Karenleigh A. Overmann directs the Center for Cognitive Archaeology at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs. She earned a doctorate in archaeology from the University of Oxford as a Clarendon Scholar. She completed two years of postdoctoral research at the University of Bergen, Norway as a Marie Curie research fellow. She investigates numeracy and literacy as complex cultural systems that emerge through sustained interactions between brains, behaviors, and material forms, using Material Engagement Theory as her theoretical framework. She is retired from the U.S. Navy, where she performed communications-electronics work as an enlisted Radioman before earning a commission under the Limited Duty Officer program.