Laura Paisley is a 2025 graduate of the Historical Archaeology master’s program at the University of Massachusetts Boston. She graduated from the University of Wisconsin La Crosse in 2020, double majoring in Archaeology and History. Laura first worked with UMass Boston in 2018 in Plymouth, MA, excavating the town’s original 17th century settlement. She went on to work in cultural resource management across the Midwest and southern United States prior to beginning graduate school. Her work in NEAAAL has included assisting a large collection management project of material from Sylvester Manor to make artifacts more accessible for future research. Additionally, Laura’s thesis research has focused on analyzing how the racialization of space changed on Nantucket Island following the decline in whaling in the mid-nineteenth century. This thesis will aid in better understanding the full history of the New Guinea community, an Afro-Indigenous community that formed on Nantucket in the late eighteenth century, and how the island’s historical narrative has influenced the way its diverse history has been preserved.