Kaja Tally-Schumacher’s research interests include ancient Mediterranean gardens and landscapes, comparative environmental history, and issues pertaining to sustainability and resiliency in the ancient Mediterranean world and in contemporary archaeological practice. Her secondary area of interest includes Classical Reception, especially as evidenced in urban planning, architecture, and design history.

Tally-Schumacher received her B.A. in Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology and in Political Science from the University of Minnesota (2007), an MA with distinction in Ancient Art History from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst (2012), and a PhD in Ancient Art and Archaeology at Cornell University (2020). She has held appointments at Dumbarton Oaks, at the University of Pennsylvania as an Exchange Scholar, and at the Society for the Humanities at Cornell as a Postdoctoral Fellow. She currently co-leads the joint Cornell University-University of Bologna Casa della Regina Carolina excavation at Pompeii as an Assistant Director. Tally-Schumacher is also a recipient of two distinguished teaching awards, the University of Massachusetts-Amherst Distinguished Teaching Award (2011-2012), and the Cornell University James F. Slevin Assignment Sequence Writing Center Instructor Award (2017).