Anthropology Commons^™

A National Bilingual Education Policy For The Economic And Academic Empowerment Of Youth In St. Lucia, West Indies, Gabriella Bellegarde

Capstone Collection

This campaign portfolio argues the case for a national bilingual education policy on the island of St. Lucia, where youth speak both St Lucian Creole and St. Lucian standard English. The portfolio consists of a policy paper and brief, an advocacy plan, a communications plan, monitoring and evaluation plan. The Bilingual Education Taskforce (BET), made up of teachers, parents and principals, is an advocacy organization that discovered the need for a bilingual education intervention when they observed, assessed and analyzed the written work of struggling readers at their school, the Anse la Raye Infant School on the west coast of …

Pathways To Leadership: Four Women's Journeys To The Peace Negotiation Table In The Fight For Democracy In Burma, Brittany Shelmon

Indiana Journal of Constitutional Design

No abstract provided.

“I’M Trying To Do The Right Thing”: Competing Responsibilities Among Teen Parents In The Context Of Neoliberalism, Jennifer Kimberly Heipp

Arts & Sciences Graduate Student Theses and Dissertations

Over 14 months of participant observation at teen mom serving organizations, I examined competing and complimentary ideas between the teen moms and the staff of the organizations about what it means to be "responsible." Within neoliberalism, being a "responsible" person is seen as both an ideal and an obligation, and scholars have elaborated how within neoliberal regimes, processes of "responsibilization" occur. In this dissertation, I advance the notion of "competing responsibilities," in that both the programs and my teen mom informants believe it is important to be a responsible person but they differ on the key question of to whom …

Surviving Collapse: Collective Memory And Political Reorganization At Actuncan, Belize, David Williams Mixter

Arts & Sciences Graduate Student Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation focuses on a study of political reorganization at the ancient Maya site of Actuncan, Belize following the 9th century collapse of Classic Maya society. During the Terminal Classic period (A.D. 780–1000), Maya divine kingship was gradually abandoned, leading to increased warfare, regional food scarcity, and mass migration. In contrast to broader trends, the residents of Actuncan did not leave. In this dissertation, I draw on the theoretical frameworks of resilience theory and collective memory to explain why Actuncan was not abandoned and how the local community reorganized its political and ritual institutions after the failure of divine kingship. …

Lactating In St. Louis: Attachments, Technologies, And Disparities, Sarah Sobonya

Arts & Sciences Graduate Student Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation uses the concept of attachments to explicate women’s breastfeeding practices and beliefs in the racially and economically segregated St. Louis, Missouri region. My analysis examines the interplay among attachments at three levels: women’s intrapersonal attachments to specific concepts of self; their attachments to the values and priorities of social groups; and attachments they form in response to larger structural and ideological forces in society. I argue that racial and socioeconomic disparities are manifested through breastfeeding praxis, so that breastfeeding serves as a lens through which these oppressions and disparities can be more fully viewed. To illuminate this, I …

Farming Through The Auca Runa: Agricultural Strategies And Terraces During The Late Intermediate Period, Altiplano, Peru, Brieanna Sylvia Langlie

Arts & Sciences Graduate Student Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines agricultural strategies farmers employed to cope with the consequences of war and drought in the southern Peruvian Andes during the Late Intermediate Period (A.D. 1100-1450) using paleoethnobotanical data from the fortified hilltop site Ayawiri and findings from excavations of a terrace complex flanking the site. During the Late Intermediate Period, lifeways dissolved into a period of endemic warfare after the collapse of Tiwanaku. At the same time a well-documented, century-long drought surely threatened food security. Interested in how farmers responded to this political and climatic disjuncture, I analyzed 108 flotation samples collected from the residential area of …

The Non-Masticatory Use Of The Anterior Teeth Among Late Pleistocene Humans, John Charles Willman

Arts & Sciences Graduate Student Theses and Dissertations

Characteristic patterns of dental wear form through the use of the dentition for non-masticatory manipulative behaviors. The use of “teeth-as-tools” or the dentition as a “third hand” for manipulative behaviors emphasizes the importance of the human dentition in our otherwise extrasomatic tool-kit. The extreme pattern of anterior dental wear found in many Neandertals, together with their large anterior teeth, has led researchers to suggest that the unique craniofacial morphology of Neandertals is the result of functional adaptation to the habitual use of the dentition for manipulative tasks. However, decades of research investigating the adaptive significance and biomechanical properties of Neandertal …

Cultivating Knowledge: The Production And Adaptation Of Knowledge On Organic And Gm Cotton Farms In Telangana, India, Andrew Flachs

Arts & Sciences Graduate Student Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation explores the ways in which genetically modified (GM) cotton seeds, rice seeds, and organic cotton seeds in Telangana, India set farmers on diverging economic, environmental, and social trajectories. GM cotton, a cash crop sold under hundreds of different brand names by private corporations, leads farmers to rapidly change to new seeds and copy their neighbors’ choices as they chase high yields that counter their high investments in an input-intensive agriculture. Rice, a subsistence and market crop distributed largely by public breeders, allows farmers to change their seeds more slowly as they carefully evaluate durability and taste alongside overall …

An Epigenetic Clock Analysis Of Race/Ethnicity, Sex, And Coronary Heart Disease, Steve Horvath, Michael Gurven, Morgan E. Levine, Benjamin C. Trumble, Hillard Kaplan, Hooman Allayee, Beate R. Ritz, Brian Chen, Ake T. Lu, Tammy M. Rickabaugh, Beth D. Jamieson, Dianjianyi Sun, Shengxu Li, Wei Chen, Lluis Quintana-Murci, Maud Fagny, Michael S. Kobor, Philip S. Tsao, Alexander P. Reiner, Kerstin L. Edlefsen, Devin Absher, Themistocles L. Assimes

ESI Publications

Background: Epigenetic biomarkers of aging (the “epigenetic clock”) have the potential to address puzzling findings surrounding mortality rates and incidence of cardio-metabolic disease such as: (1) women consistently exhibiting lower mortality than men despite having higher levels of morbidity; (2) racial/ethnic groups having different mortality rates even after adjusting for socioeconomic differences; (3) the black/white mortality cross-over effect in late adulthood; and (4) Hispanics in the United States having a longer life expectancy than Caucasians despite having a higher burden of traditional cardio-metabolic risk factors.

Results: We analyzed blood, saliva, and brain samples from seven different racial/ethnic groups. …

Coastal Louisiana: Adaptive Capacity In The Face Of Climate Change, Tara Lambeth

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Extreme weather events can result in natural disasters, and climate change can cause these weather events to occur more often and with more intensity. Because of social and physical vulnerabilities, climate change and extreme weather often affect coastal communities. As climate change continues to be a factor for many coastal communities, and environmental hazards and vulnerability continue to increase, the need for adaptation may become a reality for many communities. However, very few studies have been done on the effect climate change and mitigation measures implemented in response to climate change have on a community’s adaptive capacity.

This single instrumental …

Surviving In The Land Of Opportunity: Outcomes Of Post-Crisis Urban Redevelopment In The United States, Brianna D. Foster

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

How we develop cities in the twenty-first century remains a subject of contentious debate worldwide. As neoliberal strategies are implemented in redevelopment projects, public safety nets are reduced and low-income communities of color in declining urban neighborhoods become particularly vulnerable. This multiple case study seeks to understand the experiences of post crisis urban redevelopment for low-income communities of color in 5 major U.S. cities. The data I analyzed include 101 short videos from the interactive documentary platform Land of Opportunity, documenting the process of post-crisis urban redevelopment in New Orleans, New York, Chicago, Detroit, and San Francisco. In doing so, …

Bulletin No. 42: The Mamacoke Conservation Area, Glenn Dreyer, Robert Askins, Scott Peterson

Bulletins

No abstract provided.

Outliving Love: Marital Estrangement In An African Insurance Market, Casey Golomski

Anthropology

Marital estrangement and formal divorce are vital conjunctures for married women’s kinship relations and life course, where a horizon of future possibilities are revalued and negotiated at the interstices of custom, law, and social and ritual obligations. In this article, after delineating the forms of customary and civil marriage and the possibilities for divorce or estrangement from each, I describe how some married women in Swaziland and South Africa mediate this complex social field for their children and families through pensions and continuing to pay for their partners’ insurance coverage. This was not solely out of avarice to reap future …

Black Gentrification Twice Removed: A Study Of Migration And Community Involvement In Washington, Dc, Janwin A. Zeegar-Holman

Capstone Collection

This paper is about Black people and community involvement against the backdrop of gentrification in Washington, DC, and possibility of Black-led neighborhood revitalization. My practicum in Southeast Washington DC compelled me to examine the ability of a Black person in Washington DC to sustain commitment to a community that they do not live in, and if Black people moving to gentrifying areas of Washington DC can help the predominantly Black non-gentrifying areas to gentrify on their own terms.

This paper focuses specifically on Black individuals who have spent time in DC and proposed ways that Black non-gentrifying communities can revitalize …

American Myths, Legends, And Tall Tales: An Encyclopedia Of American Folklore, Christopher R. Fee, Jeffrey Webb, Danielle R. Dattolo, Emily A. Francisco, Bronwen Fetters, Jaime Hillegonds, Andrew Wickersham

Gettysburg College Faculty Books

Folklore has been a part of American culture for as long as humans have inhabited North America, and increasingly formed an intrinsic part of American culture as diverse peoples from Europe, Africa, Asia, and Oceania arrived. In modern times, folklore and tall tales experienced a rejuvenation with the emergence of urban legends and the growing popularity of science fiction and conspiracy theories, with mass media such as comic books, television, and films contributing to the retelling of old myths. This multi-volume encyclopedia will teach readers the central myths and legends that have formed American culture since its earliest years of …

Building Xunantunich: Public Building In An Ancient Maya Community, Leah M. Mccurdy

Sociology & Anthropology Faculty Publications - Archive

The purpose of this study is to consider the nature and implications of large-scale public building conducted by ancient groups. “Public building studies” is offered as a unifying moniker for investigations of ancient construction processes with public significance. This work concentrates on labor as an understudied component of public building in the ancient past and narrows focus directly to laborers as contributors to and the actual actors in public building activities. As such, this study considers alternatives to elite-centric interpretations of monumental buildings and their processes of creation.

This study focuses on an ancient Maya case study to apply a …

Crossroads: An Interdisciplinary Study Of Funeral Directors In Indiana, Aubrey Thamann

Open Access Dissertations

This work is an ethnographic study of funeral directors in Indiana, focusing on the social role they play. Funeral directors, through performances as director and actor, with their living tableaux and focus on the life of the deceased individual, rather than his or her death, offer us the illusion of a modern American ideal—a society with no death. In the face of a great loss, we are reminded how much we depend upon others, which runs contrary to the traditional American concept of the individual. Individualism is so important to us that our funerary ritual, in place for the living, …

From Cow Pasture To Cul-De-Sac: The Intersection Of Rural Values, Memory, And Nostalgia Amidst Suburban Development In The American South, Emily F. Ramsey

Theses and Dissertations

How do residents of a once small farming community react to rapid suburbanization? By examining rhetoric on growth, progress, and rurality, this thesis argues a complex landscape forms where longtime residents weave among pragmatism, disaffection, and nostalgia, with efforts to preserve memories of the past for themselves and future generations.

Reply To Marom Et Al.: Mitochondrial Panmixia In Dromedaries Predates Ancient Caravan Trading, Pamela A. Burger, Joris Peters, Peter Magee, Olivier Hanotte

Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology Faculty Research and Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Project 400: The Plymouth Colony Archaeological Survey Report On The 2015 Field Season Burial Hill, Plymouth, Massachusetts, Christa M. Beranek, David B. Landon, John M. Steinberg, Brian N. Damiata

Andrew Fiske Memorial Center for Archaeological Research Publications

In May and June of 2015, a field school from the University of Massachusetts Boston, in partnership with Plimoth Plantation, undertook a third season of work in Plymouth, Massachusetts, as part of Project 400: The Plymouth Colony Archaeological Survey, a site survey and excavation program leading up to the 400th anniversary of New England’s first permanent English settlement in 1620, the founding of Plymouth Colony. This work was conducted under permit #3384 from the State Archaeologist’s office at the Massachusetts Historical Commission. The 2015 work focused on the eastern edge of Burial Hill along School Street in downtown Plymouth where …

Morphological Characteristics Of The Ice Margins Of Antarctic Ice Shelf And Outlet Glacier Extracted From Icesat Laser Altimetry Along-Track Profiles, Jieun Kim, Jaehyung Yu, Lei Wang, Hongxing Liu, Haein Shin

Faculty Publications

The Antarctic ice sheet topography including elevation and slope is a key parameter for understanding ice sheet dynamics because the surface slope is a major controller of the ice flow gravitational driving stress magnitude. This study used Ice, Cloud, and land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) laser altimetry data to analyze the ice margin morphological parameters for 20 ice shelves and 12 outlet glaciers distributed over Antarctica. The bottom-up segmentation algorithm application effectively extracted the morphological parameters from the laser altimetry profiles. The ice shelves had an average boundary elevation of 29.5 m and a slope of 7.8°, with a decreasing surface …

Northwest Coast Native American Art: The Relationship Between Museums, Native Americans And Artists, Karrie E. Myers

Museum Studies Theses

Museums today have many responsibilities, including protecting and understanding objects in their care. Many also have relationships with groups of people whose items or artworks are housed within their institutions. This paper explores the relationship between museums and Northwest Coast Native Americans and their artists. Participating museums include those in and out of the Northwest Coast region, such as the Museum of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia, the Burke Museum, the Royal British Columbia Museum, the American Museum of Natural History and the Smithsonian Museum. Museum professionals who conducted research for some of these museums included Franz Boas, …

The Organization Of Technology In The Pine Hills Of Mississippi, Ronald W. Wise Jr.

Master's Theses

This thesis details the use of experimental flintknapping to better understand stone tool production and the organization of technology among Woodland period hunter-gatherers within the Pine Hills region of Mississippi. The Pine Hills region is characterized archaeologically by the presence of numerous sites consisting of flake scatters and little other material remains. Local tool stone resources consist of high grade chert in the form of small river cobbles, which restricts potential tool forms available to users.

Research for this project focused on the statistical analysis of debitage created during the experimental replication of stone tools using local chert cobbles. Special …

Being With Bees: An Anthropological Study On Human-Animal Relations In Southern Beekeeping, Kori Nadine Armstrong

Master's Theses

This thesis investigates the complex and dynamic communicative relationship between beekeepers and their managed honey bee colonies, providing insight into the relationship between bees, their stewards, and the interface between nature and culture. It also helps unravel the ways in which this interspecies relationship changes a beekeepers’ perception of what it means to be human. Data collection features extensive participant observation with 21 semi-structured interviews with Southern beekeepers.

The interrelationship between communication and interaction, as well as diverse ways in which messages and cues manifest in the bee yard are explored through olfactory, optical, touch, and mechanical modalities. Variables including …

Effect Of Migration, Carrying Capacity, And Fecundity On The Formation Of Clinal Patterns During Range Expansions., Neha J. Angal

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Range expansions, empirically and in simulations, lead to clinal patterns of genetic diversity. Clines are often used as spatial markers of past migrations. This study investigated the effects of migration, growth, and carrying capacities on clinal patterns during range expansions, using forward-time simulations in Nemo. Initial results show, in the absence of prior population structure, range expansions result in a loss of diversity strongly affected by migration, growth, and carrying capacity. This loss of diversity did not persist to the final generation, corresponding to 10,000 years, indicating clinal patterns are less durable than previously assumed—challenging the utility of clinal patterns …

Knitting Rebellion: Elizabeth Zimmermann, Identity, And Craftsmanship In Post War America, Maureen Lilly Marsh

Open Access Dissertations

At mid 20th century, hand knitting in the United States was practiced as a minor and fading chore of the domestic economy, with decreasing pattern publications in national women’s magazines, and the demise of Vogue Knitting Book by the late nineteen-sixties. By 1990, it had rebounded into major new publications in periodicals and books, new and revived artisanship practices, gallery exhibitions and major international conferences and gatherings. A driving figure in this resurgence was the knitter, writer, teacher, designer, and publisher Elizabeth Zimmermann. With her initial publication in 1955 up to her retirement in 1989, Elizabeth’s philosophy of knitting stressed …

Cryptosporidium Parvum Among Coprolites From La Cueva De Los Muertos Chiquitos (600–800 Ce), Rio Zape Valley, Durango, Mexico, Johnica J. Morrow, Karl Reinhard

Karl Reinhard Publications

In the present study, 90 coprolites from La Cueva de los Muertos Chiquitos (CMC) were subjected to enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) tests for 3 diarrhea-inducing protozoan parasites, Entamoeba histolytica, Giardia duodenalis, and Cryptosporidium parvum, to determine whether these parasites were present among the people who utilized this cave 1,200–1,400 yr ago. These people, the Loma San Gabriel, developed as a culture out of the Archaic Los Caracoles population and lived throughout much of present-day Durango and Zacatecas in Mexico. The Loma San Gabriel persisted through a mixed subsistence strategy of hunting-gathering and agricultural production. The results of …

How The City Of Indianapolis Came To Have African American Policemen And Firemen 80 Years Before The Modern Civil Rights Movement., Leon E. Bates

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study explores a series of events that occurred in the spring of 1876. The relationship between the Indianapolis city government, the Marion County Courts, the Indianapolis Police Department, and the African American community came together to usher in changes never before envisioned. The Indianapolis Police Department (IPD) was formed in 1855, then disbanded 12 months later in a political dispute. From 1857-to-1876, the IPD was all white. These changes took place as the Reconstruction era was coming to a close. The first Ku Klux Klan was at its apex, terrorizing black communities, and Jim Crow was coming into its …

The Proof Is In The Pots: Residue Analysis Of Virgin Branch Puebloan Ceramics, Brenna Lynn Wilkerson

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This study focuses on better understanding diet and subsistence strategies among Virgin Branch Puebloan groups living in the Moapa Valley in southern Nevada and on the Shivwits Plateau in northwestern Arizona. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) was used to identify absorbed food residues in three types of Virgin Branch Puebloan ceramics (Moapa Gray Ware, Shivwits Ware, and Tusayan Virgin Series). The data produced by the residue analysis were used to compare patterns of subsistence between Virgin Branch Puebloan sites in the lowlands along the Muddy River and at upland sites on the Shivwits Plateau as these two areas have different environments …

Effects Of Human Maternal Placentophagy On Postpartum Maternal Affect, Health, And Recovery, Sharon Marie Young

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Postpartum ingestion of the afterbirth by the mother, or maternal placentophagy, is a common behavior among eutherian mammals, including non-human primates, with humans as a rare exception. Despite the conspicuous absence of placentophagy in the cross-cultural ethnographic record, the practice appears to be gaining popularity among a small but growing number of advocates in various industrialized contexts who claim that the practice provides benefits to the postpartum mother, namely the relief and prevention of postpartum blues and depressive symptoms, improved breast milk production, and enhanced bonding with their infant. Because the placenta serves as an endocrine organ throughout pregnancy and …