Shifting Focus: Reorienting Western Histories with Historical Archaeology

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Frontier and Settlement Archaeology" session, at the 2019 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

Traditional histories of the American West tend to privilege and centralize the perspectives of the white male elite. But what hidden pathways into the past have been ignored as we continue to privilege this well worn historiography? What would happen if we shifted our perspective to the margins? Could reorienting our focus to those so often left out of historical narratives open our eyes to new ways of understanding our nation's heritage? This talk will focus on the Fort Davis Archaeology Project's (FODAAP) research on a community of frontier army laundresses and military families stationed at Fort Davis, Texas during the late 19th century. By (re)orienting heritage landscapes we can better illuminate the complexity of frontier experiences and the importance of community ties to a social landscape in flux. 

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2019   •
• Frontier and Settlement Archaeology

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Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 374