Maayan was awarded the Fulbright Postdoctoral Fellowship to pursue her research project titled ‟Cultural Variability and Cultural Dynamics in the Upper Paleolithic Period of the Near East (~40 30 ky BP): Synchronic and Diachronic Insights Based on the Comparative Study of Flint Technologies from the Zagros and the Southern Levant”. This project tests social interactions between prehistoric hunter-gatherer groups from different regions of the Near East, reconstructing the evolutional and dispersal patterns of ancient societies.

Maayan received her BA in archaeology from Ben-Gurion University in the Negev (BGU) and her MA with a specialization in the study of ancient lithic industries from the University of Haifa.

Her PhD research, conducted at BGU, focused on the study and cultural characterization of hunter-gatherer groups that inhabited the Levant ca. 40–30 kya based on case studies from Israel and the comparative study of archaeological collections from key sites in the region and in west Europe.

Recent publications:

Shemer, M., et al., 2023. Early Upper Paleolithic cultural variability in the Southern Levant: New evidence from Nahal Rahaf 2 Rockshelter, Judean Desert, Israel. Journal of Human Evolution 178, 10334 [awarded the MHR Award for Excellent Publication in the Social Sciences and Humanities, Ben-Gurion University]. 

 Shemer, M., et al., 2024. Cultural dynamics in the Levantine Upper Paleolithic, ca. 40–33 ky BP: Insights based on recent advances in the study of the Levantine Aurignacian, the Arkov-Divshon, and the Atlitian. Journal of Paleolithic Archaeology, 7, 10