North America (Geographic Keyword)
2,601-2,625 (3,602 Records)
Margaret Conkey and Joan Gero published "Programme to Practice: Gender and Feminism in Archaeology" in 1997 to underscore the ways feminist critiques of science could transform the practice of archaeology. In this paper, we argue that their feminist critique profoundly shaped the practice of public archaeology. We explore the nature of scientific inquiry, multivocality, politics and collaborative forms of knowledge production, and the necessity of making interpretations more meaningful as...
Project Archaeology in Florida: Teaching and Understanding Slavery at Kingsley Plantation (2016)
The Florida Public Archaeology Network (FPAN) was established in 2005 and within a year hosted its first Project Archaeology workshop. As a proud sponsor of Project Archaeology in Florida, FPAN staff partnered with the National Park Service and University of Florida to publish the first Investigating Shelter investigation in the southeast. It was also the first in the Investigating Shelter series to feature a National Park site. Investigating a Tabby Slave Cabin teacher guide and student...
Project Archaeology: Assessing Paper and Digital Approaches to Online Learning (2018)
Project Archaeology is a comprehensive national archaeology education program, jointly sponsored by the Bureau of Land Management and Montana State University, which uses archaeological inquiry to foster understanding of past and present cultures; improve social studies and science education; and enhance citizenship education to help preserve our archaeological legacy. To date it has reached more than 15,000 educators with curriculum guides, activity guides, and professional development. These...
Projectile Points Exhumed by Dune Migration, Implications for Human Presence and Mid-Holocene (?) Wetter Climate in the South Texas Sand Sheet (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The South Texas Sand Sheet (STSS) spans ~7,000 km2, and consists largely of sand sheet deposits, mostly under three meters thick, stabilized by vegetation, but active SE-NW longitudinal dune ridges make up less than 5% of its area. Evidence of human presence in the STSS in prehispanic times is sparse. Limited archeological investigations have revealed a record...
Projectiles or Pikes? Clovis Point Attributes and Braced Weapon Use (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Fluted point weaponry types and the expansion of Indigenous people across North American megafauna habitats 13,050–12,650 cal BP are considered in light of historical polearm use. Confronting megaherbivores such as Proboscidea and Bison or megacarnivores such as Arctodus, Panthera, and Smilodon with thrust or thrown spears was likely less effective than...
Promoting an Archaeological Perspective in Repatriation, Consultation, National Monuments, and Data Science (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Attention to Detail: A Pragmatic Career of Research, Mentoring, and Service, Papers in Honor of Keith Kintigh" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Keith Kintigh is having quite a career in archaeology. I use the active voice because, as those of us who work with Keith well know, he’s not finished yet! Throughout his career, Kintigh has promoted the benefits and values of an archaeological perspective steadfastly. Since...
Promoting Cultural Heritage through Contemporary Art: A Model from a San Antonio Based Artist Team (2018)
Cultural heritage has been presented to the public in a variety of traditional and engaging formats from heritage and archaeological fairs, museum exhibits, movies, plays, school curriculum, conferences, merit badge programs, books, etc.,--- and through artwork. With the preparations and events leading up to San Antonio’s big 300th celebration of the founding in 2018, the recent designation of our five San Antonio Missions as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the archaeology-artist team present an...
A Proof-of-Concept Study: Can Fishermen Interviews Locate Historic Shipwrecks? Methodology and Preliminary Results (2015)
With immanent energy development off the US mid-Atlantic coast, submerged natural and cultural resources must be located, classified, and protected. Commercial bottom fishermen may be an untapped primary source of local environmental knowledge about shipwrecks and hard bottom morphology (natural reefs). This proof-of-concept study utilizes a sequenced multi-disciplinary methodology: ethnographic interviews, GIS cluster analysis of "hang" locations, side scan sonar surveys, and obstruction...
Propelling Change: A Statistical Analysis of the Evolution of Great Lakes Passenger Freight Propeller Vessels (2018)
During the 19th century, passenger freight propeller vessels were used to transport goods and people to the newly opened Great Lakes region. This migration was fueled and supported by many factors, which have all been well discussed, yet the impacts of these factors on the vessels themselves have not received as much attention. While improvements in technology and steel surely affected how these vessels were built, canals, insurance requirements, and consumer needs would have also impacted these...
"A Proper and Honorable Place of Retreat for the Sick Poor": Bioarchaeology of Philadelphia’s Blockley Almshouse Cemetery (2017)
Philadelphia’s Blockley Almshouse served as one of the primary centers of medical education in nineteenth-century America. Operating between 1835 and 1905, "Old Blockley" was served by some of the era’s most prominent physicians, including the "father of modern medicine" Sir William Osler, and Elizabeth Blackwell, the first woman to earn a medical degree in the United States. Excavation of one of the almshouse’s two cemeteries in 2001 revealed over 400 graves and thousands of anatomical...
A Proposal for Investigating Identity, Class, and Labor in Washington State Worker Settlements (2015)
This paper will propose research to address the formation of ethnic identity and class consciousness as manifested in the material remains of workers and administrators in Washington State working camps. From the mid-1800s to the Great Depression, logging and mining camps and company towns formed a critical part of Washington’s and the Pacific Northwest’s economies. The archaeology of labor-related sites in this region and period has been historically under-researched, and the relationship...
A Proposed Methodology for Elemental Analysis using portable X-Ray Fluorescence on Lead (Pb) Projectiles (2018)
As the field of battlefield archaeology continues to evolve, adopting new techniques and technologies, it is important that we as a community strive to collaborate, share, and develop standards for which to compare research. The introduction of pXRF technology to source lead projectiles, differentiating their country of origin by trace elements, was presented in 2014 and created a wave of interest in the technology. Unfortunately, this recent fervor has resulted in projects with varied...
A Proposed Methodology Using Buttons and Other Clothing Fasteners to Identify 19th and Early 20th Century Clothing Assemblages (2017)
Buttons and other forms of clothing fasteners are routinely found on 19th and early 20th century domestic sites. Typically these objects are analyzed and presented in summary tables by material type, occasionally by form, rarely by size and implied function. While signifiers of clothing – buttons, hooks-and-eyes and utilitarian studs are viewed in isolation and the clothing from which they are derived are not envisioned or interpreted. A proposed new methodology is to treat button assemblages...
Protecting the Past From the Future: The Effects of Climate Change on Archaeological Sites in Louisiana's Coastal Zone (2018)
Archaeological sites around the world are threatened by the effects of climate change. Oceans are encroaching inland due to sea level rise, with daily tides and waves imperiling coastal archaeological sites. Inland torrential rains can lead to flooding and higher temperatures can lead to droughts that kill off vegetation, both of which can expose middens and other subsurface features to erosion. This paper will focus on Louisiana’s coastal zone; current impacts to archaeological sites from...
Providing Outreach that Empowers Teachers and Students to Create Integrated STEM Learning (2015)
Utilizing the whole experience of a multi-disciplinary expedition to reach teachers and students empowers the recipients. The Deepwater Shipwrecks and Oil Spill Impact study provided an array of information to teachers and students covering diverse topics from how do folks in the southern tip of Louisiana build homes that survive flooding to what do microorganisms tell us about the impact of the oil spill and shipwrecks they thrive upon. Getting the information out through multiple channels...
A Provisional Cultural Resource Survey off Northern Alaska (2013)
The United States' Bureau of Ocean Energy Managemnt (BOEM) will require comprehensive and integrated scientific information from the northern Alaska region's Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) to improve regulatory decisions and environmental analyses that will be pertinent for allowing lease sales in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas to energy industry representatives. BOEM is also manadated to mitigate the effects of its actions on submerged cultural resource materials. By joining the National Ocean...
Provisioning a 19th Century Maya Refugee Village; Consumer Culture at Tikal, Guatemala. (2018)
In the late-nineteenth century Maya refugees fleeing the violence of the Caste War of Yucatan (1847-1901) briefly reoccupied the ancient Maya ruins of Tikal. Unlike the numerous Yucatec refugee communities established to the east in British Honduras, those who settled at Tikal combined with Lacandon Maya, and later Ladinos from Lake Petén Itza to form a small, multiethnic village in the sparsely occupied Petén jungle of northern Guatemala. This paper discusses the analysis of the mass-produced...
Provisioning The City: Plantation and Market in the Antebellum Lowcountry (2016)
Archaeological evidence for regional and inter-site landscape use during the antebellum period in Charleston, South Carolina, suggests that segregation and segmentation characterized much, but not all, of the city's economy. Much of the city's architecture and material culture reflects economic disparity in an increasingly crowded urban environment. Data from plantation, residential, commercial, public, and market sites reveal fluid and complex provisioning strategies that linked the city with...
Provisions, Possessions, and Positionality: Faunal Analysis of the Dorchester Industrial School for Girls (2018)
Through faunal analysis of the remains of mammals, molluscs, fish and fowl found at the Dorchester Industrial School for Girls this report explores the dietary habits of staff and students, and connects the socioeconomic and cultural positionality of the girls, the School, and their food to the greater context of late 19th century Boston. We may interrogate specific social circumstances and their effect on daily meals, and in doing so draw useful comparisons between the activities of the port of...
Public Archaeology Evaluation Implementation (2018)
The greatest potential in supporting a person’s learning process is using evaluation and assessment. There has been a lack of research into whether Public Archeology programming is currently effective at achieving the desired benefits. As increasing enrollments in educational programs continues, assessment tools to evaluate education policy and practice will become more vital to ensure quality education. Evaluation can answer questions about who is coming to programs (looters) and what they are...
Public Archaeology in a Mobile, Digital World (2013)
Mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets have become integral pieces of technology in the lives of many individuals. This expanding presence of mobile technology demands the development of ways to interact with the public outside the traditional means of public archaeology. These technologies can offer opportunities to reach out to a different demographic than might normally be reached. A younger, more tech-savvy generation can often be found tethered to their device of choice. It seems...
Public Engagement Is Not Enough – Historical Archaeology’s Future Is in Collaboration (2016)
As a framework, collaborative archaeology forefronts reciprocity and shared knowledge as primary components of archaeological work. Historical archaeology has long been concerned with public engagement but continually tends toward the model of an expert archaeologist beneficently bestowing knowledge about "their history" on curious or concerned publics rather than toward reciprocal partnerships. If we are to consider the future of the field, we should be rethinking the role archaeological...
Public Engagement through Maritime Landscapes (2018)
The future of American Archaeology lies in its ability to engage the public and demonstrate the field’s relevance to a broad range of communities. One way that maritime archaeology can contribute to this future is through identifying and interpreting maritime landscapes. A maritime landscape approach draws on the "lure of the sea" that attracts many people to shipwreck studies, but engages larger constituencies through place-based history. Geographic space is one of the things that all people...
Public Face and Private Life: Identity Through Ceramics at the Boston-Higginbotham House on Nantucket (2018)
As an African American-Native American family living on Nantucket in the late-18th and early-19th centuries, the household of Seneca Boston and Thankful Micah faced many challenges of race and class. Through their ceramic assemblage it becomes clear that in order to successfully navigate their diverse identities in a predominantly white society the Boston-Micah family adopted both a public and private persona. The presence of European manufactured ceramics such as hand painted and transfer...
Public History at Appomattox: A Broadened Perspective (2018)
The farm owned by Dr. Samuel Coleman represents a typical homestead within the Virginia community of Appomattox. The site is also an integral part to the conclusion of the Civil War. In conjunction with the National Park Service and the University of South Carolina archaeological research will be performed to develop interpretations of each component of the site. A primary effort of this work is to learn about the life of Hannah Reynolds, an enslaved person at this home. Traditional excavations...