Social and Cultural Anthropology Commons^™

Eye Of The Needle: Cold Stress, Clothing, And Sewing Technology During The Younger Dryas Cold Event In North America, Alan J. Osborn

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

This paper examines the possible underlying systemic context(s) for spurred flake gravers and eyed bone needles recovered from Paleoindian sites in North America. The idea that spurred flake gravers and eyed bone needles were closely associated is not new. Archaeologists in both Eurasia and North America have also proposed that eyed bone and ivory needles were used for manufacturing tailored skin clothing. It is suggested here that spurred flake gravers and eyed bone needles may, in fact, be the material correlates of critical non-subsistence related work carried out by women to meet the challenges of very severe winters and cold …

Sedentism, Social Change, Warfare, And The Bow In The Ancient Pueblo Southwest, Paul F. Reed, Phil R. Geib

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

In the ancient American Southwest, use of the bow developed relatively rapidly among Pueblo people by the fifth century AD. This new technology replaced the millennia-old atlatl and dart weaponry system. Roughly 150 years later in the AD 600s, Pueblo socioeconomic organization began to evolve rapidly, as many groups adopted a much more sedentary life. Multiple factors converged to allow this sedentary pattern to emerge, but the role of the bow in this process has not been fully explored. In this paper, we trace the development of the bow and discuss its role as sedentism emerged and social changes occurred …

A Survey Of Non-Classical Polyandry, Kathrine E. Starkweather, Raymond Hames

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

We have identified a sample of 53 societies outside of the classical Himalayan and Marquesean area that permit polyandrous unions. Our goal is to broadly describe the demographic, social, marital, and economic characteristics of these societies and to evaluate some hypotheses of the causes of polyandry. We demonstrate that although polyandry is rare it is not as rare as commonly believed, is found worldwide, and is most common in egalitarian societies. We also argue that polyandry likely existed during early human history and should be examined from an evolutionary perspective. Our analysis reveals that it may be a predictable response …

Signifying The Place Of Unforgettable Memory: Atrocity And Trauma In A Post-Conflict Landscape, Ralph J. Hartley

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

After active inter-group lethal violence subsides places at which atrocities occurred are often assigned significance, reflecting an altered social topography influenced by ideology that may foster the hardening of socio-ethnic boundary distinctions. While using a comparativist approach, this paper explores the relationships between socio-cultural trauma, places of atrocity, and socio-political polarization. Two sites in the former Yugoslavia and in Rwanda, where highly publicized massacres occurred, illustrate the power of place significance in social environments vulnerable to flare-ups of violent conflict.

Binford, Lewis R., Alan J. Osborn

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

Binford challenged anthropologists and archaeologists to expand the scope of their research, to develop more rigorous methodologies for data collection and analysis, and to think more critically. Science is a marathon without a finish line. Our understanding of past and present human behavior and cultural systems does not come easily. Social scientists can produce reliable knowledge by means of an iterative process that involves generating, testing, and refining (or rejecting) explanatory models. These models are, then, combined to construct scientific theories. The robust consequences of these theories are then continually scrutinized and evaluated. Binford continually made use of the complex …

Social Interaction At The Maya Site Of Copan, Honduras: A Least Cost Approach To Configurational Analysis, Heather Richards-Rissetto

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

In this article, I employ least cost paths using GIS to measure the relationship between site configuration and social connectivity at the ancient Maya site of Copan, Honduras. I investigate two questions. First, did people of different social classes experience varying degrees of social connectivity? Second, did people living in different parts of the city experience difference degrees of social connectivity? Ultimately, the goal is modify traditional configurational analysis using least cost analysis (LCA) to identify how social hierarchy was embedded in landscapes and how ancient people may have strategically manipulated landscapes to structure social interaction and community organization.

In Memoriam: Lewis R. Binford, 1931-2011, Alan J. Osborn

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

Obituary of archaeology and anthropology professor Lewis Roberts Binford, 1931-April 11, 2011.

Cordage, Textiles, And The Late Pleistocene Peopling Of The Andes, Edward A. Jolie, Thomas F. Lynch, Phil R. Geib, J. M. Adovasio

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

Harsh high-altitude environments were among the last landscapes to be settled by humans during the Late Pleistocene between ∼15,000 and 11,000 calendar years before present (cal yr BP). Successful colonization required physiological adaptations to hypoxia and cultural adaptations to limited resources and cold temperatures. How and when humans colonized Andean South America has been poorly understood owing to controversial early archaeological sites and questions about the impact of environmental factors, including the presence of glaciers. Here we report the reexamination and direct dating of six finely woven textiles and cords from Guitarrero Cave, Peru, that identify South America’s earliest textiles …

A Web-Based Interactive Tool For Multi-Resolution 3d Models Of A Maya Archaeological Site, G. Agugiaro, Fabio Remondino, Gabrio Girardi, Jennifer Von Schwerin, H. Richards-Rissetto, Raffaele De Amicis

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

Continuous technological advances in surveying, computing and digital-content delivery are strongly contributing to a change in the way Cultural Heritage is “perceived”: new tools and methodologies for documentation, reconstruction and research are being created to assist not only scholars, but also to reach more potential users (e.g. students and tourists) willing to access more detailed information about art history and archaeology. 3D computer-simulated models, sometimes set in virtual landscapes, offer for example the chance to explore possible hypothetical reconstructions, while on-line GIS resources can help interactive analyses of relationships and change over space and time. While for some research purposes …

The Role Of Basketry In Early Holocene Small Seed Exploitation: Implications Of A Ca. 9,000 Year-Old Basket From Cowboy Cave, Utah, Phil R. Geib, Edward A. Jolie

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

Despite ranking at the low end of the continuum in net caloric benefit relative to other foods, small seeds assumed great dietary importance in many parts of the world, including western North America. In a series of publications, Adovasio (1970a, 1974, 1980, 1986) argued that coiled basketry technology was invented in the eastern Great Basin during the early Holocene as a specialized food-processing technique. Coiled baskets are indeed useful for collecting and processing seeds, but it does not necessarily follow that they were originally designed for this purpose. A whole basket recently discovered at Cowboy Cave in southeastern Utah returned …

Time In Archaeology: An Introduction, Simon J. Holdaway, Luann Wandsnider

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

Lifeway reconstruction is listed as one of the objectives of "World Prehistory," the ubiquitous course taught in universities and colleges the world over (e.g., Fagan 1995:8). It complements well the other subdisciplines of anthropology, at least for beginning anthropology students, offering them a familiar approach to foreign material: if cultural anthropologists study the behavior of present-day (or at least near-to-present-day) peoples, then archaeologists may be expected to deal with peoples' behavior from the past. Certainly, some archaeologists study the past aided by textual records, and some cultural anthropologists are interested in past historical experience. But this overlap only enhances the …

Age Discrepancies With The Radiocarbon Dating Of Sagebrush (Artemisia Tridentata Nutt.)., Phil R. Geib

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

When ancient hearths at open archaeological sites do not yield carbonized annual plant remains or other highquality samples, wood charcoal is commonly used for radiocarbon dating. Sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata Nutt.), a shrub frequently used for fuel across much of the western United States, seems a potentially better candidate for 14C dating than tree wood since the possibility for significant age discrepancy might be less. A comparison of multiple assays from single features reveals that sagebrush can overestimate age more than even tree wood charcoal. A plausible cause of this appears to be persistence of the shrub on the ground surface …

Review Of The Archaeology Of Chaco Canyon: An Eleventh-Century Pueblo Regional Center, Edited By Stephen H. Lekson, Carrie Heitman

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

The Archaeology of Chaco Canyon is one of two synthesis volumes resulting from the National Park Service Chaco Project (1971-1982) (see also Mathien 2005). As the capstone to that project, this volume has much to offer the student of Chaco and those interested in the intellectual history and trajectories of archaeological theory. From 1999 to 2004, Stephen Lekson (and many others) organized six working conferences to address different dimensions of Chacoan prehistory. Broadly called the Chaco Synthesis, the topics included ecology and economy, architecture, the organization of production, the Chaco world, and so- ciety and polity and concluded with a …

Re-Evaluating The “House” In Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, Carrie Heitman

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

IN RECENT YEARS, a growing number of archaeologists have explored the potential of Claude Lévi-Strauss’s concept of “house societies.” His and subsequent works describe ethnographic contexts where people are organized through houses ranked according to their age and connection to ancestors. Using Puebloan ethnographic literature and cross-cultural comparisons, the house model helps to draw out the symbolic meaning of Chaco-era architecture. Looking specifically at the classificatory distinction between “great houses” and “small houses” in Chaco Canyon (A.D. 850–1180), my research compares the evidence for house creation, manifestation, maintenance, and abandonment in both great and small house contexts. Using data generated …

Landscapes Of Settlement In Northern Iceland: Historical Ecology Of Human Impact And Climate Fluctuation On The Millennial Scale, Thomas H. Mcgovern, Orri Vesteinsson, Adolf Fridriksson, Mike Church, Ian Lawson, Ian A. Simpson, Arni Einarsson, Andy Dugmore, Gordon Cook, Sophia Perdikaris

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

Early settlement in the North Atlantic produced complex interactions of culture and nature. The sustained program of interdisciplinary collaboration is intended to focus on ninth- to 13th-century sites and landscapes in the highland interior lake basin of M´yvatn in Iceland and to contribute a long-term perspective to larger issues of sustainable resource use, soil erosion, and the historical ecology of global change.

Paleo-Indians, Alan J. Osborn

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

First paragraph:

Paleo-Indians were the earliest people to inhabit the Americas. Between thirty and eleven thousand years ago, small, highly mobile groups of huntergatherers extended their hunting areas throughout Beringia (the landmass that joined Siberia and Alaska) and into the Western Hemisphere. This “bridging landmass” emerged slowly from beneath the Bering Sea as more than nine million cubic miles of glacial ice accumulated over southern Alaska, Canada, Labrador, and Greenland. About twenty to eighteen thousand years ago an immense “ice dome” (the Laurentide glacier) towered more than one mile over present-day Hudson Bay. Two lobes of ice spread southward over …

The Ecologically Noble Savage Debate, Raymond Hames

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

Debate around the ecologically noble savage represents two markedly different research threads. The first addresses the issue of conservation among native peoples and narrowly focuses on case studies of resource use of ethnographic, archaeological, or historic sources. The second thread is broader and more humanistic and political in orientation and considers the concept of ecological nobility in terms of identity, ecological knowledge, ideology, and the deployment of ecological nobility as a political tool by native peoples and conservation groups.

Houses Great And Small: Reevaluating The 'House' In Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, Carrie Heitman

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

In recent years, a growing number of archaeologists have explored the potential of expanding Lévi-Strauss’ concept of house societies to better understand specific archaeological contexts. Looking specifically at the classificatory distinction between “great houses” and “small houses” within Chaco Canyon (A.D. 850–1180), I suggest this theoretical model might yield new insights with regard to four symbolic dimensions of house construction: the use of wood, directional offerings, resurfacing practices, and the bones of ancestors. Using Puebloan ethnographic literature and cross-cultural comparisons, I suggest a house model analysis may serve to integrate anomalous “ceremonial” dimensions of house construction in an effort to …

Understanding Chaco: A Digital, Archival Approach, Stephen Plog, Carrie Heitman

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

MANY ASPECTS OF Chacoan prehistory remain unclear due to the inaccessibility of unpublished excavation records and photographs for the earliest excavations and explorations. As a result, key unanswered questions about the nature of Chaco itself and individual Chaco villages and towns—small- rather than large-scale issues—have become more, rather than less, significant over time. Despite the magnitude of the excavations at Pueblo Bonito and Pueblo del Arroyo and the amount and range of materials recovered, our knowledge of why these sites were built and how they were used remains remarkably uncertain or, at best, highly contested. To explore some of these …

Hunter-Gatherers In Jackson Hole, Wyoming: Testing Assumptions About Site Function, Kenneth P. Cannon, Dawn R. Bringelson, Molly Boeka Cannon

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

The settlement-subsistence pattern of hunter-gatherers in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, has been viewed historically as an economic system organized around the altitudinal distribution of seasonally ripening food crops and has come to be known as high country adaptation (HCA). Although this study does not take issue with the basic tenet of the modelhunter- gatherer movement through altitudinal zones for the exploitation of seasonally available resources-we critically assess the normative functional interpretations presented by previous investigators. We examine artifacts in three lithic assemblages from southern Jackson Hole in terms of the organization of technology as a means to investigate each locale's function …

Solving Meno's Puzzle, Defeating Merlin's Subterfuge: Bodies Of Reference Knowledge And Archaeological Inference, Luann Wandsnider

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

THE MIND OF Lewis Binford is nimble and constantly evolving. In part, one can map Binford's prodigious intellectual growth by looking at the research trajectories of his students, who often continue on paths they began under his tutelage. In my case, certainly, this is very true. When I arrived at the University of New Mexico in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Binford was exploring the nature of the archaeological record: how to understand past human organization at a supra-ethnographic scale, what we might learn from bones and site structure, and how to reliably give meaning to the archaeological record. …

Poison Hunting Strategies And The Organization Of Technology In The Circumpolar Region, Alan J. Osborn

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

INUPIAT ESKIMO WHALERS are allowed to kill up to 50 bowhead whales every year in the arctic waters off Barrow, Alaska. Some of the older bowheads are more than 20 m in length and weigh more than 50 tons. Since 1981 the Inupiat have found at least six lance and harpoon end blades embedded within the thick blubber that insulates these magnificent mammals (Raloff 2(00). These archaeological weapon points included projectiles fashioned from chipped stone, ground slate, ivory, and iron. Wildlife biologists have suspected that whales may live to be quite old. One can only imagine their surprise, however, once …

Niche: A Productive Guide For Use In The Analysis Of Cultural Complexity, Lewis R. Binford

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

THIS CHAPTER EXPLORES some of the interpretative implications of a failure to consider the potential causes for organized variability among cultural systems. The niche concept is considered useful when exploring organizational similarities and differences among cultural systems and central to a productive discussion regarding the differences between living systems that are biologically as opposed to culturally organized. Some interesting issues regarding systems complexity are focused upon through a discussion of mutualism and what is implied by the term when students of cultural systems use the idea.

Women’S Work, Child Care, And Helpers-At-The-Nest In A Hunter-Gatherer Society, Raymond Hames, Patricia Draper

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

Considerable research on helpers-at-the-nest demonstrates the positive effects of firstborn daughters on a mother’s reproductive success and the survival of her children compared with women who have firstborn sons. This research is largely restricted to agricultural settings. In the present study we ask: “Does ‘daughter first’ improve mothers’ reproductive success in a hunting and gathering context?” Through an analysis of 84 postreproductive women in this population we find that the sex of the first- or second-born child has no effect on a mother’s fertility or the survival of her offspring. We conclude that specific environmental and economic factors underlay the …

Mobility, Sedentism, And Intensification: Organizational Responses To Environmental And Social Change Among The San Of Southern Africa, Robert K. Hitchcock

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

HUNTER-GATHERER ADAPTATIONS included mobility strategies that were geared toward mapping people on to both resources and other people. There are factors that condition the ways in which people position themselves on the landscape and move over it. Mobility strategies are organizational responses to the structural properties of the natural and social environments (Binford 1980, 2001). The logistical component of a settlement system, in which task-specific groups range out from residential locations for purposes of obtaining food, raw materials, or information, is related to the organization of production of a society as well as to the distribution of critical resources in …

Introduction To Endangered Peoples Of Africa And The Middle East : Struggles To Survive And Thrive, Robert K. Hitchcock, Alan J. Osborn

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

Endangered Peoples of Africa and the Middle East: Struggles to Survive and Thrive is about human populations residing in Africa and the Middle East, a diverse region that is connected geographically, culturally, and historically. The African continent is vast and covers 11.7 million square miles, or an area slightly larger than the combined area of the United States and South America (Table 1). Today, the African continent is home to some 771 million people distributed within fifty-four separate countries. Of the world's continents, Africa is by far the most diverse culturally. In Sudan, for example, there are over 200 ethnic …

The Ogoni Of Nigeria, A. Olu Oyinlade, Jeffery M. Vincent

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

The Ogoni are a minority ethnic people who live in the Western Niger Delta Region of southern Nigeria. During the 1970s, Ogoniland, or the Ogoni Nation, became part of the Rivers State of Nigeria. There are approximately 500,000 Ogoni who represent less than 0.05 percent of Nigeria's 100 to 120 million people. The population density of this region equals 1,233 people per square mile, making it one of the most densely populated areas of Nigeria. Reliable information about the origin of the Ogoni is limited. Archaeological and oral historical evidence suggests that the Ogoni have inhabited the area for over …

The Rwandese, Clea Msindo Koff, Ralph J. Hartley

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

The Rwandese are a set of peoples who live in the country of Rwanda in eastern central Africa who today number an estimated 7.9 million.2 Rwanda is a small country that has the highest population density (numbers of people per square-mile) in Africa. All Rwandese speak Rwanda (Kinyarwanda), and some speak French, Swahili, or English. Rwandese identify with three population groups called Hutu, Tutsi, and Twa. Today, these labels are used as ethnic identifiers; however, in the past they designated an individual's occupation. It is not clear if the words Hutu, Tutsi, and Twa existed in ancient times when people …

Rough Cilicia Archaeological Survey Project: Report Of The 2002 Season, Nicholas Rauh, Luann Wandsnider, F. Sancar Ozaner, Michael Hoff, Rhys Townsend, Matthew Dillon, Mette Korsholm, Hulya Caner

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

The Rough Cilicia Archaeological Project conducted archaeological and geoarchaeological research in the Gazipaşa area from July 20 through 1 September 2001. Several goals were met this season. Under the direction of Michael Hoff and Rhys Townsend, detailed plans were completed of monumental structures at the sites of Asar Tepe, Lamos, and Selinus. At Lamos, in particular, the team made a number of finds, including the discovery of an inscribed statue base of large size in a small podium complex on a hill above the so-called "stadium."

The Fort Clark Archeology Project, 2000-2001 Historical Archeological Investigations., William J. Hunt Jr.

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

Historical archeological work during the summers of 2000 and 2001 has been directed toward development and installation of a series of interpretive panels relating to the history, archeology, and peoples living at Fort Clark. In anticipation of this, investigations in 2000 included small scale testing and large scale geophysical surveys at the village and both trading posts. Fieldwork in 2001 was more focused and utilized geophysical survey data from both years to guide a multi-university field school excavation at Fort Clark. Excavation goals were to clarify the structural history and evolution of the post, discern functional change in one portion …