Forensic Archaeology (Other Keyword)
26-50 (64 Records)
This resource is a citation record only, the Center for Digital Antiquity does not have a copy of this document. The information in this record has been migrated into tDAR from the National Archaeological Database Reports Module (NADB-R) and updated. Most NADB-R records consist of a document citation and other metadata but do not have the documents themselves uploaded. If you have a digital copy of the document and would like to have it curated in tDAR, please contact us at comments@tdar.org.
The Forensics of Commodification: Examples from Louisiana of the Acquisition, Analysis, and Legal Problems Related to Trophy Skulls Seized from Illegal Sales (2015)
Since the inception of the Louisiana Department of Justice’s human remains acquisition program in 2007, two Tibetan kapalas have been recovered from illegal sales. This commodification of human remains constitutes technical violations of the law, but the nature of the remains makes for an awkward fit to the existing laws. The forensic, bioarchaeological, and cultural analysis of these remains are difficult due to their altered nature, leading to problems of disposition. Questions inherent in...
Further Defining the Role of the Forensic Archaeologist (2017)
As the use of archaeologists in forensic matters grows, it is important to define the role the archaeologist ought to play in such situations. Archaeologists should educate law enforcement personnel as to their utility in investigations. It is important that archaeologists understand their usefulness in criminal matters, and even more importantly, archaeologists should understand their limitations in investigations. There is a need to establish guidelines as to what archaeologists should/should...
The Geochemical Profile of the Woman in the Iron Coffin, a Mid-19th C. Burial in Queens, New York City (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Illegal construction excavation in Queens (NYC) unearthed a mid-19th C. iron coffin and exposed the burial interred within. Known as the Woman in the Iron Coffin, the well-preserved burial was a young adult female of African ancestry who died of small pox. Here we provide stable isotopic (δ13C, δ15N, δ18O, 87Sr/86Sr, 206Pb/207Pb) and elemental (Pb, As)...
Getting the Job Done: Case Resolution in the Field, from Investigation through Recovery, at Site GM-05585, a Low-Angle B-17G Crash Site in Sachsen Anhalt, Germany. (2019)
This is an abstract from the "A Multidimensional Mission: Crossing Conflicts, Synthesizing Sites, and Adapting Approaches to Find Missing Personnel" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The DPAA case resolution process involves a number of important steps that occur before a recovery team is sent into the field to excavate an incident site, and typically includes a combination of historic research, witness interviews, field investigations, and...
Handbook of Forensic Archaeology and Anthropology (1983)
This resource is a citation record only, the Center for Digital Antiquity does not have a copy of this document. The information in this record has been migrated into tDAR from the National Archaeological Database Reports Module (NADB-R) and updated. Most NADB-R records consist of a document citation and other metadata but do not have the documents themselves uploaded. If you have a digital copy of the document and would like to have it curated in tDAR, please contact us at comments@tdar.org.
Hitting Huggins’ Roadblock: Confronting the Challenge of Recovering the Missing from a World War II Battlefield in Oro Province, Papua New Guinea (2019)
This is an abstract from the "A Multidimensional Mission: Crossing Conflicts, Synthesizing Sites, and Adapting Approaches to Find Missing Personnel" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The complexity of accounting for missing in action personnel is highly dependent on the past—and present—context of the loss. In late 1942, during the Battle of Buna-Gona in New Guinea, United States forces established a roadblock behind forward Japanese positions in an...
Hot, Cold, Above and Below: Enhanced Survey Methods in the Detection of Clandestine Graves (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Forensic Archaeology: Research & Practice" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Ground-based methods of searching for clandestine graves and surface remains have been utilized by law enforcement and search and rescue personnel for years. When ground conditions and the technique of search are appropriate for the circumstances of the case, results are often successful. However, weather, terrain, acreage, foliage and efforts...
How Experimental Research in Forensic Archaeology Informs Archaeological Practice: Differentiating Perimortem Fracture From Postmortem Breakage (2018)
Often perceived as a highly specialized and peripheral subfield of archaeology, forensic archaeology contributes to our understanding of not only forensic anthropology and forensic science, but also traditional archaeological practice. Forensic archaeologists’ extensive knowledge of postmortem taphonomic effects on material objects has led to more precise interpretations of postmortem interval, environmental (including scavenger-induced) scattering and alteration of human remains, and site...
In Search of MIA from One Fateful Day in 1943: Florida Gulf Coast University Partners with the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) to Bring Servicemen Home (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Applying the Power of Partnerships to the Search for America's Missing in Action" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU) recently formed a partnership with the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA). In June 2019, FGCU participated in its first mission, the investigation of a World War II aircraft crash in Germany. For FGCU, this was the culmination of several initial endeavors. It was...
In the Groove: Alternative Functions for Sharpening Grooves in the Pueblo Southwest (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Commonly across the Puebloan Southwest, incised lines are observed adjacent to petroglyph panels. Often, these features are simply labeled as “axe sharpening grooves.” Many archaeologists label them in their site forms as such, tally them, and tend to not interpret them further. In this experimental research, I push back on this over simplified...
"Inconceivable!": Innovation and Improvisation on a WWII-Era Aircraft Crash Site in the Swamps of Papua New Guinea (2019)
This is an abstract from the "A Multidimensional Mission: Crossing Conflicts, Synthesizing Sites, and Adapting Approaches to Find Missing Personnel" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Archaeological recovery of an aircraft crash site differs significantly from traditional archaeology in that the former often takes place in locations unsuitable for human habitation, in geographic and environmental settings beyond the scope of standard excavation...
The Intersection of Bioarchaeology and Forensic Archaeology Methodologies and Theories: A Practical Application (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Forensic Archaeology: Research & Practice" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Although often viewed as disparate fields of practice, bioarchaeology and forensic archaeology share a number of commonalities in their approaches to human remains recovery techniques. To address the theoretical and methodological intersection and divergence of these two fields, a case study involving the recovery of remains from a historic...
The Intersection of Multiple Conflicts: The Excavation of an F-4C Crash Site in the Midst of the Dien Bien Phu Battlefield (2019)
This is an abstract from the "A Multidimensional Mission: Crossing Conflicts, Synthesizing Sites, and Adapting Approaches to Find Missing Personnel" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Between 2014 and 2017, archaeologists with the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) excavated an active rice paddy in northwest Vietnam in search of two missing U.S. service members from the Vietnam War. The incident aircraft, an F-4C, was shot down on March 15,...
Introduction to Exploring Globalization and Colonization Through Archaeology and Bioarcheology NSF REU Site (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Exploring Globalization and Colonialism through Archaeology and Bioarchaeology: An NSF REU Sponsored Site on the Caribbean’s Golden Rock (Sint Eustatius)" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Exploring Globalization and Colonization Through Archaeology and Bioarchaeology National Science Foundation (NSF) Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) Site located on the Dutch Caribbean island of St. Eustatius (Statia)...
Is There Strength in Numbers? An Evaluation of the Complementary Roles of Archaeologists and Anthropologists in Forensic Contexts (2017)
This paper explores the training and education that forensic anthropologists and forensic archaeologists have traditionally received, and how it is put into practice in forensic contexts. The substantial differences in theory, method, and practice between the two sub-disciplines will be summarized and how these differences shape what each can contribute in the field will be discussed. This paper will argue that although some overlap between the two sub-disciplines exists, contemporary...
Lessons Learned from the Courts: Forensic Archaeology and Anthropology in Recent United States Jurisprudence (2016)
Unlike many other aspects of archaeology, forensic archaeology and anthropology is, in part, only as effective as the courts believe it to be. While peer review is the gold standard for assessing the integrity and viability of the scientific aspects of forensic archaeology and anthropology, passing muster in a court of law can be a different—and sometimes counterintuitive—standard. Although some recent research in this area has examined the impact of court attempts to “police” the integrity of...
Life Among the Tombstones: Forensics Crosses Paths with Hoodoo (2016)
African magic rituals among the graves of the recently dead in the South and elsewhere may not be as rare as one might think. This paper is an exploration of a case wherein the author was called in as a forensic archaeologist and consultant to law enforcement investigating a case of cemetery desecrations with supernatural overtones. Further, during the course of this investigation, possible connections between the author's historical archaeological research excavation of a slave street on a...
Mind the Gap: The Evolution of Forensic Archaeology in Military Remains Recovery (2017)
The Defense POW-MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) is responsible for the recovery of U.S. servicemembers' remains from past conflicts. This paper will briefly review the history of military remains recovery by the U.S. government, focusing on the personnel responsible for field recovery as well as the methods typically employed. We will then explore the evolving role of archaeologists in the accounting community, and how this parallels the modern development of forensic archaeology as a distinct...
A Missing Person Body Recovery Case: Maintaining Professionalism & Best Practices as a Forensic Archaeologist Amidst Escalated Tensions (2015)
In Fall 2012, I was contacted by a county sheriff's department in South Carolina and their Coroner as well as by the family members of a missing person, to request my assistance as a forensic archaeologist in a body recovery. A 54 year old male had been missing for nearly two years until a timber worker stumbled upon a human bone in the course of marking trees for harvest. What followed was a body recovery wherein I witnessed growing tensions between family members towards law enforcement...
The New Role of Archaeology in Forensic Science (2017)
In 2015, the Physical Anthropology section of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences (AAFS) officially became the "Anthropology" section of AAFS. This reflected not simply a name change, but an acknowledgement of the importance of archaeology to forensic anthropology and forensic science. This has heralded a new age of forensic anthropology based on increasing reliance on archaeological methods and theoretical principles. The interaction between forensic archaeology, anthropology, and...
A New Tool for Forensic Geoarchaeology: Sediment Fingerprinting with Geochemistry for Homicide Investigations (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Forensic Archaeology: Research & Practice" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Sediment fingerprinting by elemental analysis has been an important analytical tool in the environmental sciences to help explain sediment movement and deposition in water bodies and other catchments. Related techniques have also been used in many archaeological investigations to aid in ancient activity area analysis. However, this technique has...
Post-Mortem Interval and Age-at-Death Estimation through Forensic Proteomics (2018)
The estimation of the post-mortem interval (PMI) and the age-at-death (AAD) are both important aspects of forensic anthropology for which numerous methods have been developed, each with different limitations. As proteins represent biomolecules that carry out a wide range of functions, many of which structural to the tissues undergoing decomposition, and the collection of these (i.e., the proteome) is dynamic not only throughout life, but also post-mortem, proteomic methods have great potential...
Ritual Human Sacrifice among the Tarascans (2018)
This study reports on osteological remains excavated from the Great Platform at Tzintzuntzán, the Postclassic (A.D. 1300-1522) Tarascan ceremonial capital. The osteological deposit was first uncovered by Alfonso Caso in 1937-1944, re-visited by Rubin de Borbolla and Roman Piña Chan during the 1960’s, by Efrain Cardenas in 1992, and most recently in 2011 by the Proyecto Especial de Michoacán. In 1992, 194 skull fragments (MNI=40) and 28 modified femur fragments were recovered while the most...
Searching for the lost Marines of Guadalcanal (2017)
In early 2016, Garcia & Associates conducted forensic archaeological investigations for the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) on Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands. DPAA (formerly JPAC) is the Department of Defense agency tasked with providing the fullest possible accounting for missing American service personnel from past wars. During World War II, the Battle for Guadalcanal lasted from 7 August 1942 to 9 February 1943 and included intense ground fighting to secure the airstrip known as...