Anthropology Commons^™

Between Casas Grandes And Salado: Community Formation And Interaction In The Borderlands Of The American Southwest/Mexican Northwest Region, Ad 1200-1450, Thatcher A. Seltzer-Rogers

Anthropology ETDs

The historical record of Indigenous North America at the time of European colonization attests to the presence of borderlands between competing culture cores. Yet, the oftentimes inability of the archaeological record to speak to the presence of such dynamics in the past remains a hinderance to understanding how past peoples engaged with one another in noncolonial settings as well as how these interactions resulted in ethnogenesis or the establishment of new culture cores. This dissertation uses a comparative analysis of settlement layout, architecture traits, ceramic artifacts, and mortuary practices to examine how individuals who resided in the space between two …

The Bearing Earth: Colonization, Conservation, And Political Ecology In Costa Rica (Coto Brus 1948 - Present), Pablo Alonso Arias-Benavides

Latin American Studies ETDs

This thesis presents two questions: How are relationships between people in Coto Brus and the land – specifically, forest – mediated by social, political, and economic forces? How are personal and collective identities expressed through relationship with the landscape? I chose Coto Brus because it is a forested region of Costa Rica which was populated with state support in the 1950s, and because it is my father’s hometown. In order to understand the subjective experiences of Costa Ricans involved in deforestation and reforestation, I performed interviews in the canton, visited conservation sites, and analyzed historical sources. This study combines multiscale …

Pregnancy In United States Immigration Detention: Listening To Migrant Women's Stories, Amanda Heffernan

Nursing ETDs

Over the last five years, dramatic shifts in immigration policy across three presidential administrations have impacted migrants arriving at the U.S.’ southern border, with unique impacts on pregnant migrants. The purpose of this study was to document, analyze and contextualize the experience of pregnancy in United States immigration detention. Specifically, the study aimed to: 1) understand the situation of pregnant migrants detained in United States immigration detention facilities between 2017-2022; 2) situate the experience of detained pregnant migrants within multiple contexts, including their own individual and family migration stories and the larger context of United States immigration policy; and 3) …

Social Tolerance, Cooperation, And Constraint Shape Differentiated Social Relationships In Female Chimpanzees, Stephanie Fox

Anthropology ETDs

In this dissertation, I investigate variables that promote and constrain female-female social relationships in chimpanzees, a species where females disperse at sexual maturity, reside primarily among non-kin as adults, and where fission fusion social structure can reveal how female social behavior responds to different social contexts. I conducted my research using a combination of detailed behavioural data that I collected during a one-year field season (2019-2020) and long-term data (2010-2019) collected by the Kibale Chimpanzee Project. I show that female chimpanzees form stable, differentiated social relationships, which reflect active preferences and variation in social tolerance (Chapter 2); females leverage these …

The Lithium Economy: Bolivia's "New" Resource And Its Role In Revolutionary Politics, Zsofia J. Szoke

Anthropology ETDs

ABSTRACT

Through an ethnographic analysis of the lithium industry this dissertation recounts the complex way lithium industrialization has interacted with Bolivia’s democratic and cultural revolution, officially known as the proceso de cambio, and with localized social forms and structures, which the national-level revolution seeks to reconstitute. I will argue that it is important to examine the implications of lithium industrialization’s intersection with local experiences of revolutionary politics. The dissertation’s main contention is that the industrialization of lithium in Bolivia has been conceptualized as an insurgent tool of political change and social transformation by the Morales-Linera regime and as such it …

The Manito Topos Project: Place Naming And Toponymic Silencing In The Sierras Of Northern Nuevo México And Southern Colorado, Len N. Beké

Spanish and Portuguese ETDs

This dissertation reports on documentary research on vernacular toponymies in Manito communities in Nuevo México and Colorado. These toponymies are erased, obscured and delegitimized in official maps. Within the study area, vernacular antecedents for 49.5% of official names for natural features were documented, along with 280 previously unmapped names. These data were compared to the state-sanctioned toponymy to determine a typology of linguistic mechanisms of toponymic silencing. While a majority of official toponyms are based on Manito oral tradition, only 15.4% of the labels for natural features represent unaltered versions of names in that tradition. This dissertation theorizes the conceptual …

Buying Goodwill: Local And Regional Consumer Relationships In Nineteenth Century New Mexico, Erin N. Hegberg

Anthropology ETDs

This dissertation uses comparative analysis of four nineteenth century Hispanic sites to examine the daily practices by Hispanic residents of acquiring and consuming material goods (1821–1912). Through the practice of consumption, Hispanics created and reinforced social relationships with the groups who bartered or sold them goods. In frontier New Mexico consumer relationships reflected important networks that may have played a role in the creation and maintenance of modern Hispanic identity after U.S. annexation. The nineteenth century was a key moment in the developing racialization of Hispanic identity in New Mexico, which makes it a vital period of study for archaeologists …

An Empirical And Theoretical Analysis Of Leadership In Two Egalitarian Horticultural Societies, Edmond Seabright

Anthropology ETDs

Leadership is a central subject of interest in anthropology and the evolutionary social sciences more generally because of its ubiquity in human societies as well as its role in the evolution of cooperation, social complexity, and social hierarchy. Explaining the variation in the form and functions of leadership across different societies and settings remains a major challenge for social scientists. Although it is often associated with social hierarchy, here I argue that leadership can and does evolve even in egalitarian settings where leaders cannot hope to fully make up the burdens and expenses associated with their service. I further show …

"When The Tide Is Out, The Table Is Set": Shellfish Harvesting Throughout The Holocene At Labouchere Bay, Southeast Alaska, Mark R. Williams

Anthropology ETDs

“When the tide is out, the table is set” is a familiar saying among Native communities on the Northwest Coast of North America. This phrase encapsulates traditional ecological knowledge passed down for generations concerning intertidal marine resources. Recent archaeological excavations of shellfish gathering camps at Labouchere Bay confirm that ancient people may have followed similar principles throughout the Holocene (c.9,500 -2,500 years ago). For millennia, shellfish have been a highly reliable food source that helped support sedentary fisher-hunter-gatherer settlements. Although shellfish habitats represent highly predictable foraging opportunities, optimal foraging strategies must be carefully managed to avoid overharvesting. Collecting just enough …

Energetic Tradeoffs, Infection, And Immunity In Wild Chimpanzees Of Uganda And Tanzania, Sarah Renee Phillips

Anthropology ETDs

Infectious disease is a primary source of mortality for most mammal species, but scientists have little understanding of factors driving variation in infection and immunity between individuals, populations, and species in the wild. Life history theory provides an evolutionary framework for delineating distribution of available energy to competing physiological demands, including growth, reproduction, and maintenance. Early life reproduction should be favored over late life survival, but, in long-lived species, reproductive success is strongly tied to survival to old age. Slower pace of reproduction could allow investment in immunity, reducing risk of morbidity and mortality to infectious disease. Additionally, several host …

Q’Iij Metaphysics: Vico’S Theologia Indorum And The Gods, Ancestors, And Idols Of The 16th Century K’Ichee’ Mayas, Phillip Salazar

Latin American Studies ETDs

Domingo de Vico completed the Theologia Indorum, a K’iche’ Christian manuscript, in Guatemala in 1554. In the manuscript, Vico distinguishes between the idols, ancestors, and gods of the K’iche’s. This paper shows that Vico believed the idols to be inanimate objects, ancestors to be the older generations that have passed away, and gods to be demons. This paper then develops a theory of animist ontology for the K’iche’s. Using that ontological theory, this paper argues that, for the K’iche’s, their idols and gods were indistinguishable and that their ancestors were still alive, present, and active among them.

Effects Of Environmental Change On Ancestral Pueblo Fishing In The Middle Rio Grande, Jonathan W. Dombrosky Dr.

Anthropology ETDs

It has long been assumed that fishes were unimportant in the diet of past Pueblo people in the U.S. Southwest. Yet, small numbers of fish remains are consistently recovered from Late pre-Hispanic/Early Historic archaeological sites in the Middle Rio Grande of New Mexico. The end of drought conditions may have impacted food choice and fishing decisions during this time. I use behavioral ecology to understand how fishing could have been an optimal food-getting strategy for Ancestral Pueblo farmers. Stable isotope analysis offers a way to account for environmental change. I provide a refined ¹³C Suess correction model to support …

Functional Changes In Fortified Places: Strategy And Defensive Architecture In The Medieval And Early Modern Eras, Scott Kirk

Anthropology ETDs

Castles – defined as the fortified residences of a militarized elite class – are a global, cross-cultural phenomenon rather than a historically particular development in medieval Europe. Pairing Niche Construction Theory (NCT) with the Lévi-Straussian concept of the House, this research combines architectural, statistical, and geospatial analyses for a sample of castles from medieval European, western colonial, and nonwestern societies to show: (1) castle building is a recurring feature of competition in stratified pre-industrial societies, (2) geography and topography constrain castle location and function, and (3) changes in castle placement, design and elaboration reflect the changing nature of social, economic …

Games People Played: The Social Role Of Gambling In The Prehispanic U.S. Southwest, Marilyn B. Riggs

Anthropology ETDs

This study examines the social role of gambling in the prehispanic U.S. Southwest. Many of the games recorded by ethnographers in the Southwest involved gambling, and game pieces resembling these examples have been found in archaeological sites. Settlement strategies in the Ancestral Puebloan Southwest changed through time, with periods of increasing aggregation and inter-cultural contact, two conditions that required mechanisms to facilitate successful interactions among multiple kin groups and between multiple culture groups.

Two Models explore the possibility that gambling served an integrative role in large, aggregated pueblos, and in pueblos located on the eastern frontier of the Pueblo region. …

Sex Differences In Age-Related Disease, Matthew R. Schwartz

Anthropology ETDs

Life history theory posits the evolution of sex-biased traits through asymmetries in the costs of reproduction. The research presented here evaluated the downstream effects of sex-biases in two age-related disease profiles: tooth loss, in which females exhibit a higher disease burden, and melanoma, in which females have a survival advantage.

Among the Tsimane, a natural fertility population of forager-horticulturalists with a high lifetime fertility and no access to oral healthcare, females lose more than males and around half a tooth per child. Parity accounts for 1.2\% of variation in tooth loss within females, but no variation in tooth loss in …

Ecologically Driven Changes In Subsistence Strategies: An Examination Of Bone Cross-Sectional Geometrical Properties In Hunter-Gatherers From Australia And Early Agriculturists From Belize, Ethan C. Hill

Anthropology ETDs

The primary purpose of this dissertation was to examine how changes to ecological context can urge subsistence level populations to adopt new subsistence strategies. This was accomplished by using metrics of bone strength to infer temporal behavior change in Holocene (10,000 BP – present) skeletal samples from southern Australia and southern Belize. The first paper, An Examination of the Cross-sectional Geometrical Properties of the Long Bone Diaphyses of Holocene Foragers from Roonka, South Australia, was written in collaboration with Osbjorn Pearson, Arthur Durband, Keryn Walshe, Kristian Carlson, and Frederick Grine. We compared long bone data for 69 individuals at Roonka …

The Sociality Of Charitable Giving In An Evolutionary Perspective, Wesley Allen-Arave

Anthropology ETDs

This dissertation draws on an evolutionary perspective to document and examine the social contexts in which charitable donations and appeals occur to increase our understanding of the role that social reputation may play in people’s charitable giving decisions. Charitable giving challenges theorists to contemplate pathways to cooperation that do not require shared genes, direct reciprocity, or immediate direct gains. This dissertation investigates the extent to which people give charitable donations in settings where donations are likely to have reputational consequences and how social relationships relate to charitable giving behavior. Data is based on face-to-face interviews with 512 participants covering the …

The Ontogeny Of Sex-Typed Social Strategies Among East African Chimpanzees (Pan Troglodyes Schweinfurthii), Kristin H. Sabbi

Anthropology ETDs

Although many differences in the behavior of men and women resemble those of other mammals, their developmental roots remain hotly debated due to the strong force of culture, including gender socialization, on human behavior. However, we can examine alternative and complementary mechanisms by studying chimpanzees, a closely-related species with complex sociality but without gender socialization. This dissertation comprises a multi-year, observational study of wild chimpanzee development examining three potential drivers of sex-typed social behavior: social experience, underlying differences in attention, and hormonal physiology. Immature chimpanzees experienced differential aggressive exposure that was shaped by their own early-emerging behavioral patterns. Both sexes …

Neshnabé Futurisms: Indigenous Science And Eco-Politics In The Great Lakes, Blaire K. Topash-Caldwell

Anthropology ETDs

In the wake of global climate change anthropological work in Indigenous contexts has focused on crisis intervention. Well-intentioned scholarship has emphasized how climate change disproportionately affects Indigenous communities but in the process has also erased Native voice and agency—deleting them from the future all together. In this dissertation I argue that ecological revitalization projects by tribes, Women’s Water Walks from the ceremonial Midéwiwin Lodge, and Indigenous science fiction media together constitute “Neshnabé futurisms” that challenge or disrupt these dominant narratives. Neshnabé futurisms guide Native American ecologists, theorists, and activists in the Great Lakes region in mitigating and surviving ecological destruction …

Using Archaeological Remote Sensing To Evaluate Land Use And Constructed Space In Chaco Canyon, Jennie O. Sturm

Anthropology ETDs

Archaeological remote sensing includes a suite of non-invasive methods that can be used to study elements of the archaeological record that may not be achievable otherwise. Using primarily geophysical remote sensing, and especially ground-penetrating radar (GPR), three studies involving questions of “use” were conducted in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. The first used GPR to study the built interior features of a single room in Pueblo Bonito to evaluate use and function of that room. Three categories of features were identified in the GPR data and confirmed with subsequent excavation. The second study used GPR to re-evaluate an enigmatic land use …

Amaro E Piccante: The Production And Use Of Terroir In The Scandal Of Italian Extra Virgin Olive Oils, Daniel Gene Shattuck Ii

Anthropology ETDs

This dissertation explores the revalorization of Italian extra virgin olive oils after a food scare that revealed some oils to be inauthentic or adulterated. In the process of distinguishing products, producers and tasters looked toward terroir or the “taste of place” as proof of their declarations of authenticity and as a method for differentiating oils. However, in this attempt, they engaged with other pervasive tropes of difference including those that intersected with belonging, the local and global, and race. This dissertation argues that terroir is a material-semiotic object; that while it may be grounded in the materiality of oils is …

Comparative Processes Of Sociopolitical Development In The Foothills Of The Southern Maya Mountains, Amy E. Thompson

Anthropology ETDs

Human behaviors and settlement decision-making can be evaluated through an assessment of settlement patterns. This dissertation examines the human behaviors that guide settlement selection, first through an analysis of settlement patterns to assess intra-site social communities, and second how communities develop over time. Three case studies examine settlement structure and what influences settlement selection within archaeological and modern contexts from the same region, southern Belize. Specifically, this dissertation focuses on two Classic period (250-800 CE) Maya centers, Uxbenká and Ix Kuku’il, and more than 50 modern Maya villages. Extensive survey and excavations were conducted to compare the development of settlements …

Seventeenth-Century Spanish Colonial Identity In New Mexico: A Study Of Identity Practices Through Material Culture, Caroline M. Gabe

Anthropology ETDs

This dissertation explores how seventeenth-century Spanish colonial households expressed their group identity at a regional level in New Mexico. Through the material remains of daily practice and repetitive actions, identity markers tied to adornment, technological traditions, and culinary practices are compared between 14 assemblages to test four identity models. Seventeenth-century colonists were eating a combination of Old World domesticates and wild game on colonoware and majolica serving vessels, cooking using Indigenous pottery, grinding with Puebloan style tools, and conducting household scale production and prospecting. While assemblages are consistent in basic composition, variations are present tied to socioeconomic status. This blending …

A Noncoherent Governance: Tinkering With Stones In The Old City Of Acre, Caitlin Davis

Anthropology ETDs

This dissertation recounts a series of episodes in the architectural conservation of the Old City of Acre in Israel. It studies the stones and mortars, residents and inspectors, papers and computers involved in the conservation of historic buildings, highlighting the moments in which the technical details of architectural conservation entangle themselves with the administrative techniques of government authorities. I describe architectural conservation as a tentative process, one that requires the coordination of various actants into precarious associations. Here, description is important. The pages that follow experiment with an anthropological practice that writes against conclusion. This is an anthropology that refuses …

“We Practice Lakota Way, But We Are Not An Indian Church”: The Diverse Ways Lakota Christians Articulate, Perform And Translate Ethnicity In Congregational Life, Kristin A. Fitzgerald

Anthropology ETDs

This study looks at articulations, performances and translations of ethnicity among urban Lakota Christians at St. Matthew’s and St. Isaac Jogues in Rapid City, South Dakota. Within the context of increased ethnic revitalization and recognition, Native American Christians are negotiating new models of ethnicity in typically Western arenas, often manifesting through actions and discourse that are ostensibly traditional. Yet even in this era of recognition, the public performance of cultural authenticity is not the only thing on people’s minds. Native people mark various practices, symbols, and persons as traditional or modern at different points in history or within different contexts …

The History Of Admixture In African Americans, Jessica M. Gross

Anthropology ETDs

African American admixture has been a focal topic of genetic studies since the mid-20^thcentury. Generally, these studies estimate individual- and population-level African and European ancestry proportions. Some of these studies fit unrealistic admixture models to the patterns of genetic diversity in African Americans to determine both the onset time of admixture between Africans and Europeans, and the per-generation contribution of Europeans.

This research has failed to consider the contribution of the millions of Africans who migrated, either forcibly or by choice, to North America during and after slave importation, and failed to consider how changing social dynamics have …

Facial Fluctuating Asymmetry: Developmental Origins And Implications For Long-Term Health, Katelyn Marie Rusk Phd

Anthropology ETDs

Fluctuating asymmetry (FA), characterized by random left-right deviations from perfect symmetry in anatomical structures, is a form of bilateral asymmetry that is thought to reflect underlying developmental instability (DI). DI refers to an organism’s relative ability to buffer against stochastic fluctuations in environmental conditions throughout development. FA is commonly used within evolutionary biology and anthropology as a cumulative indicator of chronic stress exposure during development and its consequences for long-term health. While the FA literature is extensive, there are two primary areas of inquiry that remain incomplete: assessing the full breadth of health correlates of FA across the human life …

Ethnic Identity And Genetic Ancestry In New Mexicans Of Spanish-Speaking Descent, Meghan Healy

Anthropology ETDs

This dissertation focuses on a regional population, New Mexicans of Spanish-speaking descent (NMS), to explore the nature of identity-related substructure in admixed populations and its implications for research and policymaking. We looked at the relationship between ethnic/ethnoracial identity and genomic ancestry in NMS in two studies. In the first, we collected genomic ancestry data using 270 autosomal microsatellites in 98 New Mexicans who self-identified as Hispanic or Latino and provided more detailed information on their ethnoracial identities. We tested for genetic substructure in this sample along with 13 other admixed samples from the Americas. The New Mexican sample showed evidence …

Trends In Health, Stress, And Migration In The Pre-Contact Southwest United States, Alexis O'Donnell

Anthropology ETDs

The major goal of this dissertation was to examine migration and its impacts on health through use of dental morphological and paleopathological data. The case study is the Southwest United States between A.D. 1200-1400s. The second chapter, written with Corey Ragsdale, Biological Distance and the Fate of the Gallina in the American Southwest, examines where the Gallina people may have gone upon abandoning their homes in the late A.D. 1200s. We used dental data for 492 individuals and mean measure of divergence (biodistance) analysis to examine several hypotheses regarding where the Gallina went. We find that the Gallina may have …

Pottery And Practice In The Late To Terminal Classic Maya Lowands: Case Studies From Uxbenká And Baking Pot, Belize, Jillian Michelle Jordan

Anthropology ETDs

This study examines interaction networks among non-elite potters at Uxbenká and Baking Pot, Belize during the Late to Terminal Classic Period (AD 600-900). Approaches to non-elite communities often assume that spatially distinct architectural groups are synonymous with social groups. While residential proximity surely influences interaction, social relations extend beyond neighbors so equating proximity with interaction simplifies the complex everyday lives of the Maya. Framed within a communities of practice theoretical framework, the goals of this study are threefold: (1) to understand pottery production practice among non-elite potters, (2) to identify communities of practice and (3) to evaluate community interaction through …