North America: California and Great Basin (Geographic Keyword)
126-150 (374 Records)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Western Stemmed Tradition lithic assemblages are typically small at buried, Younger-Dryas aged sites throughout the Great Basin. Recent work at the Connley Caves, in the Fort Rock Basin of south-central Oregon, has uncovered a rich cultural assemblage containing projectile points, scrapers, flake tools, cores, abraders, gravers, and thousands of lithic...
Fishing Features in the Mojave Desert and Beyond: Implications at Ivanpah Dry Lake, NV (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Mojave Desert is a host of many now desiccated Holocene lakes. Fishing features are rare along these lakeshores, but they do occur. Recent investigations at Ivanpah Dry Lake in the Mojave Desert along the California/Nevada border have revealed a complex of fishing features including fishing platforms and fishing circles, connecting this area to the...
The Fluted Point Component of the Old River Bed Delta, Utah (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This poster contextualizes archaeological sites with fluted point components and related finds on the Old River Bed (ORB) delta in western Utah. Between ~13,000 and 9500 cal BP the ORB delta endured as a large distributary-fed wetland in what is now the dry and forbidding Great Salt Lake Desert. This vast wetland is widely recognized for its Western...
Food Residue Analysis on Soapstone Cooking Vessels in the Chumash Homeland: Implications for Changing Foodway Patterns during the Mission Period across the Colonial Landscape (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper discusses the results of pollen, phytolith, starch, and organic residue (FTIR) analyses conducted on soapstone cooking vessels in museum collections uncovered in the Los Angeles and Santa Barbara areas, California. The vessels were excavated from distinct chronological and spatial contexts in the Chumash homeland: a pre-Mission period site...
A Forensic investigation of the Ralph Glidden Human Remains Collection of the Catalina Island Museum (2018)
Members of the Gabrielino/Tongva community always felt that the Ralph Glidden Collection within the Catalina Island museum required a forensic style of investigation. Although they may have been discussing the entire collection, it is definitely applies to the human remains collections. The Catalina Island Museum human remains collection that was recently repatriated had received limited analysis. A few scholars incorporated the collection into larger discussions about the Gabrielino and Chumash...
Fremont Fishing: New Data from Recent Excavations in Utah Valley (2018)
The Utah Valley, with easy access to montane, lacustrine, and riverine resources, is the location of some of the largest known Fremont habitation sites. Two of these sites have recently been excavated resulting in a wealth of new data. While many aspects of Fremont diet have been explored in depth, the role of fishing is often understudied due to poor preservation of fish remains and fishing tools. In this poster we report the analysis of the fish bones and the recovery and analysis of bone and...
Fremont Maize Cultivation and Latest Holocene Climate Variability in the Cub Creek Archaeological District, Dinosaur National Monument (2018)
The Cub Creek Archaeological District in northern Utah’s Dinosaur National Monument was an early center of Fremont maize cultivation and village settlement AD 450-850. Cub Creek lies near the northern limit of maize cultivation in western North America in the foothills of the Uinta Mountain Range. We couple a Bayesian analysis of radiocarbon-dated pithouses and roasting features with a 2,115-year tree-ring reconstruction of August-July precipitation to explore relationships between Fremont...
From Features to Figures: Quantitative Analysis of California Native American Baskets (2018)
There are only a few recognized experts on California Native American basketry and their informed opinions establish the current state of knowledge. It takes years of experience under the guidance of a knowledgeable mentor and examination of hundreds of baskets to develop such expertise. While analysis by the few experts may be quantitative, scientific, and exacting, designation of a basket’s ethnic identification continues to be subjective. In some instances, authors cite little but their own...
From Shore to Mountain: Insights into Resource Selection and Processing along the Central California Coast (2018)
Salvage excavations conducted in the 1970s at the Red, White, and Blue Beach site (CA-SCR-35), located in northern Santa Cruz County on the central California coast on Monterey Bay, recovered a large and diverse vertebrate faunal assemblage with a well-defined Middle Period (2800–900 cal BP) component. Few faunal assemblages from this area of the Central Coast have been thoroughly analyzed and little is known about resource selection and processing during this time. I use archaeofaunal data from...
Front-Loading Backfilling: Site Stabilization of a Cliffside Shell Midden at l’akayamu (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. We present the design of a sampling project at one of the three archaeological sites composing the Late/Historic village of l’akayamu on limuw (Santa Cruz Island, California). We developed our methods with two goals: first, to support effective site stabilization post-excavation; second, to recover fragile artifacts eroding from a sea cliff while...
The Future of Archaeological Research on Public Lands: A Case Study from California (2018)
Lynne Goldstein has been on the front lines in developing innovative field programs for the study of diverse places in North America.This paper examines her influence on archaeological investigations undertaken at the Russian colony of Ross in northern California. A significant trend in the study of sites on public lands is the shift from broad-scale, high-impact excavations to low-impact field practices. The paper outlines her legacy in the development of coordinated research programs that...
Geoarchaeological Insights from a Late Pleistocene–Terminal Holocene Site on Isla Cedros, Baja California (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Far West Paleoindian Archaeology: Papers from the Next Generation" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Current geoarchaeological investigations of the Cerro Pedrogoso (Rocky Hill) site on Isla Cedros, Baja California, seek to provide a context for a Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene human occupation along the Pacific coast. Here, a rich assemblage of artifacts signals the presence of maritime coastal adaptations from at...
The Geoarchaeology of Playa-Dune Complexes on Edwards Air Force Base (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Archaeologists working in the western Mojave Desert have long assumed that sediments in the region contain limited depth. The playas that dot the landscape are often assumed to have formed at the end of the Pleistocene, with playas having no stratigraphy and no buried cultural deposits. In the Antelope Valley, the dunes that are present are thought to be...
A Geochemical Analysis of Concave Base and Western Stemmed Tradition Projectile Points in Southeastern Oregon (2018)
The relationship between concave base and Western Stemmed Tradition (WST) projectile points in the Great Basin is not well-understood. They may represent sequential Late Pleistocene technologies, coeval technologies used by different ethnolinguistic populations, or different components within the same toolkits. To explore the latter possibility, I collected geochemical sourcing data for both types of artifacts recovered from three adjacent valleys in southeastern Oregon: (1) Warner Valley; (2)...
Geographic Distribution Analysis of Elko Series Projectile Points Across the Great Basin (2018)
The Elko projectile point series is diagnostic of the early Archaic period throughout the Great Basin. Within the Elko series, two identified subtypes exist: Elko Eared (EE) and Elko Corner-notched (ECN). While morphologically distinct, both subtypes occur within the same chronological and geographic extents. In this study, I gathered a sample of 37 sites throughout the Great Basin with identified EE and/or ECN points, then developed an index representing the proportion of EE to ECN points in...
Geophyte Exploitation in Northern Great Basin: Starch Granule Analysis of Bedrock Metates in Warner Valley, Oregon (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Hearths, Earth Ovens, and the Carbohydrate Revolution: Indigenous Subsistence Strategies and Cooking during the Terminal Pleistocene and Early Holocene in North America" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Geophytes store starch in underground organs considered highly valued food resources across many human societies. For example, Indigenous people in the northern Great Basin plan social activities around the seasonal...
A GIS Analysis of Ancient Human Trails, Human Behavioral Ecology, and Agency in the Mojave and Colorado Desert (2018)
Desert environments pose challenging conditions to human travel in the form of exposure to intense weather and access to important water sources. Environmental constraints of the desert can explain people’s decisions to consider energy-efficient modes of travel through the framework of Human Behavioral Ecology. Culture, however, does not always follow the model of Human Behavioral Ecology, even in environments posing challenges that require efficient ways of living. Cultural knowledge, beliefs,...
The Gordian Knot: Novel Methods for Digitally Identifying, Defining, and Separating Unique Rock Art Elements (2018)
In rock art research the stratigraphy of a rock art panel can offer great insight into the temporality of a panel, which can then inform many other aspects of analytical inquiry. Yet, making the necessary distinctions between elements is often difficult--as images fade and are worn by time, or the subjective nuances of the recorder. This paper explores novel means of identifying, defining, and separating unique rock art elements in digital space within different digital methodologies.
Habitat-Specific Marine Reservoir Corrections along the Central California Coast: The Effects of Differential Upwelling (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. A confluence of natural factors has created three different ecological habitats for marine shellfish with potentially unique marine reservoir offsets along the central California coast. Deep-water trenches adjacent to the rocky points (e.g., Arguello, Conception, Sal), create localized upwelling environments. Reported offsets range from 400-1000 years for...
Hard Questions for Hardrock Places: Integrating Academic-Based Research Questions into the Management of Hardrock Mining Sites on Public Lands in the Southern California Deserts (2018)
Land-managing agencies have to make tough decisions about what archaeological sites are worth conserving – decisions that are getting tougher as the capacity of agencies continues to be stretched. Academics may disagree with these decisions, yet their approaches to research have long been crucial to defining what is significant. The Bureau of Land Management California (with Statistical Research, Inc.) has recently completed a comprehensive management program for hardrock mining sites on 10+...
Harvesting Seagrass at l’akayamu (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This project is a collaborative effort driven by a multi-tribal Chumash community to reawaken cultural knowledge while simultaneously generating new archaeological data about the well-preserved Chumash village of l’akayamu. Located on limuw (Santa Cruz Island, the largest of California’s Channel Islands), l’akayamu is a historical village that was...
Haskett and its Clovis Parallels (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Current Perspectives on the Western Stemmed Tradition-Clovis Debate in the Far West" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Haskett represents an initiating point style in some parts of western North America. Radiocarbon dates suggest the earliest Haskett occupations were within the Clovis era, and Haskett shares several technological and geographic attributes that are more in kind with Clovis than with later stemmed styles....
Haskett Chronology and Its Relationship to Other North American Technocomplexes (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Late Pleistocene Stemmed Points across North America: Continental Questions and Regional Concerns" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Haskett projectile points are well known in the Great Basin, but until recently their precise age has been considered poorly understood. Outside of the Great Basin, few researchers know of Haskett or consider it an important facet of the late Pleistocene cultural landscape. Archaeologists...
Haskett: What Is It, When Is It, Where Is It? (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Late Pleistocene Stemmed Points across North America: Continental Questions and Regional Concerns" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Haskett projectile points were first defined in Idaho by Robert Butler in 1965 and have since figured variously into discussions of non-fluted lanceolate technology from the terminal Pleistocene. As one of a series of similar styles known by other names found along the western cordillera of...
Hasketts and Crescents: An Analysis of the Lithic Tools from Weed Lake Ditch, Oregon (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Far West Paleoindian Archaeology: Papers from the Next Generation" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Several open-air sites with buried stemmed point technology have been discovered in the Harney Basin, southeastern Oregon. These sites provide a unique way to expand our current understanding of Western Stemmed lithic technology and subsistence practices from the late Pleistocene and early Holocene. The research presented...