Shannon Tushingham

Macro and Micro Scale Signatures of Hunter-Gatherer Organization at the Coastal Sites of Point St. George, Northwestern Alta California

Abstract Richard Goulds classic 1966 monograph, Archaeology of the Point St. George Site and Tolowa Prehistory, provided an important source of information on settlement and subsistence systems on the north coast of California. This article provides a quantitative assessment of two key ideas set forth in the study: (1) that there was profound variation in hunter-gatherer land use between the Middle and Late period components of the site, where marine foods were initially largely ignored and only later became a major focus; and (2) that the Late Period component was largely analogous to the ethnographic Tolowa, thus supporting an ethnoarchaeological approach. Drawing on previously unpublished quantitative macro-scale data from Goulds excavations at CA-DNO-11 and new micro-scale data from CA-DNO-13, we conclude that the components reflect two fundamentally different adaptive strategies: a more mobile foraging system in the Middle Period where people were targeting almost exclusively highly ranked taxa (regardless of whether they were marine or terrestrial foods), and a sedentary village-based system in the Late Period, when mass extractive methods, storage, and the logistical procurement of resources became important strategies. Identified dietary remains include all major staples used by ethnographic Tolowa, but certain interior resources (salmon and acorns) may have been less of a focus on the coast than previously portrayed.

Hunter-Gatherer Tobacco Smoking in Ancient North America: Current Chemical Evidence and a Framework for Future Studies

Tobacco (Nicotiana sp.) is a powerful plant intoxicant and was widely used by contact period indigenous peoples throughout the North American west. Until recently, however, evidence of its prehistoric use has remained elusive. Recent advances in residue extraction and chemical identification techniques employing gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) and liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) are giving archaeologists the tools that are needed to address questions about the antiquity and nature of tobacco use. Recent chemical analyses of residues extracted from stone pipes and pipe fragments excavated at sites in the southern Pacific Northwest Coast of North America and Central California demonstrate tobacco was being smoked for at least 1100 years, a practice that continued into the historic period. Yet, it is likely that tobacco smoking began much earlier, and a number of anthropological questions about tobacco remain. In this chapter, we review recent research on the history of tobacco use in western North America, summarize ethnographic data, and discuss the theoretical framework of chemical studies and potential for future work. Our focus is on tobacco use by hunting-gathering-fishing societies who manipulated many different indigenous (“wild” and cultivated) tobaccos through selection to a degree that has been largely unappreciated. These cultural practices likely altered several tobacco species on a genetic and phenotypic level, perhaps even leading to the generation of unique varieties or species. We suggest several potential avenues of research, from historical questions of indigenous use and management to “Tobacco Sovereignty” and other modern-day applications for tribal communities.

The peer review gap: A longitudinal case study of gendered publishing and occupational patterns in a female-rich discipline, Western North America (1974–2016)

Researchers have repeatedly demonstrated that women continue to be underrepresented in publication output in the sciences. This is true even in female-rich fields such as archaeology. Since most gender-related publication studies rely on data from peer-reviewed journals, it would be instructive, though challenging, to also track publication output in non-refereed and professional or industry venues, which tend to be more accessible to those working in extra-academic settings. This comparison is important in fields such as archaeology in which the vast majority (approximately 90%) of practitioners in the USA work for private sector cultural resource management firms and federal and state agencies. To understand the dynamics of who publishes where, we compiled a new dataset tracking over 40 years of peer-reviewed versus non-peer-reviewed publications that publish articles on the archaeology of California (an American Indian cultural area including southwest Oregon, most of the state of California, and Baja Mexico) and the Great Basin culture area (spanning eight western USA states). Historic gender differences in the publishing output of authors identified as men versus those identified as women were revealed by articles published between 1974 and 2016 in two refereed journals, the Journal of California Anthropology/ Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology and California Archaeology, and in one un-refereed venue, the Society for California Archaeology Proceedings. Although multiple independent measures indicate that women are contributing and active members of the discipline, publishing records yield more variable results. Specifically, while women have historic and increasingly robust levels of participation in the non-peer-reviewed Proceedings, they remain vastly underrepresented in the two peer-reviewed journals, which are widely regarded as more prestigious and influential. We argue that this “peer review gap” is influenced by variation in the costs (largely time investment) and benefits of publication for people working in different professional roles (e.g., agency professionals, private/cultural resource management firm personnel, tenure-track faculty, adjunct faculty, etc.). We also argue that these cost and benefit variations may ultimately influence the decisions of people of all genders and backgrounds, but, because of the current structure of our discipline—including the fact that women and minorities lag in positions where costly peer-reviewed publication is a rewarded and supported activity—overwhelmingly affect these groups. We recognize that non-refereed publications such as Proceedings provide an important means of bridging the peer review gap and give voice to individuals from diverse backgrounds and perspectives.

Expanding Perspectives on the Archaeology of Pipes, Tobacco, and Other Smoke Plants in the Ancient Americas

Popular culture has made the public aware of the general roles tobacco and pipes played in Native ceremonial rituals concerned with diplomacy, particularly in North America. For example, a focus on certain types of pipes, such as the iconic calumet, and specific smoke plants, such as tobacco, have encouraged the stereotype that pipes and tobacco were used solely to make peace, and that Native groups used the same pipes and smoke plants everywhere. In recent years, a great deal of scholarly research has expanded our view of indigenous smoking practices that challenge simplistic perceptions of the use of pipes, tobacco, and other smoke plants throughout the Americas. This chapter highlights some of the overarching themes and research questions that scholars are addressing both within and outside of this volume, including: production and artifact life histories, smoking pipes as windows to ritual and social processes, pipe use in prehistory, the value of collections-based research, integrating interdisciplinary methods, anthropogenic range extension, plant cultivation and management, and tobacco sovereignty and modern heath initiatives. Researchers are approaching these issues from a variety of theoretical frameworks and applying cutting edge technologies to investigate questions that address the development smoking in the past and, in so doing, highlight implications for modern day society. By broadening research questions, utilizing new analytical methods, and applying interdisciplinary interpretative frameworks, this new research offers innovative perspectives into a diverse array of perspectives on smoke plants and pipes.

First Coastal Californians: Edited by Lynn H. Gamble. School for Advanced Research Press, Santa Fe. 2015. ISBN 978-1-938645-19-8 (Paperback US

To those of us who pursue it, we know that California archaeology is spectacular and immensely interesting, but we should face it, this is not generally well known by the public. Indeed, as far as archaeology in the Americas goes, it is much easier to garner interest in the pyramids of Mesoamerica, the mounds of the southeast, and the pueblos of the southwest. This is a point made by Brian Fagan in the forward of First Coastal Californians, the latest in the SAR Popular Archaeology Series published by the School for Advanced Research Press and designed to garner public interest in California archaeology. The book is profusely illustrated with 175 glossy photographs and illustrations, including 37 color plates and figures. The volume editor, Lynn Gamble, assembled an impressive list of academic, CRM, and tribal scholars to write 17 short chapters featuring some of the more spectacular archaeological discoveries and cultural correlates of California’s indigenous peoples.

24.95), 144 pp, 24 color plates, 13 color illustrations, 3 drawings, 135 halftones, 5 maps, 3 charts.

The late adoption of pottery technology in the North American Arctic between 2,500 and 2,800 years ago coincides with the development of a specialized maritime economy. Arctic pottery technologies present an excellent case study for examining possible correlations between hunter-gatherer pottery and aquatic resource use. Review of the timing and distribution of early pottery in Alaska shows that early pottery is rare and dates at the earliest to 2,500 years ago; the earliest pottery is found in small numbers and primarily in coastal areas. Despite expectations that pottery use would be strongly linked to marine lipids, biomarkers and compound-specific δ13C values of 20 sherds from the Cape Krusenstern site complex, dating from 2700 to 200 cal B.P. years ago, are most consistent with freshwater aquatic resources; mixtures of freshwater aquatic, marine aquatic, and terrestrial resources are also possible. While additional analysis of a larger sample and zooarchaeological reference specimens is necessary, our study suggests that the development of pottery production by Arctic peoples is more complex than previously appreciated. This research is the first synthesis in over 30 years of early pottery in Alaska and is the first to include residue analysis of a small sample of pre-1500 B.P. pottery. La adopción tardía de la cerámica en el Ártico norteamericano entre 2500 y 2800 a.P. coincide con el desarrollo de una economía marítima especializada. Las tecnologías cerámicas del Ártico presentan un excelente estudio de caso para examinar las posibles correlaciones entre la adopción de la cerámica entre los cazadores-recolectores y el uso de recursos acuáticos. Una revisión de la temporalidad y distribución de la cerámica temprana en Alaska demuestra que ésta es poco común y apareció después de 2500 a.P.; la cerámica más antigua se encuentra en pequeñas cantidades y principalmente en las zonas costeras. A pesar de la expectativa que el uso de cerámica estaría fuertemente ligado a los lípidos marinos, los biomarcadores y los valores de δ13C de compuestos específicos en 20 tiestos fechados entre 2700 y 200 años cal a.P. y procedentes del complejo del sitio de Cape Krusenstern son más consistentes con el uso de recursos de agua dulce. También es posible que reflejen una mezcla de recursos de agua dulce, marinos y terrestres. Aunque son necesarios análisis adicionales de muestras más grandes y de especímenes de referencia zooarqueológica, nuestro estudio sugiere que el desarrollo de la producción de la cerámica por los pueblos árticos es más complejo de lo que se pensaba. Esta investigación es la primera síntesis en más de 30 años de la cerámica temprana en Alaska y también es la primera en incluir el análisis de residuos de una pequeña muestra de cerámica anterior a 1500 a.P.

Aquatic Adaptations and the Adoption of Arctic Pottery Technology: Results of Residue Analysis

Abstract The Manila site (CA-HUM-321) is a stratified prehistoric midden site with a long history of use by the Wiyot people. The site is located on Humboldt Bay on the North Coast of California, a major estuary system of the Pacific Northwest, and is unique for its excellent preservation, depth and integrity of deposits, and its strategic location, with ready access to both open coast and estuarine resources. In this article, we report our constituent analysis of excavated materials—the first study of its kind from Humboldt Bay—involving identification and quantification of dietary and material residues, including shellfish, fish, bird, and mammal bone, paleoethnobotanical seeds and wood, and lithics. The research establishes that the site dates to over 1,300 cal BP—predating deposits excavated by Loud (1918) at Tuluwat village on Gunther (Indian) Island (CA-HUM-67) by several hundred years—as well as the earliest evidence to date of the mass harvest of fish (especially smelt) and intensive shellfish procurement on the North Coast of California. The study contributes to our understanding of the historical ecology of northern California estuaries and provides insight into the emergence of bulk storage, mass capture techniques, and the development of plank house villages in the region.

Late Holocene Coastal Intensification, Mass Harvest Fishing, and the Historical Ecology of Marine Estuaries: The View from the Manila Site (CA-HUM-321), Humboldt Bay, Northwestern Alta California

The entirely unnecessary confusion regarding the differences between middle-range and optimal foraging theory reviewed in Chapter 4 indicates the kinds of problems that arise when research is conducted in the absence of a firm understanding of how it relates to general theory. Middle-range theorists to the contrary, like any other scientific enterprise, hunter-gatherer research requires a decent body of general theory. In the sense I intend here, to be viable that general theory must present, minimally, a coherent explanatory matrix in which materialist explanation and a concern for evolutionary processes figure prominently. I assume, further, that just as these features will characterize any modern theory of hunter-gatherers, so must they characterize any modern general theory of anthropology. These stipulations reflect my own theoretical perspective and assumptions regarding the quintessential role of hunter-gatherers in anthropology. Note further still that by invoking these stipulations and the body of theory underlying them, I am denying deliberately any possible role here for what has been called “post-processual archaeology” (Hodder 1982a, b, 1983). As Yengoyan (1985) notes, that approach effectively precludes any chance of doing comparative or generalizing research, which is assumed to be the principal purpose of all the theories, limited and general, in question here (see later discussion).

Marxist and Structural Marxist Perspectives of Hunter-Gatherers

One problem in evaluating the potential utility of foraging theory in anthropology is that the results of critical behavioral tests are seldom clear-cut. Historically, where optimal models have been applied to real cases (see Chapter 4), the fit between expected and observed behavior has been close enough to satisfy advocates and loose enough to encourage critics. Because alternative theories weigh facts differently, such empirical indeterminacies are unavoidable. Constructive critics of foraging theory have made this a productive area of research. They regard the inevitable mismatches between observed and expected foraging behavior neither as devastating (providing an excuse to ignore such models) nor as uninteresting (to be dismissed as noise reflecting faulty or incomplete data). Rather, the constructive critics of optimal foraging theory see such mismatches as opportunities to develop better models. These alternative models all sacrifice some of the simplicity of explanation that characterizes the foraging models previously discussed by introducing additional assumptions and logical complexity. In each case it is assumed that the loss in elegance is justified by gains in predictive accuracy or in model realism.

More Complex Models of Optimal Behavior Among Hunter-Gatherers

Neo-Darwinian theories explain macro-level phenomena as the cumulative consequence of explicitly defined processes acting on a micro level, specifically on reproductive individuals. There are currently three schools of neo-Darwinian thought in anthropology: evolutionary archaeology, human behavioral ecology, and cultural transmission theory (sometimes called dual inheritance theory). In this chapter, we deal primarily with human behavioral ecology in which behavior is interpreted in terms of genetic fitness and often modeled using game theory. Central to human behavioral ecological studies is the tension between individual and group interests. We describe the fundamental tenets of human behavioral ecology and explore its advantages and limitations through a variety of models and case studies.