Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

A Study Of The Cultural And Geological Environment Of The Magic Mountain Site In Golden, Colorado, Brianna K. Dalessandro

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Magic Mountain site, located in Golden, Colorado, has been the subject of intensive academic studies since the 1950s because of its extensive artifact assemblage and long habitation periods. The aim of this thesis was to use ground-penetrating radar, magnetometry, GIS models, and lithic analysis to further study when and how the Magic Mountain site was used during prehistoric times and contextualize a variety of hypotheses about site habitation and migratory patterns of prehistoric people in Colorado.

The results of these analyses indicate the habitation and migratory pattern of the Magic Mountain site was a periodic, but consistent, proximal visitation …

Making Forests, Making Communities: An Ethnography Of Reforestation In Monteverde, Costa Rica, Megan Brown

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

Reforestation is not just planting trees in the ground. More than net increase in forest cover, reforestation is a complex political endeavor undertaken by both humans and non-humans and a popular climate change mitigation tactic. However, little research has examined the dynamics between selection of specific reforestation strategies, health, and community resilience, particularly with attention to entanglements between the lives of both human and non-human forest dwellers. This ethnographic work, based on six months of in-person fieldwork and six months of digital ethnography, examines reforestation and forest relations in Costa Rica’s Monte Verde zone, a region which experienced widespread deforestation, …

Constructing The Eastern Coyote: A Temporal Analysis Of The Scientific And Social Production Of A Controversial Northeastern Canid, Kayleigh Moses

Senior Theses and Projects

Eastern coyotes (Canis latrans var) have confounded the scientific and social boundaries established by postcolonial United States. The first eastern coyote specimen on record comes from Otis, Massachusetts in 1957. At the time, this unknown and unnamed wolf-like creature sparked fear amongst human residents of the Northeastern United States. Threatened by the presence of this predator, Northeasterners launched coyote killing efforts similar to the eradication campaigns that had previously failed in the Western United States. Today, Massachusetts officials estimate that 11,500 eastern coyotes occupy the state, living amongst people and pets in every county. This abundance of eastern …

Save Water Drink Wine: Challenges Of Implementing The Ethnography Of The Temecula Valley Wine Industry Into Food-Energy-Water Nexus Decision-Making, Zaida E. Darley

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study demonstrates the interrelationships of people, food, energy, and water associated with Temecula Valley’s wine industry and reveals contradictions and biases in how people view these resources, which ultimately shape management and policies. The FEW (Food, Energy, and Water) Nexus is an approach increasingly used by policy- and decision-makers to understand the interrelationship of several resources. However, a FEW Nexus approach often lacks in social aspects that influence environmentally and economically sustainable outcomes, especially in the wine and wine tourism industry. When quantitative and qualitative data are available, the other challenge is which assessment to use. Two assessments often …

Kitchen Chronicles And Crude Expectations: Understanding Everyday Life In The Upper Ecuadorian Amazon, Emily A. Babb

Senior Theses

My thesis examines the everyday life of my Ecuadorian, Kichwa host family in an attempt to better understand how, if at all, they interact with and think about oil companies on a regular basis. In this way, I attempted to supplement the current literature, which tends to focus on the large, contentious interactions between indigenous people and the petroleum industry. It was my hope to expand the understanding of their identities both within and outside the context of oil and to show the complexity of their relationship with petroleum companies.

Dental Microwear Textures Of Paranthropus Robustus From Kromdraai, Drimolen, And An Enlarged Sample From Swartkrans: Ecological And Intraspecific Variation, Alexandria Sachiko Peterson

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The original microwear texture baseline for South African hominins was done by Scott et al. (2005) and concluded that Paranthropus robustus exhibited higher complexity values (Asfc) that are seen in occasional hard object feeders. Australopithecus africanus has higher anisotropy values (epLsar) consistent with consuming tough objects. This study expands upon this baseline by increasing the sample size from n = 9 for P. robustus and n = 10 for Au. africanus to n = 66 and n = 44, respectively. Additionally, this study incorporates multiple different sites and deposits. The P. robustus sample includes Drimolen, Kromdraai, and an expanded sample …

Using Particle Size Analysis To Separate The Deposition Of A Bonebed And Artifact At The Wenas Creek Mammoth Site, Genevieve Brown

All Master's Theses

The 2005 discovery of a 17,000 year old mammoth bonebed in close proximity to a possible artifact at the Wenas Creek Mammoth Site (WCMS) brought with it the question of whether the bones and artifact were actually deposited together. If the two are associated, the WCMS would qualify as a Pre-Clovis site, a title given to just a handful of proven archaeological sites in North America, though claimed for numerous more. A close interval particle size analysis was performed on 2 column samples from the WCMS with the intention of identifying microstratification that would separate the bonebed from the artifact. …

Owning Our Food System: Urban Community Gardening And Local Food Movements, Paige A. Edwards

Masters Theses

Food is a means of examining culture, including identity, autonomy and power. It creates relationships and memories between people via shared connections. Through food, I explore local food movements and urban community gardening.

We both ingest and produce garden-grown foods. This movement is often described as simple nostalgia. I suggest that it is a response against heavily processed foods within a system reliant on mass produced food. This desire for ownership pushes community gardens and other counter-hegemonic spaces forward in their goals of using social practice to challenge the established food industry and take control within their own lives.

The Consciousness Of Water: Narrative Flows, Environmental Change, And The Voice Of Yemen, Tricia Nellessen

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Icebergs are melting in the Arctic. The Gulf of Mexico is warming and producing hurricanes such as Katrina. The delta of the southern United States is drying. And, Yemen will be the first country in modern history to experience a lack of accessible ground water, as soon as 2017 possibly. Yemen's situation has been tracked by scholars and governments since the 1960s. Despite this fact, cities have expanded in Yemen and the population has increased its use of water while little has been invested in desalination or infrastructure to offset growth. Climate change has affected humans for thousands of years; …

Building Sustainable Societies: Exploring Sustainability Policy And Practice In The Age Of High Consumption, Cindy Isenhour

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation is an attempt to examine how humans in wealthy, post-industrial urban contexts understand sustainability and respond to their concerns given their sphere of influence. I focus specifically on sustainable consumption policy and practice in Sweden, where concerns for sustainability and consumer-based responses are strong. This case raises interesting questions about the relative strength of sustainability movements in different cultural and geo-political contexts as well as the specific factors that have motivated the movement toward sustainable living in Sweden.

The data presented here supports the need for multigenic theories of sustainable consumerism. Rather than relying on dominant theories of …