Diagnostics, Stratification and Zeppelin

Just a bit of a restatement or expansion of Mike's question and my response from class today.

The survey project I described used diagnostic pottery and projectile points to place the sites in the region into a basic temporal sequence.  What inferences was this based on?  Well, bear with my analogy again...

Points of View

This post is to hopefully recap a bit of the discussion from today's class. While anthropology has traditionally focused primarily on culture, I tried to emphasize other aspects of the human experience and how they articulate with culture. However, it might be best to think of the four divisions I used as different angles from which to look at the same thing...humans.

Talking Up the Field School

Last night, I had the opportunity to present about the 2012 summer field school--both the class and its initial findings--at the Wisner Library in Warwick.  One of the great results of such public presentations is getting to talk to folks with expertise and knowledge you didn't previously have.  I believe some of the leads will prove productive in future field seasons.

Holistic Connections

This post primarily stems from Friday's discussion in the Archaeology course, but it's relevant for the Cultural one as well.

Shedding Light on Early Homo

This week, the news of new fossil finds northern Kenya hit the anthropological scene.  You can find a good summary by Kate Wong here, and at Hominid Hunting here.  For further, bloggy, but knowledgeable commentary, check out Adam Van Ardsdale's post.  These fossils have special importance because they fit into the time period just around two million years ago, which marks the beginning of our genus, Homo, and has been characterized by a relatively fragmentary fossil record.

In the News: Early Pottery and Presidential Politics.

A couple of things caught my eye this week in the world of anthropology.

Modern Genetics and Ancient Humans

Yet again, a new study seems to have found evidence of the interbreeding of ancient human populations.