Old Data, New Format: Digitizing to Increase the Accessibility of Mortuary Information at S'edav Va'aki, Phoenix, Arizona

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Digital databases are critical to archaeological data management, but our increasing use of them since the 1980s means that some of them have become artifacts in themselves. Cultural resource management (CRM) firms in particular rely on different databases to document mortuary features and associated funerary objects, but as many CRM collections have already been repatriated to descendant communities, the field notes, field maps, osteological drawings, artifact recordings, and databases from the excavations are all that remain. This poster uses the large Classic period Hohokam site of S’edav Va’aki (formerly Pueblo Grande) in Phoenix, Arizona, to show how mortuary feature information previously stored in outdated technology may be converted into an accessible online platform. While some field and osteological notes had already been digitized, many still existed only in physical form. This poster presents a methodology to digitize and compile the data from each of the recovered ancestral remains at S’edav Va’aki and organize them into a searchable database to better compare mortuary features within and beyond the site to help us better understand Hohokam society.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 40384.0