Joanne Dombrowski was an American anthropologist. She was born to Grace and Theodore Dombrowski on June 18, 1943, in Chicago, Illinois, and spent her early years in Lake County, Indiana. She attended Wirt High School in Gary, Indiana where she excelled as a student. She went on to Northwestern University where she studied anthropology and earned a B.A. in 1964. She continued her education at Yale University where she would eventually earn an M.A. In 1966 she went on to pursue a Ph.D. from Boston University. Dombrowski's anthropological studies focused primarily on the origins of agriculture. While working on her dissertation for her Ph.D. she conducted extensive fieldwork in Ethiopia between 1966 -1968, where she excavated the Lalibela and Natchabiet caves.

In the early 1970's she became a Lecturer at the University of Ghana where she would go on to conduct field research at the Kintampo archaeological site. After returning to the States, she resided in Palm Springs Flordia for a number of years. Not much is known about Dr. Dombrowski's later years other than she passed away on January 8, 2005, and is buried in Greenwood Cemetery, Hot Springs, Arkansas.