Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Interspecies Relations In The Midst Of The Russia–Ukraine War, Tanya Richardson

Anthropology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Settlement Scaling In The Northern Maya Lowlands: Human-Scale Implications, Scott Hutson, Adrian S.Z. Chase, Jeffrey Glover, William Ringle, Travis Stanton, Walter R. T. Witschey, Traci Ardren

Anthropology Faculty Publications

Settlement scaling theory predicts that higher site densities lead to increased social interactions that, in turn, boost productivity. The scaling relationship between population and land area holds for several ancient societies, but as demonstrated by the sample of 48 sites in this study, it does not hold for the Northern Maya Lowlands. Removing smaller sites from the sample brings the results closer to scaling expectations. We argue that applications of scaling theory benefit by considering social interaction as a product not only of proximity but also of daily life and spatial layouts.

World Bee Day In Ukraine During The Russian Invasion, Tanya Richardson

Anthropology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

A Multi-Proxy Assessment Of The Impact Of Environmental Instability On Late Holocene (4500-3800 Bp) Native American Villages Of The Georgia Coast, Carey J. Garland, Victor D. Thompson, Matthew C. Sanger, Karen Y. Smith, Fred T. Andrus, Nathan R. Lawres, Katharine G. Napora, Carol E. Colaninno, J. Matthew Compton, Sharyn Jones, Carla S. Hadden, Alexander Cherkinsky, Thomas Maddox, Yi-Ting Deng, Isabelle H. Lulewicz, Lindsey Parsons

Anthropology Faculty Publications

Circular shell rings along the South Atlantic Coast of North America are the remnants of some of the earliest villages that emerged during the Late Archaic (5000-3000 BP). Many of these villages, however, were abandoned during the Terminal Late Archaic (ca 3800-3000 BP). We combine Bayesian chronological modeling with mollusk shell geochemistry and oyster paleobiology to understand the nature and timing of environmental change associated with the emergence and abandonment of circular shell ring villages on Sapelo Island, Georgia. Our Bayesian models indicate that Native Americans occupied the three Sapelo shell rings at varying times with some generational overlap. By …

The Mirror Of The Dead: Thanatoptic Storytelling In An Italian Cemetery, Emanuela Guano

Anthropology Faculty Publications

As the contemplation of death, thanatopsis is the attempt to come to terms with mortality; in the contemporary world, dark heritage and tourism have become main conduits for this practice. This paper draws on ethnographic research conducted in Genoa’s Staglieno monumental cemetery between 2016 and 2019 to examine the events--poetic readings, guided walking tours, and outdoor theater performances--that have become popular against the backdrop of the local tourist industry and its economy of cultural experiences; its goal is to explore the strategies through which the evocative power of storytelling promotes the contemplation of mortality. Drawing on Heidegger (1962), I argue …

Historias De Boruca: Balanceando Lo Tradicional Y Lo Contemporañeo A Través De Imágenes / Stories Of Boruca: Balancing The Traditional And The Contemporary Through Pictures, Steven Black, Carolina Bolaños Palmieri, Cassandra Eng, Yanet E. Fundora, Carlos Alberto Faerron Guzmán, Belén Cruz González, Kiany Fernandez, Valeria Gutierrez, Fabiana Lazaro, Yatana Lazaro, Jose David Lázaro González, Taba Shidira Leiva Leiva, Daniela Mora Lazaro, Fabio Morales Morales, Kiany Morales

Anthropology Faculty Publications

This book is a glimpse of Boruca Indigenous Territory through the lens of its youth inhabitants. It is an ethnographic photography book that features photographs taken by researchers and by youth participants in the project. Photographs are arranged into chapters by themes that were identified through qualitative coding of photographs, transcribed interviews, and field notes. The themes include: methods, ancestral landscapes, livelihoods, cuisine, daily life, perspectives on land, and la fiesta de los diablitos.

Litigating For Legality: Nature Conservation, Commercial Fisheries And Disputed Territoriality In Ukraine’S Danube Delta, Tanya Richardson

Anthropology Faculty Publications

Between 2014 and 2016 Ukraine’s Danube Biosphere Reserve (DBR) administrators devoted extensive time to lawsuits in which they defended the legality of commercial fisheries in reserve territory. Two cases are discussed in order to examine what impact litigation had and why administrators pursued litigation when dominant accounts of law in Ukraine suggest that avoiding the courts might be a more likely response. It analyzes court documents and interviews gathered during anthropological research about nature conservation in the Danube Delta by combining insights from political ecology, agrarian studies, and socio-legal scholarship on Ukraine. Even though administrators lost their cases and had …

Patterns Of Recent Natural Selection On Genetic Loci Associated With Sexually Differentiated Human Body Size And Shape Phenotypes, Audrey M. Arner, Kathleen E. Grogan, Mark Grabowski, Hugo Reyes-Centeno, George H. Perry

Anthropology Faculty Publications

Levels of sex differences for human body size and shape phenotypes are hypothesized to have adaptively reduced following the agricultural transition as part of an evolutionary response to relatively more equal divisions of labor and new technology adoption. In this study, we tested this hypothesis by studying genetic variants associated with five sexually differentiated human phenotypes: height, body mass, hip circumference, body fat percentage, and waist circumference. We first analyzed genome-wide association (GWAS) results for UK Biobank individuals (~194,000 females and ~167,000 males) to identify a total of 114,199 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) significantly associated with at least one of …

Metabolomics-Based Analysis Of Miniature Flask Contents Identifies Tobacco Mixture Use Among The Ancient Maya, Mario Zimmermann, Korey J. Brownstein, Luis Pantoja Díaz, Iliana Ancona Aragón, Scott R. Hutson, Barry Kidder, Shannon Tushingham, David R. Gang

Anthropology Faculty Publications

A particular type of miniature ceramic vessel locally known as “veneneras” is occasionally found during archaeological excavations in the Maya Area. To date, only one study of a collection of such containers successfully identified organic residues through coupled chromatography–mass spectrometry methods. That study identified traces of nicotine likely associated with tobacco. Here we present a more complete picture by analyzing a suite of possible complementary ingredients in tobacco mixtures across a collection of 14 miniature vessels. The collection includes four different vessel forms and allows for the comparison of specimens which had previously formed part of museum exhibitions with recently …

Displacing The Delta: Notes On The Anthropology Of The Earth's Physical Features, Tanya Richardson

Anthropology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Biocultural Evidence Of Precise Manual Activities In An Early Holocene Individual Of The High-Altitude Peruvian Andes, Fotios Alexandros Karakostis, Hugo Reyes-Centeno, Michael Franken, Gerhard Hotz, Kurt Rademaker, Katerina Harvati

Anthropology Faculty Publications

OBJECTIVES: Cuncaicha, a rockshelter site in the southern Peruvian Andes, has yielded archaeological evidence for human occupation at high elevation (4,480 masl) during the Terminal Pleistocene (12,500–11,200 cal BP), Early Holocene (9,500–9,000 cal BP), and later periods. One of the excavated human burials (Feature 15‐06), corresponding to a middle‐aged female dated to ~8,500 cal BP, exhibits skeletal osteoarthritic lesions previously proposed to reflect habitual loading and specialized crafting labor. Three small tools found in association with this burial are hypothesized to be associated with precise manual dexterity.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: Here, we tested this functional hypothesis through the application of …

Ancient Maya Rural Settlement Patterns, Household Cooperation, And Regional Subsistence Interdependency In The Río Bec Area: Contributions From G-Liht, Scott R. Hutson, Nicholas P. Dunning, Bruce Cook, Thomas Ruhl, Nicolas C. Barth, Daniel Conley

Anthropology Faculty Publications

Research on intensive agricultural features contributes to the social relations of farming, including the means by which farmers mobilize labor and the possible destination of surplus. Lidar provides high-resolution data on ancient houses and agricultural features at a regional scale. This paper uses lidar data from NASA’s G-LiHT airborne imager to derive insights about rural demography, interhousehold cooperation, and subsistence interdependency among the ancient Maya. We assess the differences in intensity of agricultural investment in rural and urban areas of the Río Bec region of southern Campeche and Quintana Roo, Mexico, leading to inferences about regional food exchange and complex …

Book Review: Becoming Creole: Nature And Race In Belize By Melissa A. Johnson, Marcia Mikulak

Anthropology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Masculinity, Migration, And Forced Conscription In The Syrian War, Kristin V. Monroe

Anthropology Faculty Publications

In this essay, I provide a different perspective on the Syrian conflict by examining how the war’s reach can also be located amid the losses, interruptions, and experiences of those Syrians who have until now largely escaped its incredible violence. By looking closely at how the war has altered the life trajectories of and produced distinct modes of vulnerability for military-age men, I develop an argument about how, although they avoid fighting by going to work in Qatar, the lives of a group of Syrian men remain defined by conscription. Through my investigation of how these men are located in …

Reflecting On Pasuc Heritage Initiatives Through Time, Positionality, And Place, Scott R. Hutson, Céline Lamb, Daniel Vallejo-Cáliz, Jacob Welch

Anthropology Faculty Publications

This paper reports on heritage initiatives associated with a 12-year-long archaeology project in Yucatan, Mexico. Our work has involved both surprises and setbacks and in the spirit of adding to the repository of useful knowledge, we present these in a frank and transparent manner. Our findings are significant for a number of reasons. First, we show that the possibilities available to a heritage project facilitated by archaeologists depend not just on the form and focus of other stakeholders, but on the gender, sexuality, and class position of the archaeologists. Second, we provide a ground-level view of what approaches work well …

Neoliberal Aesthetics And The Struggle Against Redevelopment In An Italian Postindustrial Periphery, Emanuela Guano

Anthropology Faculty Publications

Much has been written about the neoliberal aestheticization of cities and its role in fostering consumption not just in, but also of, urban space. However, at a time when the pursuit of aesthetic experiences has become increasingly common, its exclusive association with privileged urban groups needs to be revisited. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted in the Bisagno Valley, a postindustrial periphery of Genoa, Italy, this paper explores how forms of resistance to redevelopment may challenge a dominant distribution of the sensible condemning postindustrial peripheries to the ruinations of redevelopment. Valley activists, it suggests, seek to subvert the categorization of peripheries …

Haiti’S Pact With The Devil?: Bwa Kayiman, Haitian Protestant Views Of Vodou, And The Future Of Haiti, Bertin M. Louis Jr.

Anthropology Faculty Publications

This essay uses ethnographic research conducted among Haitian Protestants in the Bahamas in 2005 and 2012 plus internet resources to document the belief among Haitian Protestants (Haitians who practice Protestant forms of Christianity) that Haiti supposedly made a pact with the Devil (Satan) as the result of Bwa Kayiman, a Vodou ceremony that launched the Haitian Revolution (1791–1803). Vodou is the syncretized religion indigenous to Haiti. I argue that this interpretation of Bwa Kayiman is an extension of the negative effects of the globalization of American Fundamentalist Christianity in Haiti and, by extension, peoples of African descent and the …

The Terrestrialization Of Amphibious Life In A Danube Delta 'Town On Water', Tanya Richardson

Anthropology Faculty Publications

Visitors to the Danube Delta town of Vylkove, known as the “Ukrainian Venice,” are often disappointed by the condition its 40 kilometers of canals, which frequently resemble over-grown ditches that are often impassible by boat. Consequently, a development organization and town administrators have begun lobbying for funding for a large-scale canal restoration project and for the town’s designation as a heritage site to help in mobilizing funds. However, these tourism-development narratives also assume that all residents can and want to practice an amphibious way of life that prevailed for centuries. Combining analytical frameworks of amphibious anthropology and recent social science …

Women’S Political Representation In Rwanda, Jennie E. Burnet

Anthropology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Unpacking Oakland Cemetery: Immersing Students In Atlanta History, Brennan Collins, Jeffrey Glover, Jes Moss, Spencer Roberts, Michael Page, Pouya Dianat

Anthropology Faculty Publications

Working with Oakland Cemetery, Georgia State and Emory Universities, and Beam Imagination are creating an experimental, public-facing digital archive that combines maps, a burial database, 3D visualizations, and curation.

Intimate Political Economies Of The Andes, Carmen Martínez Novo

Anthropology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Rise Of Women, #Metoo And Why It Matters, Meredith Conroy, Tiffany Jones, Kathy Nadeau

Anthropology Faculty Publications

In light of current political events here in the United States and around the world, such as the #MeToo movement, discussions about toxic masculinity, the tumultuous appointment of Justice Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court, and a worldwide surge of participation of women in politics, it is obvious that we are living in an important historical period where ideas about gender and power are being debated, reinforced, and challenged. While some political leaders blatantly dismiss gender discrimination and gender-based violence, the global community has recently acknowledged the significance of this issue by awarding the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize to two …

Producing, Collecting, And Exhibiting Bizango Sculptures From Haiti: Transatlantic Vodou On The International Art Scene, Catherine Benoît, André Delpuech

Anthropology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Early Fieldwork At The Beijing Farmers’ Market, Amy Y. Evrard

Anthropology Faculty Publications

Now that I’ve passed tenure review, published a book, cemented my teaching skills, and learned how to be a productive member of a college committee, I feel confident, self-assured, and filled with certainty about every aspect of my career as a professor. The same certainty extends to research and fieldwork. From choosing a topic to developing research questions to getting a good start in the field—it’s all a piece of cake.

Ha! I wish I felt this confidence. The truth is that passing the tenure phase two years ago, as wonderful as it was, opened up a whole new set …

Political Settlements, Women’S Representation And Gender Equality: The 2008 Gender-Based Violence Law And Gender Parity In Primary And Secondary Education In Rwanda, Jennie E. Burnet, Jeanne D’Arc Kanakuze

Anthropology Faculty Publications

This paper explores the ways in which power and politics shape the realisation of women’s rights and gender equity in Rwanda. In the past decade, Rwanda has become a global leader in increasing women’s inclusion in politics and in promoting and securing women’s rights. This paper considers legislative reform, policy formulation and policy implementation in two areas: gender-based violence and gender parity in education. The paper injects a gender analysis into the political settlement theoretical framework and seeks to answer two questions: (1) how do women and other actors (including formal and information institutions, powerbrokers and other key decision-makers) negotiate …

Managing Ambiguous Amphibians: Feral Cows, People, And Place In Ukraine’S Danube Delta, Tanya Richardson

Anthropology Faculty Publications

This paper analyzes how a herd of feral cattle emerged in the core zone of Ukraine’s Danube Biosphere Reserve and why it still exists despite numerous challenges to the legality of its presence there. Answering these questions requires an analytical approach that begins from the premise that animals, plants, substances, documents, and technologies are active participants in making social and political worlds rather than passive objects of human intervention and manipulation. Drawing together insights from multispecies ethnography, animal geography, amphibious anthropology, and studies of nature protection in former Soviet republics, the author argues that the feral cattle exist because they …

Accountability For Mass Death, Acts Of Rescue And Silence In Rwanda, Jennie E. Burnet

Anthropology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Connections Beyond Chunchucmil, Traci Ardren, Scott R. Hutson, David R. Hixson, Justin Lowry

Anthropology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Architectural Group Typology And Excavation Sampling Within Chunchucmil, Scott R. Hutson, Aline Magnoni, Bruce H. Dahlin

Anthropology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Introduction: The Long Road To Maya Markets, Scott R. Hutson

Anthropology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.