North America - NW Coast/Alaska (Geographic Keyword)
276-300 (301 Records)
In this paper, we address the extent to which Northwest Coast societies, and specifically those of the Salish Sea, were engaged in, participated in, or were connected to an external world beyond their own perceived borders. We consider four elements of the problem. First, we examine ethnographic data pertaining to the spatial extent of the known world, and trace its borders. We then consider the flow of exogenous and exotic materials into the Northwest Coast over time, and assess the...
Traditional Dena’ina Land Use at the Cottonwood Creek Village Site, Southcentral Alaska (2017)
The Dena’ina and Ahtna developed a sedentary socioeconomically-stratified lifestyle with material inequality by the time of European contact. The development of permanent villages indicates a shift into a complex society with qeshqas (leaders) who had better food, larger houses, and more wealth. Semisubterranean depressions at Cottonwood Creek, ranging from 802 years cal BP to modern age, are remnants of storage and house pits still present on the landscape. Geochemical testing of sediments has...
Traditional practices that inform cultural competency in archaeological studies and cultural safety for First Nation communities. (2017)
While Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission on Indian Residential Schools completed its mandate in December 2015, pursuit of the truths and movements towards reconciliation of past residential school practices continue. Efforts to identify missing former students and locate unmarked cemetery, grave and burial sites are continuing at the former Kuper Island Industrial School on Penelakut Island. This work is structured as both a collaborative and community based archaeology and is being...
Trenches, Embankments, and Palisades: Terraforming Landscapes for Defensive Fortifications in Coast Salish Territory (2016)
The Coast Salish hunter-gatherer fishers of the Northwest Coast built substantial defenses, involving the labor of multiple households and entire villages. These fortifications, perched upon high bluff promontories or at the points of narrow coastal sandspit ridges, often involved deep trenches and steep embankments that were enclosed by tall palisades of cedar planks. Such constructions would have dominated the viewshed of their seascape. In this presentation, I’ll highlight the degree of...
Tsimshian households and trade: the view from Casey Point (2017)
Large-scale excavations at GbTo-13 and GbTo-54 near Casey Point, Prince Rupert Harbour, revealed house remains whose differential contents of exotic features, goods, and wealth or status-signalling artifacts strongly suggest that one household ranked above others. All labrets and all mountain goat horn cores were associated with a single house. Even the households lacking these prestige goods have more wealth items than at almost any regional assemblage. The extraordinary amount of bracelets...
Turning Privilege into "Common-Sense": Truth-Claims and Control of Cultural Heritage (2015)
Over the course of the last few decades Indigenous and descendant communities have increasingly made calls for control of their own heritage, both in terms of material objects and historical narratives. While these efforts have resulted in at least some measure of success, these communities continue to occasionally face challenges from researchers, scholars, and other agents who are in positions of power that allow them to control and define what heritage consist of. In my paper I interrogate...
Under Threat of Erosion: Late Prehistoric to Historic Contact Houses near the Native Village of Shaktoolik, Alaska (2015)
Historical documents note that the Shaktoolik Peninsula, located in Norton Sound, Alaska, was a nexus of interaction among local Yup’ik, Inupiat from the north, Athabaskans from the east, and Russian and American traders in the 1800s. Yup’ik populations were displaced from the area and replaced by Inupiaq groups during this time; however, limited archival, ethnographic and oral history accounts make it difficult to disentangle the local history. The archaeological record may be able to fill in...
Understanding the Health of the People of Pender Island (B.C.) Through Portable X-ray Fluorescence of Human Remains (2015)
Bioarchaeology has undergone some amazing advancements since the 1970s. Due to ancient DNA and isotopic analysis, we are now able to understand health, ancestry, and diet, among other topics. Unfortunately, these methods of investigation are largely inaccessible to many descendant communities due to prohibitive costs and the destructive nature of many forms of analyses on human remains. Archaeologists are beginning to respond to these concerns, by developing non-destructive analytical tools....
Underwater Archaeological Surveys in Shakan Bay, SE Alaska (2017)
The coastline of SE Alaska was submerged by post-Pleistocene sea level rise from at least 16,000 cal yrs BP until it stabilized about 10,600 cal yrs BP. The submerged continental shelf was modeled using bathymetry and other data to identify areas exhibiting high potential for the occurrence of archaeological sites. Two seasons of underwater archaeological survey have been conducted at this location (NSF OPP -#0703980 and 1108367), using multibeam sonar, side-scan sonar, sub-bottom profiler,...
Unearthing Sandpoint’s Chinatown: the Archaeology of Sandpoint, Idaho’s Overseas Chinese (2015)
Established in the early 1880s, Sandpoint, Idaho became a bustling railroad and lumber town with commercial businesses sprouting up along the Northern Pacific railroad tracks. Overseas Chinese came through the town when building the railroad, but quickly moved on along with the construction. Who then, were the Overseas Chinese that came and settled, making Sandpoint their home? Archaeological investigations of the original town site uncovered a structure referred to as Sandpoint’s "Chinatown"...
Unique Ecologies of British Columbia (2017)
It is widely understood that humans have varying degrees of influence on a wide range of ecological patterns and processes. In British Columbia an array of landscape management practices have been documented among Indigenous communities resulting in novel ecosystems. Yet, little is known about the range and extent of these eco-human dynamics in pre-settler colonial contexts. We explore the concept of "unique ecologies" as a way of better understanding the untold past of ecological and cultural...
Updates and New Discoveries of Early Holocene Predictive Model sites in the southern Alexander Archipelago of Southeast Alaska (2015)
New Early Holocene sites were discovered during the 2014 field season using a predictive model based on the age and elevation of Saxidomus giganteus shells in relic raised marine deposits in the Alexander Archipelago of Southeast Alaska. Additionally, three new higher elevation sites were found inadvertently during road construction activities which fit the criteria of the predictive model. This paper presents the preliminary findings of latest discoveries and updates on the first Early Holocene...
Use of integrated faunal records from 10-liter bucket samples to explore complex human ecodynamics at Tse-whit-zen (2015)
On the northern Pacific Coast of North America, animals play an extremely important role in conceptual models related to hunter-gatherer evolution and social dynamics of household production and resource control. Our ability to rigorously apply faunal remains to these models is limited by substantial data requirements including well-documented contexts, high-resolution chronology, control over complex site formation processes and taphonomy, as well as large sample sizes. Unique circumstances...
Using LiDAR and Relative Elevation Modeling (REM) to Identify and Analyze Archaeologically Sensitive Alluvial Landforms (2015)
Alluvial landforms are highly sensitive areas, with the potential to contain both surface exposed and buried archaeological deposits, but systematic analysis and identification of these landforms has proved problematic in the past. Although large alluvial terraces can be identified visually on topographic maps, high resolution LiDAR, and Digital Elevation Models; smaller, subtler terraces, and other complex alluvial landforms can be problematic due to stream gradient issues and resulting...
Using remote sensing to detect late Holocene mound sites along the Calapooia River, Willamette Valley, Oregon (2015)
Low mound sites, often referred to as Calapooia Mounds in western Oregon, are prevalent throughout stream systems within the Willamette Valley. Archaeologists postulate that the Willamette Valley mounds, which date to within the last 4,000 years, were created through the accumulation of occupational debris over time. Many of these late Holocene sites are located on private property and are continually impacted by farming activities while others, located in riparian zones, are less effected....
Utilizing Tablets for Mobile Data Recording in a CRM Context (2015)
This poster session illustrates the effective utilization of tablet computers in archaeology using a cultural resource management (CRM) case-study. CRM in British Columbia requires rapid turn-around times between site identification, investigation, reporting, and project development. This dynamic makes tablets ideal for generating complex datasets from archaeological sites in short periods of time. Digital data can be imported into GIS or database management systems immediately, without...
Variation in Animal Predation and Processing Strategies at the Bridge River Winter Pithouse Village (EeRl4) Thru Time: A Zooarchaeological Analysis of Subsistence Change (2015)
Late Holocene occupants of Housepit 54 at Bridge River participated in complex strategies of food acquisition that were much more varied than the oft-cited reliance on storable anadromous fish resources practiced throughout much of the Pacific and inland/riverine Northwest of North America. While acquisition and storage of fish, particularly salmon, was (and is) a vital part of aboriginal subsistence, permeating many aspects of Native life, seasonal and spatial variations in animal procurement...
Washed Away? Was Tse-whit-zen Deserted in the Aftermath of Cascadian Earthquakes? (2017)
The northern segment of the Cascadia subduction zone has ruptured at least four times in the last 2000 years. Each of these giant earthquakes triggered a tsunami that potentially inundated the Tse-whit-zen village site to depths of 3-6 m and exposed it to currents of ~10 m/s. We compare the timing of these tsunamis, as recorded by wash-over deposits at Tse-whit-zen and sand sheets in the marshes at Discovery Bay, some 50 km to the east of Tse-whit-zen, with the palaeodemographic history of the...
"We ask only that you come to us with an open heart and an open mind": The transformative power of an archaeology of heart. (2017)
Indigenous scholars propose that the outside researchers most useful to indigenous communities are those willing to engage in a process of self-discovery and transformation. These researchers are willing to learn from, not just about, the people they work with. This paper contemplates the challenges and opportunities that arise when archaeologists embark on this transformative journey. I use personal examples drawn from two decades of conducting archaeology with and for indigenous communities to...
The whale beneath the Barnacle: Rare Taxa in the analysis of Marine Invertebrates from the Tse-Whitzen Village Site (2015)
In faunal analysis, rare taxa can potentially provide valuable biogeographic or socioeconomic information, but are inherently difficult to interpret and to integrate with quantitative measures. Working with extremely large assemblages highlights these issues. Among the half million specimens of shell identified from the Tse-Whitzen village site are more than 20 taxa represented by less than 30 specimens. There is no single explanation for the presence of taxa in very low numbers, and the...
Whales, Whaling Amulets, and Human–Animal Relations in Northwest Alaska (2017)
The use of personal amulets appears to have been a common practice among northern hunting peoples of Alaska, Canada, and Greenland. Many of these amulets were intended to facilitate individual human relations with sea mammals. Cooperative whaling, however, required the development of an amulet that mediated group relations with prey. This paper describes a set of Alaska Eskimo whaling "charms" dated to the late 19th century and identified in museum collections from across the United States. The...
What can archaeobotanical remains from exceptionally well preserved contexts tell us about past arctic life-ways? (2015)
Anthropological studies of western Alaska consistently remark upon the substantial knowledge of the regional flora by local Eskimo groups. Despite the attritional impact of Western lifestyles on traditional ecological knowledge, the indigenous peoples of the region maintain a rich appreciation of the plant resources available in their local environment. Yet, archaeobotanical analyses from the region remain scarce and there rests a general opinion that plants did not play an important role in...
Where’s the Cod?: Toward a Predictive Model of Prehistoric Land-use and Migration in the Aleutian Islands (2015)
This study explores human/environment interactions in the Aleutian archipelago by pairing eco-niche modeling of cod (Gaddus sp.), a primary subsistence species, with prehistoric archaeological site distribution using a GIS platform. The distributions of site locations and cod habitat simulated using GARP software at multiple time slices through the Holocene show strong spatial and temporal correlation. Both site location and cod distribution are time transgressive with a pattern of westward...
The World of Secret Societies: Dynamics from the Northwest (2015)
Secret societies are one of the most under-theorized and ignored aspects of prehistoric societies in archaeology, yet they may be pivotal in understanding major developments in sociopolitical complexity in the past. Probable prehistoric examples of secret society remains include the elaborately painted caves of Upper Paleolithic France, the communal structures or caves of the Early Near Eastern Neolithic (Gobekli Tepe, Jerf el Ahmar, Nahal Hemar, and others), and the kivas and caves used in the...
Yama Village: Community College Students Develop an Archaeological Analysis of a Historic Transnational Japanese Community in Washington State. (2017)
Olympic College has created a field school around the historic Japanese immigrant site of Yama Village, on Bainbridge Island, WA. A field school associated with a community college offers access to professional training to a selection of students who would otherwise not have access to this education. Our multidisciplinary approach provides students with comprehensive field experience in the effort to recover this "hidden chapter" in Washington State history.