Working as part of the British Museum Amara West Research Project, she has conducted interviews with the local communities in the vicinity of the site in 2015 and 2016, and helped to develop community outreach programmes, including podcasts (in English and Arabic) and a leaflet for school children.

Publications