Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

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, …

Economic Agency And Risk Mitigation Among The Classic Period Maya At Holtun, Guatemala, Dawn Crawford

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

Research into social inequality among the Maya often focuses on how elites gained power, while my research sought to identify how both elites and non-elites used economic decision-making to maintain and/or augment their status. My research tested for economic agency and risk mitigation strategies among elite and non-elite households at a single Maya site, Holtun, in the Central Lowlands. Its purpose was also to test for conservation behavior during a period of abundance.

The data for this dissertation was collected through the excavation of civic ceremonial and domestic plazas, and through lithic analyses of obsidian and chert artifacts from the …

Texas Hospitality: Pro-Refugee Activism, Volunteerism, And Coalition-Building In Xenophobic Times, Sara Mosher

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

This project employs ethnographic methods to explore the experiences of forty ordinary Texans of different social and religious backgrounds who were active in pro-refugee volunteer and advocacy work during the four chaotic years of the Trump administration. The goal of this research is to better understand people’s reasons for volunteering and advocating on behalf of refugees during a time of political upheaval, when prominent public figures in positions of leadership around the country have repeatedly framed refugees as a threat to American security and cultural identity. Despite the crucial roles that local volunteers typically play in the process of refugee …

The Zooarchaeological Dimension Of Preceramic Human-Environment Dynamics In The Highlands Of Southwestern Honduras, Alejandro J. Figueroa

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation I evaluate different hypotheses regarding human-environment dynamics in the Mesoamerican neotropics during the Preceramic period (ca. 11000-7400 cal B.P.) by examining the largest extant faunal assemblage dated to this time. The Preceramic was characterized by major climatic and ecological changes following the end of the Pleistocene, including the extinction of megafauna and the expansion of tropical forests. This period ended with a series of behavioral adaptations suited to this transformed landscape such as increased territoriality, sedentism, agriculture, and domestication. Three hypotheses have been proposed to explain these dynamics: the Broad-Spectrum Revolution hypothesis suggests post-Pleistocene resource uncertainty and …

Making Scents: Multispecies Partnership, Security, And Affect Among Canine Search And Rescue Teams, Kara Griffin

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

This study examines the qualitative experiences of dogs and handlers working on canine search and rescue teams as they strive to develop a successful relationship through working, training, and living together. In order to work effectively, these teams form affective partnerships characterized by mutual advocacy, correspondence, and trust, which highlight the co-constructed nature of more than human worlds and allow members of both species to contest certain framings of their partners in their social worlds. Each chapter will further explore how handlers grapple with contemporary controversies in their field which are often framed as questions of effectiveness and personal choice …

Food Security In Ancestral Tewa Coalescent Communities: The Zooarchaeology Of Sapa'owingeh In The Northern Rio Grande, New Mexico, Rachel Burger

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

Food security, the measure of access to safe and sufficient food, is a critical global issue, not just because of its effects on health, but also because of the potentially negative consequences that food insecurity can have on mental and social well-being. Archaeology is uniquely situated to inform and articulate with global food security studies by focusing on past lived experiences of social and environmental conditions and events. The experiences of and responses to those conditions, in turn, inform present day policy and humanitarian efforts.

This study examines how residents of Sapa’owingeh, a Classic Period (A.D. 1350-1600) Tewa pueblo in …

Mourning Practices On Facebook: Facebook Shrines And Other Rituals Of Grieving In The Digital Age, Sydney Yeager

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

Death is a universal, and for humans so is the experience of grief that follows. This dissertation exams how Facebook users utilize the social media platform as they mourn their loved ones, process their grief, and support the grief of others. It explores how the experience of death and loss shapes the religious beliefs and actions of grievers and how social media impacts the grief experience of its users. It looks at the community that arises organically from mourning on the deceased’s Facebook Timeline and interrogates the social pressure to perform grief in such a public space. Finally, it asks …

Communities Of Consumption On The Southeastern Mesoamerican Border: Style, Feasting, And Identity Negotiation In Prehispanic Northeastern Honduras, Whitney Annette Goodwin

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

Prehispanic northeastern Honduran communities were situated at the border between southeastern Mesoamerica and lower Central America. Previous studies of pottery style suggest that local groups shifted their affiliation from north to south at the end of the Classic period (ca. AD 1000). This study examines the contexts in which pottery, as a medium for style, was used, and how the food people prepared, stored, or served in these vessels offers a perspective complementary to pottery style for understanding how identity was actively negotiated in this region. In this view, other parts of the foodways system – the foods chosen to …

“I Am Not My Illness!”: Navigating The Mental Healthcare System In New Orleans, Saira Mehmood

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

This research examines the experiences of individuals diagnosed with chronic mental illnesses and how they navigated the mental healthcare system in New Orleans, Louisiana. To realize the main research objective, I analyzed how individuals with chronic mental illnesses perceive mental illness and stigma; the services individuals use to address their mental health needs and the barriers they face in this process; who individuals disclose their mental illness to and under what contexts; and how individuals diagnosed with mental illness and their caregivers understand and embody recovery. Situated between medical anthropology and urban anthropology, it examines the challenges individuals diagnosed with …

Locating Human Security In The City: The Case Of Rohingya Refugees In New Delhi, Ashvina Patel

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

This research examines the subjective experience of human security by Rohingya urban refugees who fled to New Delhi, India, from Myanmar, in 2012. It uses bottom-up, top-down, and historical-to-present approaches to recognize the myriad factors that influence the path to security. The bottom-up approach frames the Rohingya present-day experience; the top-down approach delineates motivations embedded in the current India state and the international refugee regime; and the past-to-present approach explains the perspectives of each of these actors.

One urban refugee settlement was chosen as a primary field site to examine the challenges and varied everyday experiences of the city for …

Women’S Experiences With Maternity Care And Medical Discourse In Florence, Italy, Michaela Wallerstedt

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is based on ethnographic research in Florence, Italy. The primary focus of this research is based on a comparison of medical discourse from Italian State documents with women’s experiences during pregnancy and childbirth in Italy. Mirroring trends throughout the developed world, Italy has maintained high rates of cesarean sections since the turn of the century. Italy’s unique political and cultural history has made Tuscany one of the best regions for maternity care within a country with significant regional variability. This dissertation looks at historical and current cultural trends to understand the ways in which women experience high-quality maternity …

Dignity In Decision-Making: Modernity And Social Navigation Among Rural French Polynesian Youth, Laura Jarvis

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

This research examines critical questions about the experiences of youth through the lenses of modernity, subjectivity, and the lifecourse. Growing up in a (post)colonial context of shifting definitions of adulthood, youth from the rural island of Rurutu, French Polynesia must navigate various decisions and transformations with little information to base their future aspirations on. This dissertation identifies dignity as the main motivating factor in youth decision-making, one that is constantly redefined as youth navigate shifting social fields. Dignity, as used here, is a target youth strive for in order to contest feelings of social precarity stemming from unaccommodating education systems …

Pharmaceutical Territories: Contested Pharmacopoeias And Environmental Debates In Brazil, Kerri Brown

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

Over the past 30 years, emergent global health and trade policies have transformed "traditional medicine" into a contested biomedical endeavor. Brazil has been particularly affected by these policies due to its vast biodiversity and numerous labelled as traditional. As a result, the country has implemented strict intellectual property laws, has begun to invest in federal research on medicinal plants and other forms of traditional medicine, and in 2009 established its National Program of Medicinal Plants and Phytotherapeutics based on the World Health Organization's traditional medicine program, integrating medicinal plants into Brazil's national healthcare system. This multi-sited ethnographic project compares the …

Nongovernmental China: 300 Million Migrant Workers And The Ngo Response, Ian Dorfman

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

Based on seventy weeks of field research in Beijing and Shenzhen, as well as a review of relevant literature, this dissertation explores the role of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in creating and redefining local economic relationships with China’s 300 million internal migrant workers. The founders/directors of these organizations run programs to improve migrants’ access to legal aid, education, and sense of community. Their perspectives, experiences, and decision-making provide significant insights into China’s paradoxical relationship with its migrant workers as well as changing state-society relations in the transition to capitalism.

Gendered Reproductive Negotiation And Family Formation: Latino/A Parents And Voluntarily Childless Couples In Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas, Jessica Lott

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

My dissertation explores tensions between the empirical reality that Latino/a birth rates have been slowing in the United States since the Great Recession in 2007 and American discourse that presumes Latinos/as are a fairly homogenous group with “excessively” high fertility rates. This study is an intervention in the literature on Latino/a reproduction that assumes large family size as well as the literature on voluntarily childless couples, who are generally assumed to be Anglo in the American context. I explore these tensions with the case study of middle-class heterosexual Latino/a couples in Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas. I compare voluntarily childless Latinos/as with …

Common Goods In Uncommon Times: Water, Droughts, And The Sustainability Of Ancestral Pueblo Communities In The Jemez Mountains, New Mexico, Ad 1100-1700, Michael Aiuvalasit

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

Adapting our infrastructure and institutions to climate change is a crucial dilemma for modern society. Archaeologists should be well positioned to address this issue with examples from the past. Yet, too often when we find that cultural changes are synchronous with climate variation, such as abandonment of a region during a drought, we advance causal arguments to what may merely be correlations. I argue that identifying proxies for resource management in the archaeological record, particularly for resources managed by collective action and vulnerable to climate change, can help to address this problem. To test this approach I studied water management …

Supplementing Maize Agriculture In Basketmaker Ii Subsistence: Dietary Analysis Of Human Paleofeces From Turkey Pen Ruin (42sa3714), Jenna M. Battillo

Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

This research explores the factors that motivated increasing reliance on maize during the Basketmaker II period in the North American Southwest. Through the analysis of 44 human paleofeces from Turkey Pen Ruin, Utah, I investigate resource choice and nutritional supplementation of maize before the advent of bean horticulture. In order to discern what resources provided caloric and nutritional supplementation to maize, all paleofecal specimens were analyzed for pollen and macrofossil content, and 20 were further sampled for PCR analysis targeted at several select animal and plant species. Eight paleofecal specimens from various stratigraphic layers were directly AMS dated in order …