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Archaeological Anthropology

Selected Works

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Megan C Kassabaum

Articles 1 - 13 of 13

Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

The Argument For Archaeology, Megan C. Kassabaum, Rebecca Yamin Dec 2018

The Argument For Archaeology, Megan C. Kassabaum, Rebecca Yamin

Megan C Kassabaum

No abstract provided.

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Early Platforms, Early Plazas: Antecedents Of Mississippian Mound-And-Plaza Centers In The American South, Megan C. Kassabaum Dec 2018

Early Platforms, Early Plazas: Antecedents Of Mississippian Mound-And-Plaza Centers In The American South, Megan C. Kassabaum

Megan C Kassabaum

Platform mounds and plazas have a 5000-year-long history in the eastern United States but are often viewed through the lens of late prehistoric and early historic understandings of mound use. This review approaches the history of these important landscape features via a forward-looking temporal framework that emphasizes the variability in their construction and use through time and across space. I suggest that by viewing platform mounds in their historical contexts, emphasizing the construction process over final form, and focusing on nonmound sites and off-mound areas such as plazas, we can build a less biased and more complex understanding of early …

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Residue Analysis Of Smoking Pipe Fragments From The Feltus Archaeological Site, Southeastern North America, Stephen B. Carmody, Megan C. Kassabaum, Ryan K. Hunt, Natalie Prodanovich, Hope Elliott, Jon Russ Dec 2017

Residue Analysis Of Smoking Pipe Fragments From The Feltus Archaeological Site, Southeastern North America, Stephen B. Carmody, Megan C. Kassabaum, Ryan K. Hunt, Natalie Prodanovich, Hope Elliott, Jon Russ

Megan C Kassabaum

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The practice of pipe smoking was commonplace among indigenous cultures of the Eastern Woodlands of North
America. However, many questions remain concerning what materials were smoked and when tobacco first
became a part of this smoking tradition. Chemical analysis of organic residues extracted from archaeological
smoking pipes is an encouraging avenue of research into answering questions regarding the development of a
smoking complex within indigenous cultures of the Eastern Woodlands. In the right environmental conditions,
absorbed organic compounds within artifacts can remain structurally stable for millennia, allowing …

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Gathering In The Late Woodland: Plazas And Gathering Places As Everyday Space, Casey R. Barrier, Megan C. Kassabaum Dec 2017

Gathering In The Late Woodland: Plazas And Gathering Places As Everyday Space, Casey R. Barrier, Megan C. Kassabaum

Megan C Kassabaum

No abstract provided.

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Getting Vessels From Sherds: The Utility Of Archaeological Illustrations In Reconstructing Assemblages, Megan C. Kassabaum Dec 2017

Getting Vessels From Sherds: The Utility Of Archaeological Illustrations In Reconstructing Assemblages, Megan C. Kassabaum

Megan C Kassabaum

Ceramic data and radiocarbon dates from two Coles Creek mound centers in the lower Yazoo Basin, Mississippi, are used to modify the chronology of the local Coles Creek period sequence. The modifications have ramifications for efforts to understand the Coles Creek to Mississippian transition ca. AD 1200.

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Review Of Ancestral Mounds: Vitality And Volatility Of Native America, By Jay Miller, Megan C. Kassabaum Dec 2017

Review Of Ancestral Mounds: Vitality And Volatility Of Native America, By Jay Miller, Megan C. Kassabaum

Megan C Kassabaum

No abstract provided.

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Standing Posts And Special Substances: Gathering And Ritual Deposition At Fetlus (22je500), Jefferson County, Mississippi, Megan C. Kassabaum, Erin S. Nelson Dec 2015

Standing Posts And Special Substances: Gathering And Ritual Deposition At Fetlus (22je500), Jefferson County, Mississippi, Megan C. Kassabaum, Erin S. Nelson

Megan C Kassabaum

Because it immediately precedes the Mississippi period, Coles Creek (A.D. 700–1200) culture is often viewed through the lens of Mississippian social organization. In particular, early platform mound-and-plaza complexes have long been understood as elite compounds due to their physical similarities with later sites. However, evidence regarding the construction and use of the monumental landscape at the Feltus site (22JE500 ) in Jefferson County, MS, suggests that platform mound construction was but one aspect of a broader ritual sequence aimed at gathering the dispersed Coles Creek community. In addition to mound building, this sequence included the setting and removal of freestanding …

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Cahokia's Coles Creek Predecessors, Vincas P. Steponaitis, Megan C. Kassabaum, John W. O'Hear Dec 2014

Cahokia's Coles Creek Predecessors, Vincas P. Steponaitis, Megan C. Kassabaum, John W. O'Hear

Megan C Kassabaum

No abstract provided.

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Expanding Social Networks Through Ritual Deposition: A Case Study From The Lower Mississippi Valley, Megan C. Kassabaum, Erin S. Nelson Mar 2014

Expanding Social Networks Through Ritual Deposition: A Case Study From The Lower Mississippi Valley, Megan C. Kassabaum, Erin S. Nelson

Megan C Kassabaum

No abstract provided.

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Between Surface And Summit: The Process Of Mound Construction At Feltus, Megan C. Kassabaum, Edward R. Henry, Vincas P. Steponaitis, John W. O'Hear Dec 2013

Between Surface And Summit: The Process Of Mound Construction At Feltus, Megan C. Kassabaum, Edward R. Henry, Vincas P. Steponaitis, John W. O'Hear

Megan C Kassabaum

Geophysical methods that explore depths more than 1m below the surface were employed at Feltus (22Je500), a Coles Creek period (AD 700–1200) mound-and-plaza group in southwestern Mississippi, USA. It is difficult to assess the internal structure of large platform mounds such as those at Feltus using excavation and traditional geophysical techniques alone. As a result, such investigations often focus only on activities that took place during and after the final stage(s) of construction. Our 2012 research at Feltus utilized electrical resistivity tomography and downhole magnetic susceptibility to examine the internal structure of two platform mounds at depths beyond those commonly …

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Review Of Archaeology Of Louisiana. Mark A. Rees (Ed.) With A Foreword By Ian W. Brown. Louisiana State University Press, Baton Rouge, 2010., Megan C. Kassabaum Dec 2011

Review Of Archaeology Of Louisiana. Mark A. Rees (Ed.) With A Foreword By Ian W. Brown. Louisiana State University Press, Baton Rouge, 2010., Megan C. Kassabaum

Megan C Kassabaum

No abstract provided.

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Multiple Modes Of Monumentality: Case Studies From The American South, Megan Kassabaum, David Cranford, Erin Nelson Aug 2011

Multiple Modes Of Monumentality: Case Studies From The American South, Megan Kassabaum, David Cranford, Erin Nelson

Megan C Kassabaum

No abstract provided.

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Looking Beyond The Obvious: Identifying Patterns In Coles Creek Mortuary Data, Megan Kassabaum Dec 2010

Looking Beyond The Obvious: Identifying Patterns In Coles Creek Mortuary Data, Megan Kassabaum

Megan C Kassabaum

While the lack of grave goods has been the focus of most scholarly discussion of Coles Creek burial practices, the mortuary analyses presented here focus on recognizing correspondences among sex, age, and burial position. Using assemblages from three Coles Creek sites (Greenhouse, Lake George, and Mount Nebo), I find that while there is significant intersite variability among Coles Creek mortuary programs, certain age groups are consistently treated differently from each other and from everyone else. Thus interments were being made with deliberate care and consideration for those involved and are not nearly as haphazard and disorderly as previously thought.

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