Creative Clearance: Caring for an Important Place

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Training a New Generation of Heritage Professionals in the Valley of the Sun: The ASU Field School at S’eḏav Va’aki" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

S’edav Va’aki (formerly known as Pueblo Grande) is an ancestral O’Odham (Hohokam) archaeological village site and Phoenix’s only National Historic Landmark. Most of the site is preserved and maintained by S’edav Va’aki Museum (Museum) and includes a publicly accessible trail and non-public preserves. Hidden by trees and desert grasses and surrounded by fences, there remain areas of myriad surface artifacts and features, reflecting occupation from prehistoric to historical times. The Museum protects this land from illegal dumping, collecting, and other disturbances, a difficult task in the heart of an urban metropolis. Struggling for decades with managing these modern intrusions in a sensitive area called “Trashmound 1,” it was determined that non-excavation professional documentation was necessary. Through conversations with Arizona State University (ASU) School for Human Evolution and Social Change the team developed a mutually beneficial, non-destructive a field school in this location. The Museum and ASU collaborated with Tribes to develop a program in which students learned in-field artifact analyses, GIS mapping, archival research, and the importance of working in concert with descendant O’Odham communities. The Museum benefitted with sensitive areas clearly documented for protection and wealth of new information on an area that was not well understood.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)   •
• Training a New Generation of Heritage Professionals in the Valley of the Sun: The ASU Field School at S’eḏav Va’aki

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 38880.0