Lela is a PhD candidate in Classical archaeology. She graduated with a BA in Classics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2002. Her research focuses on the Greek settlement of the western Mediterranean within the greater colonization process of the 8th through the 6th centuries BC. She is currently interested in the roles of agriculture and community organization in the Greek poleis of Sicily and Magna Graecia, as well as the interaction between Greeks, Phoenicians, and "indigenous" residents. She has participated in fieldwork in North Carolina, Sicily, Crete, and Israel.
Research InterestsPhoenician and Punic archaeology, colonization and colonialism, ethnic identity, religious architecture, and the historiographic tradition
