Dear Friends,
As I mentioned in a previous note, I always take window seats while flying so I can watch the landscape below as we cruise along. On Thursday, March 21, I had a window seat from Tucson to Denver. I almost wish I hadn’t; what I saw made me sick to my stomach.
As you can see from this picture I took, construction on the SunZia power transmission line is doing severe damage to our beloved San Pedro Valley. One month ago, I took a similar photograph on a flight from Denver into Tucson, and I counted only 11 pads in one segment. In this more recent photograph, I count no fewer than three dozen construction pads and many miles of new roads. Desert flora and fauna have simply been scraped away and eradicated from a beautiful, comparatively untouched ecosystem. And an immense cultural landscape, sacred to the San Carlos Apache, Tohono O’odham, and many other Tribal Nations, is being repeatedly violated.
We at Archaeology Southwest eagerly await a pending decision in federal court, where we and our partners (the Tohono O’odham Nation, San Carlos Apache Tribe, and Center for Biological Diversity) seek a temporary injunction to halt construction until the Bureau of Land Management conducts a Cultural Landscape Study. Even if we “win” that case, the damage has been, and is being, done.
I have a window seat booked for my flight back to Tucson in a couple of weeks. I’m starting to rethink that…I may need to take an aisle seat to keep despair at bay.
Sorrowfully yours,
Steve Nash
President & CEO, Archaeology Southwest
P.S. In last week’s post, I accidentally demonstrated my ignorance with respect to various astronomical phenomena while discussing the vernal equinox. Thanks to those who pointed out my errors, which have now been corrected. Mea culpa!
Progress at Illinois’ Dickson Mounds Museum
Under the new [NAGPRA] regulations, institutions have five years to make the rest of the human remains and accompanying funerary objects in their possession accessible to tribes for repatriation; for Illinois, that means addressing the remains of more than 5,800 Native Americans and about 30,000 burial belongings. The process often involves lengthy consultations with multiple Native nations, archival research and curatorial work that can involve going through boxes of funerary objects. “It’s a daunting task,” said Logan Pappenfort, the curator of anthropology at the Dickson Mounds Museum, which has kept open other exhibits about the history of the land and its inhabitants. “But I think that the core tenets of what we have to do doesn’t change.” Pappenfort, who is a member of the Peoria Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma, is part of a younger generation of museum curators who have been at the forefront of rethinking repatriation work by letting tribes lead the decision-making over what should be returned and how. Julia Jacobs for the New York Times | Read more »
ASU Works with Tribal Reps to Fulfill NAGPRA Obligations
Arizona State University is working diligently and respectfully to improve its care for and repatriation of Native American human remains and cultural items, under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA). These ancestors and belongings were brought to ASU through federal actions, such as road construction, and in support of the university’s development and educational mission. ASU works closely with federal and state agencies that also have the duty and responsibility to fulfill the mandates of NAGPRA. “Our number one priority at the repository is living up to our NAGPRA responsibilities. We have taken concrete steps to increase our capacity for this work by substantially increasing our staff through both internal and external funds,” said Christopher Caseldine, who in 2021 became the curator of collections for the Center for Archaeology and Society Repository, part of ASU’s School of Human Evolution and Social Change. Arizona State University | Read more »
Continuing Coverage: Abandoned and Orphaned Oil-Gas Wells Pose Threats to Communities and Cultural Heritage
Our recent report on orphaned and abandoned wells in the US highlights the grave threat they pose to irreplaceable sacred and historic sites and to cultural landscapes across the West. The Tribal engagement work I’ve been fortunate to undertake over the last decade makes clear to me that our Tribal partners are on the front lines of this issue. Impacts associated with oil-gas development—as well as the lingering, abandoned infrastructure once the resources have been depleted—fall heavily on Tribal lands, resources, and communities. Paul F. Reed for Archaeology Southwest | Read more »
REMINDER: Comment on the Draft Management Plan for Bears Ears National Monument
The draft plan is the culmination of a first-of-its-kind collaboration between federal agencies and the five tribes of the Bears Ears Commission—Ute Indian Tribe, Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, Zuni Tribe, Hopi Tribe and the Navajo Nation—to incorporate Indigenous knowledge into the monument’s approach to balancing public use with protection of cultural and natural resources. The partnership is especially historic, Ruben Pacheco of the Bears Ears Inter-Tribal Coalition said, because Bears Ears and other public lands across the West overlap with ancestral homelands that tribes were removed from. “So ensuring that tribal perspectives are meaningfully involved in the protection of these lands is a way to respect tribes, and it’s a move towards what we consider repairing historical injustices.” It’s a pivotal and necessary shift in the federal government’s approach to managing public lands, he said, and represents a model that could be replicated by other tribal nations elsewhere. The alternative preferred by federal agencies and the Bears Ears Commission is option E. David Condos for KUER (NPR) | Learn more and comment today »
Learn why the National Parks Conservation Association applauds the plan and option E. Read more »
Please Sign Letter of Support for the Great Bend of the Gila National Monument by April 16
We are in collective agreement, as organizations, businesses, and individuals, that more can be done to permanently protect the Great Bend of the Gila. We support designating this remarkable landscape as a national monument to ensure the cultural, historic, and natural resources are safeguarded for future generations. … This remarkable landscape is currently threatened by the relentless expansion of the Phoenix metropolitan area, by insufficient management funding, and by vandalism and theft of cultural resources. Permanent protection of the Great Bend of the Gila will preserve the irreplaceable cultural, historic, and natural resource for the enjoyment and benefits of future generations. Respect Great Bend Coalition | Learn more and sign »
Grand Canyon Celebrates 10 Years of Tribal Demos Program
This week’s return of the Grand Canyon National Park’s cultural demonstration program, which highlights artisans from the 11 culturally associated tribes for park visitors, marks a decade milestone since the program began in 2014. Park goers may see weekly demonstrations of silversmithing, kachina carving, basket weaving and pottery making at the Desert View Watchtower, a 70-foot tall watchtower overlooking the South Rim. … “Seeing the significance behind the murals, from the Hopi way of life … I think it’s a powerful touch point that we can have in bridging that cultural understanding with the public,” said Jason Coochwytewa, a Hopi who sits on the Grand Canyon Conservancy board of directors. … [Coochwytewa’s] nonprofit partnered with the National Park Service to create a first-of-its-kind Inter-Tribal Cultural Heritage Site, setting up “a model” for other national parks to follow. Gabriel Pietrorazio for KJZZ (NPR) | Read more or listen now »
Commentary: Protecting Ukrainian Collections during War
Ukraine is a big country with a long history and centuries-old universities, public libraries, and research centers. Not surprisingly, Ukrainian scientific collections are diverse: They include cultural and natural objects which are permanent and usable in everyday research, as well as live lab cultures and specimens from wild and domesticated plants and animals. Institutions involved in preserving this diverse heritage include museums, libraries, archives, protected areas, universities, and research institutions scattered across the country. Ukrainian researchers have contributed to physics, biology, chemistry, earth and planetary sciences, and archaeology by extensively using existing collections and archives and adding enormous numbers of new items to this rich heritage. However, decades of economic turmoil and outdated policies eventually led to the erosion of infrastructure and collection management practices. Emergency plans for protecting collections dated back to the Cold War era of Soviet dominance. Pavel Gol’din for Undark | Read more »
In Memoriam: Frans de Waal
On March 14, noted primatologist Frans de Waal passed away at the age of 75. The author of over a dozen books and hundreds of articles, his pathbreaking research furthered the scientific study of animal cognition. He drew particular attention to bonobos, whom he dubbed “the forgotten ape” and “the hippies of the primate world.” SAPIENS via Emory University | Read more »
Funding Opportunity: Native American Students Scholarship
The CCPA Native American Initiatives Committee (NAIC) strives to foster an atmosphere of cooperation and understanding between the archaeological and Native American communities through a variety of means, including but not limited to professional development of archaeological careers, education and outreach. The CCPA offers a competitive scholarship of $1,500.00 for one or two college student to attend an archaeology field school. The scholarship is for a Native American college student who is enrolled in an accredited Anthropology program and the field school should be through a university or college. In lieu of an archaeological field school, the scholarship may be awarded for compensation of costs up to $1,500.00 for similar training or other educational expenses related to archaeological or anthropological studies; examples of such include (but are not limited to) training in NEPA, NAGPRA, NHPA (Section 106), museum studies, artifact analysis, tribal cultural preservation programs, etc. Colorado Council of Professional Archaeologists | Learn more »
Position Announcement: Project Archaeologist (Velarde NM)
The Mesa Prieta Petroglyph Project (MPPP) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit focused on the protection and preservation of archaeological features and cultural landscape of the Mesa Prieta region of the northern Rio Grande Valley. MPPP seeks to hire a Project Archaeologist who aligns with our mission of education, outreach and promotion of heritage stewardship. PROJECT ARCHAEOLOGIST DUTIES: The full-time Project Archaeologist will be tasked with managing the Preservation arm of the Mesa Prieta Petroglyph Project. Mesa Prieta Petroglyph Project | Learn more »
April Subscription Lectures (Santa Fe NM)
April 1, Istara Freedom; My Genízaro Roots; April 8, Susan Ryan, The Northern Chaco Outliers Project; April 15, J. McKim Malville, The Sun, Moon, and Supernova at Chimney Rock and Beyond; April 22, Gregorio Gonzales, Genízaros Valorosos: Indigenous Political Movement in Native New Mexico Borderlands; April 29, Philip J. Deloria, From the Charging Elk Sketchbook, 1940: A Dialogue on Art and Epistemology? Southwest Seminars | Learn more »
REMINDER: April 2, Archaeology Café Welcomes Jim Enote
Join us on Zoom Tuesday, April 2, 2024, when Jim Enote (Colorado Plateau Foundation) will discuss “A Lifelong Zuni Farmer’s Authority and Influence.” Experienced in planting crops for 67 consecutive years, Enote will share thoughts about traditional knowledge, climate change, economics, and life on the precipice. Archaeology Café (Archaeology Southwest) | Learn more and register (free) »
REMINDER: TODAY, March 27 Online Event: Finding the Children: Using Archaeology to Search for Unmarked Graves at Indian Residential School Sites in Canada
With Kisha Supernant. In May 2021, the Tk’emlúps te Secwe̓pemc First Nation in British Columbia, Canada, announced that 215 potential unmarked graves were located near the Kamloops Indian Residential School using ground-penetrating radar conducted by archaeologists. While this was not the first announcement of unmarked graves associated with Indian Residential Schools, it garnered national and international attention. The subsequent months saw significant commitments of funding from the government to support Indigenous communities who wanted to conduct their own searches. Many Indigenous communities turned to archaeologists to assist them in designing an approach to finding potential unmarked graves of their relatives. In this talk, Supernant provides an overview of how archaeologists have been working with Indigenous communities in Canada to locate potential grave sites and discuss the opportunities and challenges in this highly sensitive, deeply emotional work. Archaeology Hour (Archaeological Institute of America) | Learn more and register now (free) »
REMINDER: March 28 Online Event: Food Sovereignty in the Desert: Reclaiming Traditional Foodways
With Dr. Jacelle Ramon-Sauberan. Traditional foodways of the Tohono O’odham are inextricably linked to their ancestral lands in the Sonoran Desert. O’odham knowledge of hunting, farming, and harvesting wild foods has evolved over generations and continues to adapt to the land. How are communities sharing contemporary cultivation methods? How is climate change affecting traditional foodways? What can we learn from O’odham practices for sustainability? Join us for a conversation about the cultural food systems of the Tohono O’odham and their connection to the land, plants, and animals. Arizona Humanities | Learn more and register (free) »
April 4 Online Event: Leaving Traces
With Michelle and Derek Turner. Anyone who spends a lot of time on public lands in the U.S. is likely to encounter traces intentionally left by modern visitors, such as rock cairns, painted “kindness stones,” or even fairy houses. For some people, including most park managers, these traces are a violation of the Leave No Trace ethic. But, others find them charming and question what real harm they cause. This talk offers an anthropological analysis of what the practice of leaving traces is all about and why people have such different views, drawing on philosophical understandings of wilderness, cultural heritage studies, and archaeology of the contemporary. The presenters focus in particular on two parks known for their Indigenous stories, Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado and Machimoodus State Park in Connecticut. Crow Canyon Archaeological Center | Learn more and register (free) »
April 18 Online Event: Interaction on the Northern Mogollon Frontier
With Karl Laumbach. The Cañada Alamosa is a spring-fed canyon located on the northeastern edge of the Mimbres Mogollon world. The Ojo Caliente or Warm Spring supplies 2,000 gallons per minute, ensuring a perennial flow to the Rio Alamosa as it flows to the Rio Grande. Separated by 50 miles and the imposing Black Range from the Mimbres Mogollon cultural center, the canyon’s well-watered position on a “zone of interaction” between the Mogollon and Ancestral Puebloans resulted in a unique cultural sequence from the pithouse period up to the abandonment of the canyon in the 14th century reflecting a variety of local interactions as well as changes in their respective centers. Karl Laumbach’s archaeological career in southern New Mexico since 1974 included direction of the Human Systems Research nonprofit organization’s Cañada Alamosa project. Third Thursday Food for Thought series (Old Pueblo Archaeology Center) | Learn more and register (free) »
Remember to send us notice of upcoming webinars and Zoom lectures, tours and workshops, and anything else you’d like to share with the Friends. Thanks!