After an upstate New York childhood and a bartending stint in New Orleans’ French Quarter, seasonal resort work led R.E. Burrillo to the desert Southwest, whose redrock landscapes were a source of stability through mental and physical illness. In The Backwoods of Everywhere, archaeologist Burrillo excavates his past, examining Indigenous and tourist cultures, the complexities of American archaeology, and what it means to be a local. From the ancient canal systems of Phoenix, Arizona, to the modern Mayan communities of the Yucatan Peninsula, to the depths of the Grand Canyon, Burrillo takes us on an entertaining journey full of history, ecology, cultural preservation, and personal stories.
R.E. Burrillo is an archaeologist and conservation advocate. He is the author of Behind the Bears Ears: Exploring the Cultural and Natural Histories of a Sacred Landscape, winner of the Foreword Indies Editor's Choice Prize, and his writing has appeared in Archaeology Southwest, Colorado Plateau Advocate, the Salt Lake Tribune, and elsewhere. He lives in southern Arizona, where he works as a project manager for PaleoWest.
R.E. Burrillo will headline the following events:
Friday, July 22 at 7:30 PM at The Book Bungalow in St. George
Saturday, July 30 at 7:30 PM at the Robber’s Roost in Torrey, presented by the Entrada Institute
