Hetty Jo Brumbach

Phytolith Evidence for Early Maize (Zea Mays) in the Northern Finger Lakes Region of New York

The timing of crop introductions, particularly of maize (Zea mays), has been of long-standing interest to archaeologists working in various regions of eastern North America. The earliest confirmed macrobotanical evidence for maize in New York is A.D. 1000. We report on the results of accelerator mass spectrometer (AMS) dating, phytolith analysis, and stable carbon isotope analysis of carbonized cooking residues adhering to the interior surface of pottery sherds from three sites in the northern Finger Lakes region of New York. Maize, squash (Cucurbita sp.), wild rice (Zizania aquatica), and sedge (Cyperus sp.) were identified in phytolith assemblages dating to as early as the first half of the calibrated seventh century A.D. The results demonstrate that low δ13C values on cooking residues cannot be used to preclude the possibility that maize was cooked in vessels. Two of the maize-bean-squash crop triad were present in New York at least 350 years earlier than previously documented, and the Northern Flint Corn Complex was present in New York by at least the first half of the seventh century A.D. This research highlights the potential of cooking residues to provide new insights on prehistoric plant-based subsistence.

The Death of Owasco

The Owasco culture is a critical taxon in William A. Ritchies culture history of New York. In its final construction, Owasco was viewed by Ritchie as representing the onset of recognizable northern Iroquoian traits. This interpretation is widely accepted among archaeologists currently working in New York. An examination of the history of the taxon shows that it is nothing more than a subjectively defined unit based on the thoughts of Ritchie and his predecessor Arthur C. Parker. Recent empirical research has shown that the key traits Ritchie used to define Owasco have very different histories than he thought. Owasco does not stand either theoretically or empirically and should be abandoned as a unit of analysis.

Fun with Dick and Jane: Ethnoarchaeology, Circumpolar Toolkits, and Gender "Inequality"

Abstract Recent comparative ethnoarchaeological study of hunter-fisher and hunter-fisher-herder societies in the circumpolar world reveals interesting variation in the proportions of womens, mens and joint gear comprising toolkits employed in harvesting, processing, storage and distribution of major subsistence resources. In sheer numbers, womens tools and facilities overshadow those implements conventionally used by men and those used jointly by both sexes. Womens gear is often concentrated spatially within encampments and settlements, those areas with potentially greater accessibility and visibility for archaeologists. Moreover, women participate directly in the dispatch and processing of smaller animals, but as prey size increases women devote more time to the indispensable butchering, processing, storage and food distribution phases of hunting. These dynamics raise intriguing issues regarding the nature of the sexual division of labor and sexual inequality. Traditional archaeological paradigms have frequently privileged the hunting prowess and sociopolitical power of men while remaining virtually silent on women and womens roles in hunting. Data from a cross-cultural ethnoarchaeological study of Chipewyan, Khanty, Sámi and Iñupiaq communities offer insights for reassessing and recasting the social relations of production and gender in hunter-forager society.

Ethnoarchaeological and cultural frontiers : Athapaskan, Algonquian, and European adaptations in the central subarctic

Contents: Two anthropologists develop an ethnoarchaeological approach for understanding differential cultural-ecological adaptations in central subarctic Canada. Chipewyan, Cree, Metis and EuroCanadian life and livelihood are revealed.

Ethnoarchaeological Collaborations: Hunting Societies, Interethnic Relations, and Gender in the Northern Latitudes, Part II

While working together on ethnoarchaeology projects, we continued to pursue our separate interests in ethnology and archaeology. However, these pursuits often influenced our thinking about and approaches to ethnoarchaeology. Jarvenpa: In 1979 I traveled to Finland on a Fulbright to teach in the Institute of Ethnology at theUniversity ofHelsinki.Aside from learning a great deal about Finnish society, academia, and anthropology, I investigated possibilities for ethnographic fieldworkon agrarian adaptations in a Subarctic context. The latter came to fruition in 1983 with a project on agricultural decision making and social change. I worked as a maatyöläinen or general purpose farm hand with dairy farming families in Suomussalmi kunta or rural township, in an environmentally difficult and politically peripheral region of northeastern Finland. Since my labor was often needed in the cowshed, a traditionalworkdomainofFinnishwomen, I strongly empathizedwith the hopes and fears of rural women. That experience influenced my analysis of decision making and management style among farming families (Jarvenpa 1988). It also planted a seed regarding the significance of gender relations for future work. Among the many scholars who helped me find my way in Finland were Matti Sarmela, Juhani Lehtonen, and Jukka Pennanen. Pennanen’s wife’s cousin, Seppo Kallio, who worked for the Central Union of Agricultural Producers, was instrumental in helping me find an appropriate community and families for the research. Jukka became a particularly close colleague and friend who eventually came to the University at Albany as a visiting scholar. Many years later our paths would converge again in an ethnoarchaeological context. An interesting byproduct of the Finnish work was meeting Richard Gould. We both gave papers on our Finnish research in sessions at the AAA meetings in 1985 and at a symposium organized by Tim Ingold at the University of Manchester in 1986. I was already aware of Gould’s Australian research and could appreciate