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Using Geographic Information Systems (Gis) In Spatial Analysis Of Mortuary Practices In The Kellis 2 Cemetery, Dakhleh Oasis, Egypt, Elsalam, Heba Abd

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis focuses on the use of geographic information systems (GIS) to examine mortuary practices in the Romano-Byzantine period Kellis 2 cemetery located in the Dakhleh Oasis, Egypt. The first research objective examines the relationship between age, sex and grave substructures of 701 burials in Kellis 2 cemetery. The aim of this research objective was to determine if the presence and style of grave substructures were influenced by sex or age. Although not statistically significant, GIS analysis revealed that most of the graves in the Kellis 2 cemetery have no associated substructures, but of those that did have associated substructures, …

A Cross Cultural Study Of Disability In The United States And Brazil, Emily Kirsten Stortz

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Disability is not only a biological issue, it is an inherently social one. People are only as disabled as their society allows them to be. Enhancing our understanding of the social processes affecting the disabled will allow for their increased participation within society. The researcher employed qualitative methods including semi-structured interviews and participant observation to perform case studies at fieldwork sites providing care to the disabled in Chicago, IL, USA and Santarém, Pará, Brazil. The researcher spent two consecutive weeks in each location. The former location is a residential facility for people with developmental disabilities and the latter is a …

The Power Of Definition: Brazil's Contribution To Universal Concepts Of Indigeneity, Jan Hoffman French

Sociology and Anthropology Faculty Publications

This article builds on discussions about the potential benefits and difficulties with developing a universal definition of indigenous peoples. It explores the spaces made available for theorizing indigeneity by the lack of a definition in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, adopted in 2007. Specifically, this article addresses the challenge presented by the diversity of groups claiming indigenous status in Brazil. To what extent do distinct cosmologies and languages that mark Amazonian Indians as unquestionably indigenous affect newly recognized tribes in the rest of Brazil who share none of the indicia of authenticity? This article theorizes …

Relationships Between Snake River Paleofloods, Occupational Patterns And Archaeological Preservation At Redbird Beach Archaeological Site In Lower Hells Canyon, Idaho, Tabitha Trosper

All Master's Theses

The Snake River basin drains 282,000 km² of the northwestern U.S. and is the largest tributary to the Columbia River. Redbird Beach, an archaeological site located in the lower Hells Canyon reach of the Snake River, contains extensive vertical exposures of archaeological materials interbedded with Snake River flood sediments. Redbird Beach formed in the lee of the Redbird Creek debris fan, is composed of interfingering deposits from large floods on the Snake River and locally-derived alluvial sediments from Redbird Creek. Through stratigraphic analyses of slackwater deposits, this study compares the temporal and spatial patterns of human occupation at Redbird …

A History Of Resilience Is A History Of Resistance, Melissa Ooten

Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies Faculty Publications

As an historian, I’m struck by the emphasis this documentary places on non-humans – be it animals, plants, soil, or mountains – although as a native of Appalachia, that doesn’t surprise me. The film is billed as “America’s first environmental history series: and as such, it gives us a bold, unique template of how to talk holistically about the concept of place and the specific place of Appalachia. While it may be particularly prescient to talk about the broader concept of place through ecology and other facets when analyzing the history of Appalachia, surely it is no less important when …

Sacred Stones For Sacred Structures: An Examination Of Patterns In The Temples And Twin Complexes At Tikal And Palenque, Meredith Mae Hild

Honors Program Theses

Extensive work in uncovering and reconstructing Classic Maya temples has been completed while the importance of Maya studies has increased during the past centuries. Little has been done, however, in the interpretation of certain Maya structures within the context of Maya thought. That context includes an understanding of the Maya interpretation of their place within the cosmos, an aspect of Maya culture that dictated every individual's daily actions. Researchers have tended to focus on architectural analyses that describe the dimensions and building materials of temples and other monumental structures. This leads to interpretations that are lacking in cultural significance. While …

Ongoing Studies In Rio Grande Valley History, Milo Kearney, Anthony K. Knopp, Antonio Zavaleta

Studies in Rio Grande Valley Regional History Series

Chupacabras, a poem / Milo Kearney -- The Texas Center for Border and Transnational Studies / Antonio Zavaleta with help from others -- History Through World War I : Comparative freedom in the borderlands: fugitive slaves in Texas and Mexico from the age of enlightenment through the U.S. Civil War / Francis X. Galan and Joseph Leon -- Contraband trade in Matamoros and its impact on the northern Mexican economy during the 1820s / Melisa Galvan -- Preparando los festejos para la inauguración del Ferrocarril a Monterrey / Andres F. Cuellar -- Adolf F. Dittman and Brownsville's first motion picture …

Understanding The Subjectivities Of Pastors And Beliefs About The Current American Church Culture, Michael Ellis Anderson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study investigates the spiritual subjectivities of pastors in the Mainstream White Middle Class Evangelical Church in the context of American capitalism. The Evangelical church carries extreme amounts of power and influence in shaping the beliefs of individuals in American society. However, very little pointed research of pastors' spiritual subjectivities that guide their teachings and views in this sub-sect of church culture is present in academia. Anthropology, along with other disciplines, often focuses on dominant churches from an etic perspective of politics and power relations without fully considering the spiritual beliefs of pastors. This etic perspective can miss the deeply …

Documenting The Oral Narratives Of Transient Punks, Thomas Ross Heffernan

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

The uninitiated do not realize the complexity of the punk rock sub-culture. Outsiders may find it hard to distinguish the subtle lines by which differentiation occurs within the so-called subculture. The "punk rock subculture" is a misnomer; it is not a salient community. The experience of being "punk" is fractal; what it means to be punk and what classifies one as punk is in constant redefinition and there are various different communities with varying ideologies and identities. The punk subculture has absorbed various epistemologies in its 40+ years of existence, modified them, and made them their own. Within this milieu …

Choque Cultural In Higher Education: The Lived Experiences Of Two Transnational Doctoral Students On The U.S. Mexico Border, Lyn Mckinley

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This study seeks to develop a deeper understanding of the experience of transnational students in higher education in a U.S. public university. The setting for the study is the U.S.-Mexico border between Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, and El Paso, Texas. While numerous studies examine the experience of transnational K-12 populations in U.S. schools, there is limited research on students in advanced levels of higher education in this context.

The purpose of this study is to provide an in-depth perspective of the experiences of two transnational doctoral students enrolled at the doctoral level at a U.S. university on the U.S.-Mexico border. The …

Dormant Ethnobotany: A Case Study Of Decline In Regional Plant Knowledge In The Bull Run Mountains Of Virginia, Susan Rene Leopold

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

This dissertation introduces and applies the concept of dormant ethnobotany, a concept that helps explain the socio-economic, cultural and ecological aspects and implications of the transition away from active use of ethnobotanical knowledge and the factors that may lead to its re-emergence. Dormant ethnobotany is the study of relationships between people and plants that are inactive, but nonetheless still alive in memories, the historic record, and folklore and thereby capable of reemergence in support of the transition to a more sustainable society. The dissertation extends the field of ethnobotany from its current roots in the dynamic ethnobotany of indigenous peoples. …

Global Transformations, Local Activism: “New” Unionism’S Engagement With Economic And Health Care Transformation In Urban Central Appalachia, Rebecca Adkins Fletcher

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

It has long been argued that the organization of the U.S. health care system is shaped by the struggles between capital and labor, and this relationship is of increasing significance today. Transformations from an industrial to a service economy, rising insurance costs, neoliberal social policies, and decreased labor union power have increased the number of Americans with reduced access to health care, especially for service workers and women. This dissertation is an ethnographic study of how workers in two leading unions in the “new” unionism movement, the Retail, Wholesale, and Distribution Service Union (RWDSU) and the United Steelworkers (USW) in …

Disjuncture Among Classic Period Cultural Landscapes In The Tuxtla Mountains, Southern Veracruz, Mexico, Wesley Durrell Stoner

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Teotihuacan was the most influential city in the Classic Mesoamerican worldsystem. Like other influential cities in the ancient world, however, Teotihuacan did not homogenously affect the various cultural landscapes that thrived in Mesoamerica during the Classic period (300-900 CE). Even where strong central Mexican influences appear outside the Basin of Mexico, the nature, extent, and strength of these influences are discontinuous over time and space. Every place within the Classic Mesoamerican landscape has a unique Teotihuacan story. In the Tuxtla Mountains of southern Veracruz, Mexico, Matacapan, located in the Catemaco Valley, drew heavily upon ideas and symbols fostered at Teotihuacan, …

Mississippi Period Occupational And Political History Of The Middle Savannah River Valley, Keith Stephenson

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

Research focusing on the political economy of Mississippian mound centers in the middle Savannah River valley has prompted a reevaluation of current interpretations regarding societal complexity. I conclude the clearest expression of classic Mississippian riverine-adaptation is evident at centers immediately below the Fall Line with their political ties to chiefdom centers in the Piedmont, and especially Etowah. By contrast, those centers on the interior Coastal Plain were politically autonomous with minimal signatures in social ranking. The scale of appropriated labor and resulting level of surplus production, necessitated by upland settlement on the Aiken Plateau, fostered social contradictions making communally-oriented and …

Nationalism And Its Expression In Cuba’S Art Music: The Use Of Folklore In Mario Abril’S “Fantasia (Introduction And Pachanga)” For Clarinet And Piano, Nikolasa Tejero

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

In the centuries since the colonization of the New World, the people of Cuba created a strong musical tradition. Initially, their music mirrored the European composition canons of structural, melodic and harmonic order. The eventual confluence of its distinct cultural elements (i.e. the European, African, and, to a lesser extent, Amerindian) led to the emergence of a new, distinctly Cuban musical tradition.

The wars for independence that began in the United States and Europe in the eighteenth century created a surge towards political and cultural autonomy that swept across the Latin American colonies, generating a wave of nationalism during the …

Strategic Flexibility: Household Ecologies Of Ful’Be In Tanout, Niger, Karen Marie Greenough

University of Kentucky Doctoral Dissertations

(Agro)pastoralism in Sahelian Niger, as elsewhere, operates through household enterprises. Katsinen-ko’en (Fulбe) households, interconnected within kin and community networks, utilize a range of flexible strategies to manage a variety of ecological and economic risks. This dissertation argues that (agro)pastoralist households and communities maintain or improve viability in risky environments first by employing various mobility patterns, among other strategies, and relying on the tightly knit interdependence between household and herd. Secondly, households that most successfully sustain a cooperative integrity (i.e. partnerships between husband and wife, or wives, and parents and children) to negotiate decisions and strategies best withstand adversities such as …

Tourism, Persistence, And Change: Sherpa Spirituality And Place In Sagarmatha (Mount Everest) National Park And Buffer Zone, Nepal, Jeremy Spoon

Anthropology Faculty Publications and Presentations

Ecotourism and cultural tourism are emerging as vehicles for many of the world’s indigenous peoples to integrate into the global market economy. The ecological knowledge and understanding of these societies may in turn be affected by these nascent industries. As part of shifting human-environment relationships, tourism can influence place-based spirituality. In this manuscript, I describe research on how tourism affected Khumbu Sherpa place-based spiritual values in Sagarmatha (Mt. Everest) National Park and Buffer Zone, Nepal. As Tibetan Buddhists, the Sherpa embodied dual overlapping conceptions of sacred landscape that connected people to place in some environmentally sustainable ways. Since the 1960s, …

People In Between: The Value Of Life Stories In Exploring The Needs Of Colombian Asylum Seekers, Poonam R. Valliappan

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The long, protracted civil war, spanning nearly fifty years, in the South American nation of Colombia has displaced almost four million civilians in as much time. Tens of thousands of refugees were resettled in Ecuador, Panama, Venezuela and other neighboring countries. Some, still threatened in their country of first asylum, and resettled to the United States (US) with their families, must learn to navigate the often complex systems of life and living in America. Resettlement programs that focus primarily on immediate needs such as employment and accommodations are aware of the growing need for more long&ndashterm assistance. However, while there …

Life And Death Journeys: Medical Travel, Cancer, And Children In Argentina, Cecilia Vindrola Padros

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Recent studies on the Argentine public health system have demonstrated that the lack of medical resources in different parts of the country force pediatric oncology patients and their family members to travel to Buenos Aires in order to access care. This internal migration poses difficulties for these families as travel and resettlement are expensive, lead to the separation of family members, and interrupt the child's schooling. This dissertation was designed to document the everyday life experiences of traveling families in order to understand the barriers they faced while attempting to access medical treatment and the strategies they used to surmount …

"... Rivalry, Hostility, And Romanita." An Ethnographic Study Of As Roma's Ultras, Mark Wayne Dyal

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This is an ethnographic study of Italian Ultras, the organized and ritualized fan organizations associated with professional soccer in Italy. It examines the relationship between their belief and behaviors, paying particular attention to their political behaviors. The study follows 15 months of anthropological fieldwork undertaken in Rome, Italy. Its goal is to assess the role that the Ultras' particular critical understanding of modernity plays in organizing and actualizing their behaviors inside and outside of sporting contexts. Part of my effort in this study is to examine local reactions to national and international issues of globalization and liberalization. In following this …

Genealogies: Articulating Indigenous Anthropology In/Of Oceania, Ty P. Kāwika Tengan, Tēvita O. Ka‘Ili, Rochelle Tuitagava‘A Fonoti

Pacific Studies

Introduction article to Volume 33 Issue 2/3 Special Edition on genealogies.

Tā, Vā , And Moana: Temporality, Spatiality, And Indigeneity, Hūfanga ‘Okusitino Māhina

Pacific Studies

This article explores how indigenous perspectives—specifically from the Moana—can reshape the way anthropology is practiced and understood. A key focus is on genealogy, not just as family lineage, but as a powerful tool for understanding how people, places, and histories are connected across time and space. The article argues that genealogy in Moana cultures is deeply philosophical and relational, helping to explain how individuals and communities locate themselves within broader social and natural worlds. This approach is grounded in the Moana concepts of tā (time) and vā (space).

Collaboration And Capacity Building In The Classroom: A Decolonizing Teaching Agenda To Create A Cadre Of Indigenous Researchers, Holly M. Barker, Rochelle Tuitagava‘A Fonoti

Pacific Studies

This article explores collaborative anthropology as a response to indigenous critiques of outsider research in Oceania. Drawing from the authors' diverse positionalities and their experience teaching Anthropology, the paper reimagines the classroom as a space for co-learning, capacity building, and indigenous empowerment. By integrating participatory methods and traditional collaborative practices of Samoan and Marshallese communities, the study highlights how educational environments can foster sustainable research models and support a growing network of indigenous scholars.

Vol. 33 No. 2/3 (2010): Pacific Studies Front Matter, The Jonathan Nāpela Center For Hawaiian And Pacific Islands Studies

Pacific Studies

Front Matter for the Vol. 33, No 2/3-Aug/Dec 2010 edition of the Pacific Studies Journal.

Vol. 33 No. 2/3 (2010): Pacific Studies Full Issue, The Jonathan Nāpela Center For Hawaiian And Pacific Islands Studies

Pacific Studies

Pacific Studies is published two times a year by The Jonathan Nāpela Center for Hawaiian and Pacific Studies, Brigham Young University Hawai‘i #1979, 55–220 Kulanui Street, Lāʻie, Hawai‘i 96762, but responsibility for opinions expressed in the articles rests with the authors alone. Subscription rate is US $40.00 yearly, payable to The Jonathan Nāpela Center for Hawaiian and Pacific Studies. The Jonathan Nāpela Center for Hawaiian and Pacific Studies (formerly The Pacific Institute) is an organization funded by Brigham Young University Hawai‘i. The Center assists the University in meeting its cultural and educational goals by undertaking a program of teaching, research, …

Global Demographic Challenges: Case Study Women, Madeline Fox

Social Sciences

Half of the world lives on less than $2 a day. Everywhere men, women and children live in extreme poverty and suffer. Anthropogenic climate change has intensified famines, droughts, floods, hurricanes and other natural disasters. Modern civilization has altered nature and nature has responded to these alterations. Every year approximately 80 million people are added to the
planet, increasing pressure on the land. These added numbers of people require increased food and land resources and produce more pollution. While populations grow, arable lands with high yields do not. It is essential to reduce global consumption of all commodities and reduce …

Ambiguous Environments, Peter Riviere

Tipití: Journal of the Society for the Anthropology of Lowland South America

No abstract provided.

Fort St. Joseph Archaeological Project Annual Report, 2009-10, Michael S. Nassaney

Fort St. Joseph Archaeological Project

he Fort St. Joseph Archaeological Project continues to build on a legacy of success in fieldwork, analysis, publication, public education, and outreach as we engage the community in the pursuit of a better understanding of the fur trade and colonialism in southwest Michigan. Over the past year (September 1, 2009 through August 31, 2010) several aspects of the project were expanded. Some of the year’s highlights include:

• A new membership program that provides special benefits for project supporters at varying levels
• The summer lecture series devoted to the “Women of New France”
• A grant of $8,100 from the Michigan Humanities …

London And Middlesex Local Immigration Partnership – Research Needs And Potential Partnerships, Huda Hussein

Migration and Ethnic Relations Colloquium Series

No abstract provided.

Collaborative Researchers Or Cold Warriors? The Origins, Activities, And Legacy Of The Smithsonian’S Institute Of Social Anthropology, A. Peter Castro

Journal of International and Global Studies

International research collaboration is increasingly popular, providing many scholarly and practical benefits. These collaborative endeavors also encounter obstacles and costs, including ones involving issues of power and professional ethics. My study seeks to widen our understanding of international collaborative social science research by examining the complex origins, diverse activities, and clouded legacy of the Smithsonian Institution’s Institute of Social Anthropology (ISA). The ISA was an innovative collaborative teaching and research program founded by Julian Steward during World War II to meet many goals, including increasing social science capacity in Latin America, expanding knowledge about contemporary cultural change, strengthening area expertise …