Dr Aidan O'Sullivan BA, MA, PhD
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Biography:
Born and raised in Valleymount, in the west Wicklow mountains; BA (1988) in Archaeology and Early Irish History; MA (1991) in Archaeology from UCD and awarded PhD (2004) on The social and ideological role of crannogs in early medieval Ireland (Dept. of History, NUI Maynooth).
Appointed in UCD as College Lecturer in 2000, and promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2005. I previously lectured as a Visiting Professor in Celtic Archaeology at St. Michael's College, University of Toronto (Spring 2000) and as Occasional Lecturer in the Dept. of History, NUI Maynooth (1997-1999). Have given public lectures in USA for the Irish American Cultural Institute (April 2005), speaking in New York, New Orleans, Houston, Phoenix, etc and was invited to speak (March 2006) at Appalachian State University and East Carolina University, NC.
Between 1992-2000, I was a project director and landscape archaeologist in The Discovery Programme (the Irish state-funded archaeological research institute) and directed archaeological surveys on the Shannon estuary (1992-97), Strangford Lough (1996), and underwater archaeological excavations of an early medieval bridge at Clonmacnoise (1997-98). I have experience in the commercial, research and academic archaeological sectors, having worked on numerous archaeological projects in Ireland, Britain, Switzerland and France.
I have been Acting Vice-Chair of the Institute of Archaeologists of Ireland (IAI) (2007-2008); a member of the Royal Irish Academy Committee for Archaeology (IAI representative); a member of the editorial committee of Archaeology Ireland (and conference organiser of its annnual popular conference) and have been a member of Council of the Prehistoric Society (2000-2003); Council of The Discovery Programme (1998-2003) and Council of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland.
However, really significant career achievements included once playing for Wicklow (U-14, U-16, U-18 and U-21) hurling teams and winning two Junior Hurling Championship medals with Valleymount in 1985 and 1990. In 2003, I returned to playing hurling again with Valleymount and we were beaten by a last-minute goal in the 2003 Junior B final by Aughrim. In 2005, I scored my first goal in 15 years(!) in a JHC game against St. Pat's, Wicklow town!