Republic of Panama (Country) (Geographic Keyword)
2,126-2,150 (3,080 Records)
This is an abstract from the "Reconstructing the Political Organization of Pre-Columbian Nicaragua" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The relationship between environment, politics, and economies has often been observed in the archaeological record. In the Gulf of Fonseca, where archaeological sites concentrate around mangrove swamps, rivers and estuaries; politics were intricately tied to the affordances of riverine systems. Based on the ceramic...
Politics of Repatriation, Formalizing Indigenous Cultural Property Rights (2018)
This theoretically-oriented project engages discussions of historical arguments for the repatriation of indigenous cultural property that ultimately led to the creation of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) in 1990. I will investigate how institutions and cultural values mediated changes in repatriation policy both nationally and internationally. By examining ownership paradigms and institutional power structures, it is possible to understand the ramifications of...
Pollen Analysis at El Campanario (Peru): Preliminary Study from a Public Architecture (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The present research analyzed pollen samples recovered from public architecture at the site of El Campanario in Huarmey Valley (Peru). This exploration focuses on issues regarding archaeological palynology by presenting a case study with a preliminary set of samples in an attempt to open a line of research at El Campanario. The adobe platform, where the...
Population Dynamics and Subsistence Variability on the Farming/Hunter-Gatherer Boundary: Central Western Argentina as a Case Study (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Global Perspectives on Human Population Dynamics, Innovation, and Ecosystem Change" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This case study integrates times-series of multiple types of proxy to evaluate causal relationships between population dynamic, subsistence/diet variation, and ecosystem change. The presentation evaluates whether intensification based on wild and domesticated resources takes different evolutionary...
The Population Genetics of Machu Picchu (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Since its discovery a century ago, Machu Picchu has become an iconic archaeological site, inspiring researchers and visitors alike. Its history and function, however, are unclear and hypotheses have been advanced ranging from Machu Picchu as a royal estate, sacred shrine, or city. Here we present the preliminary results of our genomic study of human burials...
Population Reconstructions for Humans and Megafauna Suggest Mixed Causes for North American Pleistocene Extinctions (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Human Interactions with Extinct Fauna" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Dozens of large mammals such as mammoth, mastodon, and horse (i.e., "megafauna") disappeared in North America at the end of the Pleistocene with climate change and "overkill" the most widely-argued causes. However, the population dynamics of humans and megafauna preceding extinctions have received little attention, even though such information may...
Population, Sex, and Diet (2023)
This is an abstract from the "The Socioecological Dynamics of Holocene Foragers and Farmers" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This poster presents comparative data on human bone chemistry to infer sex differences in prehistoric diets. We collected a global sample of human bone isotope data. Next, we joined these data with the global radiocarbon data set developed by the People 3000 Research Network, as well as paleoclimate models and data. Finally,...
Population-area scaling in contacted and uncontacted Amazonian indigenous groups (2017)
Sublinear population-area scaling relations have been documented across a range of human societies, from hunter-gatherers to both ancient and modern cities. As such, these scaling patterns seem to capture a common statistical feature of human spatial ecology. In this talk we examine the spatial ecology of both recently-contacted and uncontacted groups in the Amazon Basin. Using a combination of census data, government estimates and imagery we find sublinear scaling between the size of villages...
¿Por Qué (No) Los Dos?: Investigating Simultaneous Blade and Flake Industries at the Ortiz Site, Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Recent analysis of the lithic assemblage from the Ortiz site, an early (2340 cal BC–cal AD 310) habitation site in Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico, has revealed the persistent parallel manufacture of blade and expedient flake technologies, with an average of 16.1% of the flaked stone assemblage consisting of blades. While other early Puerto Rican lithic assemblages...
The Portable Murals and Painted Shrouds of Middle Sicán Tombs (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The primacy of textiles as the preeminent expressive medium of identity and alterity is well documented in Andean prehistory. Based on the study of three types of textiles including tapestry woven patches and painted cloth housed in the Ethnological Museum of Berlin as they compare to mixed-media mounted canvases found in situ at the site Sicán, this paper...
The Portrait of Professional Qualification Standards: Where Archaeologists Stand Regarding the Secretary of the Interior Standards (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Transformations in Professional Archaeology" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In August 2023, the SAA Government Affairs Committee sponsored the organization of a survey of archaeologists on the Secretary of the Interior Standards and Guidelines for Archaeology and Historic Preservation (SOIS). This was done in response to a post by the US Department of the Interior announcing their intent to review and update the SOIS....
Possible Prehistoric Translocation of Non-human Primates to Remote Oceania (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. New archaeological excavation at the Ucheliungs site, located in the Rock Islands region of Palau (northwest tropical Pacific), has yielded evidence of mortuary activity and small-scale marine foraging dating to the earliest period of human settlement in the Palauan archipelago, ca. 3000 BP. The assemblage includes a small number of artifacts consisting of...
Post-Chavín Political Developments in Ancash: Comparative Perspectives from the Nepeña and Pallasca Regions (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Peering into the Night: Transition, Sociopolitical Organization, and Economic Dynamics after the Dusk of Chavín in the North Central Andes" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In this paper, we present preliminary results of our 2019 excavations at the centers of Cerro San Isidro (Nepeña) and Pashash (Pallasca) in the Moro and Cabana regions of north-central Peru, respectively. Both are multicomponent hilltop sites that...
Post-Emancipation Ceramics and Housing in the British Caribbean: A Case Study from St. Kitts’ Southeast Peninsula (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Emancipation brought many changes to the lives of the formerly enslaved in the British Caribbean. On the British Caribbean island of St. Christopher (St. Kitts), true emancipation came in 1838 following a 4-year apprenticeship period, which was really enslavement in just another name. Freedom meant Kittitians often could choose where they lived, the house...
Post-fire incising as a means of controlling esoteric knowledge in the Andean Formative (2019)
This is an abstract from the "The Movement of Technical Knowledge: Cross-Craft Perspectives on Mobility and Knowledge in Production Technologies" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Post-fire incision as method of surface "decoration" is extremely rare in the Central Andean region. This technique was used almost exclusively by the Cupisnique culture on the Peruvian North Coast during the Formative Period, primarily on ritual pottery. The technique was...
Post-Fire Incisions on Wari Pottery (2018)
Whole ceramic vessels and sherds incised after firing are known from Middle Horizon sites in the Wari heartland and periphery, associated with offering, burial and ceramic production contexts. Incisions include a wide variety of forms and have been interpreted as graffiti, makers or owners marks, and score marks to control breakage. The presence and forms of post-fired incisions were recorded during inventory of all ceramics excavated at Huari by the Huari Urban Prehistory Program in 2017. Their...
A Post-Wari World: Late Intermediate Period Defensibility in the Huamanga and Huarpa Provinces of Peru (2018)
Following the collapse of the Wari empire (ca. AD 1000), a widespread demographic and settlement change occurred in the Ayacucho Region of Peru. People were moving away from the rich farmlands and ritual centers of the flatlands to settle on hilltops and ridges. Many scholars point to strategic defense as a cause of settlement shift during this period—the Late Intermediate Period (ca. AD 1000-1450), suggesting warfare was endemic, while others suggest the sites facilitated agro-pastoralism and...
Postclassic Obsidian Trade at Arvin’s Landing, Belize: A pXRF Analysis (2017)
Arvin’s Landing is a Postclassic (A.D. 900-1500) settlement located on Joe Taylor Creek near Punta Gorda in southern Belize. The abundance of obsidian in the artifact assemblage at Arvin’s Landing indicates trade from the Maya highland sources of obsidian. During the Classic period (A.D. 300-900), obsidian was transported along the coast and by inland routes to the Maya in the lowlands. There was a shift from a dominance on El Chayal obsidian in the Classic to Ixtepeque obsidian in the...
The Postcolonial Imperative (2018)
Formal dissolution of European empires following WW II, as they transformed into transnational financial powers, allowed subaltern standpoints and "traditional knowledge" (TEK) to be voiced. American archaeology shifted into CRM becoming the dominant field, reflecting in part the rise of tourism as a principal global industry, with local histories a selling tool. Then NAGPRA put American archaeology into a postcolonial position. While much of NAGPRA negotiations still falls into colonialist...
The Potential for Using Long Bone Measurements to Determine Breed of Gallus gallus domesticus and its Implications for the Archaeological Record (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Poultry remains are often found in archaeological excavations and while the species can usually be identified, there has been little research on breed identification or purpose (egg production vs. meat production). This research aims to determine if differences exist between the long bone measurements of modern chicken breeds which can be useful for the...
Potential Method for Structure Alignment by the Ancient Maya (2018)
It is well established that the ancient Maya favored certain orientations for the buildings in their major urban centers. In the southern Maya lowlands, an orientation of 14° clockwise from the cardinal directions is particularly common. How did the ancient Maya find this orientation? What was their surveying technique? Lidar from many sites shows that this orientation was not limited to major constructions. The smallest residential structures and patio groups, structures spread throughout the...
The Potential of Games, Gamefication, and Virtual Reality in Public Archaeology (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Social-cultural changes and the growth of digital media have lead to new broadcasting methods in archaeology and public archaeology, using computer games, gamefication and virtual reality, as these encourage the user to solve problems and construct social relations that enable personal development and reflections on the past. The purpose of this paper is to...
Potentials and Pitfalls for ZooMS Analysis in the Pacific: A Case Study from Ofu Island (Manu‘a Group, American Samoa) (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Zooarchaeology and Technology: Case Studies and Applications" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Zooarchaeological analysis in the Pacific is often limited by the large proportion of small, highly fragmented, non-diagnostic remains recovered from archaeological sites. Recent advances in biomolecular methods, including collagen peptide mass fingerprinting (a.k.a. ZooMS) enable increased taxonomic identifications and refine...
Pots, People and Pacific Nicaragua: Misconceptions about Migrant Mesoamericans and Material Culture (2017)
The production of polychrome pottery in Pacific Nicaragua during the Sapoá and Ometepe Periods (AD 800-contact) has traditionally been attributed to various migrant cultural groups of vague Mesoamerican origin who were living in the region at the time of Spanish contact and who are usually assumed to have displaced the autochthonous inhabitants of Greater Nicoya. Supposed links between specific ceramic types and specific Mesoamerican groups that were originally based more on speculation than on...
Potters of Castillo de Huarmey: Confluence, Production, and Innovation of Ceramics (2023)
This is an abstract from the "A Decade of Multidisciplinary Research at Castillo de Huarmey, Peru" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Multidisciplinary research and analyses of ceramics found in Castillo de Huarmey, a political center of the Wari Empire during the late Middle Horizon (AD 800–1000), conducted in the last 10 years have produced new interpretations. A large number of ceramic vessels were deposited as offerings in elaborate mausoleums to...