Ancestral Homelands

Interviews: Bears Ears Is My Ancestral Homeland
Jim Enote is a member of the Zuni tribe. The Zuni and other southwestern Pueblo tribes, such as the Hopi, are descendants of the Ancestral Puebloans, who inhabited the canyons and mesas of the Bears Ears region of southern Utah before migrating away in the late 13th century. In the November 2018 issue of National Geographic, Hannah Nordhaus and Aaron Huey report on the deep roots of the controversy over the Trump administration’s decision to shrink several national monuments, especially Bears Ears. https://on.natgeo.com/2O1vD9o – National Geographic

Regina Lopez-Whiteskunk and her family have lived in the American southwest since time immemorial. To honor her place and that of her ancestors, she helped lead five Native American tribes in an historic campaign to protect the lands surrounding the Bears Ears Buttes in Utah. As a member of a tribe that has lived successfully in this arid climate for millennia, she expresses the hope that traditional knowledge can help guide the management of our public lands in the 21st Century. http://bit.ly/2O0zuDB – On Common Ground

Documentary Series: Native America
The producers of Native America were given remarkable access to Native American communities, going behind the scenes at special events, including a pilgrimage to ancestral ruins at Chaco Canyon in New Mexico, a trek across lost territories in the American West and an investiture ceremony for a chief in the Pacific Northwest, surrounded by cedar totem poles and centuries of tradition. Tribal members and descendant communities, whose ancestors built this world, share their stories, revealing long-held oral traditions as the thread that runs through the past to these living cultures today. http://bit.ly/2O3mwFg – Navajo-Hopi Observer

Explore the world created by America’s First Peoples. The four part series reaches back 15,000 years to reveal massive cities aligned to the stars, unique systems of science and spirituality, and 100 million people connected by social networks spanning two continents. https://to.pbs.org/2NV40yR – PBS

Commentary: Kintigh: Whither Archaeological Data?
Today, nearly all archaeological fieldwork in the U.S. is executed by private firms in response to legal mandates for historic preservation, at a cost of about a billion dollars annually. However, only a minuscule fraction of the data from these projects is made accessible or preserved for future research, despite agencies’ clear legal obligations to do so. Severe loss of these data is not unusual – it’s the norm. http://bit.ly/2O1wlDA – The Conversation; https://to.pbs.org/2O5W51S – PBS News Hour

Profile: Ada Hatch, Archaeologist
“They said if we didn’t succeed they would never hire women again.” Ada Hatch’s smile reflects the brilliance of her yellow sundress when she says this. But it’s not a sugary smile; it’s a grin full of spunk and vigor, one that hints at true adventure and wisdom. Now 76 years old, Ada spent the summer of 1962 working as one of the Southwest’s first women hired to work on an archaeological site as part of the Glen Canyon Salvage Project (1956–1963). It was her first job and a mission backed by the National Park Service through the Museum of Northern Arizona. http://bit.ly/2O1upLe – REI blog

Greater Chaco Landscape Leasing News
Paul F. Reed from Archaeology Southwest praised Secretary Zinke’s decision on deferring leases, while encouraging him to make long-term solutions: While we are pleased that Secretary Zinke has made the right decision to defer leasing so close to Chaco Canyon, this just underscores the need for a long-term solution that fully protects the Greater Chaco area from drilling. New Mexico’s pueblos and the Navajo Nation have repeatedly asked for such a solution, and today’s decision provides an opportunity for the administration to show that it is committed to working with tribal communities and other stakeholders on resolving the long-standing conflicts with drilling around Chaco. http://bit.ly/2O2LcOl – KRWG (NPR)

Repatriations from the Smithsonian
Strolling through the National Museum of Natural History and the National Museum of the American Indian, both on the Mall in D.C., it is plain that the Smithsonian is home to thousands upon thousands of the most precious items and sacred treasures in the world. But to whom do they really belong? The Smithsonian’s two repatriation offices are currently trying to figure that out, piece by piece. One office is at Natural History, and the other is at the American Indian museum. http://bit.ly/2O0abkY – Washington City Paper

Archaeology Café (Phoenix): Life before AD 1500 on the Upper Gila River, Southwest New Mexico
On Tuesday, November 6, at 6:00 p.m., Archaeology Café returns to Changing Hands (300 W Camelback) for a new season of programs exploring the deep and diverse history of Phoenix and the greater Southwest in a jargon-free zone. Dr. Karen Schollmeyer will encourage Valley residents to look east up the Gila River. Residents of the upper reaches of the Gila River in southwest New Mexico found successful ways of farming, hunting, and living together for over a millennium.  This talk explores some of these past ways of living, including periods in which people gathered into large villages or dispersed into less archaeologically visible communities.  The unique archaeological record of this area allows us to examine the challenges and benefits of these different ways of living, and how farmers adapted to local conditions from the time of the earliest villages into the late 1400s. http://bit.ly/2EaF5aW – Archaeology Southwest

Book Announcement: Aztec, Salmon, and the Puebloan Heartland of the Middle San Juan
Edited by Paul F. Reed and Gary M. Brown. University of New Mexico Press. http://bit.ly/2O2724a

Book Event, Flagstaff AZ
Join us for a book signing and rock art slide show to celebrate the release of Richard Rogers’s Petroglyphs, Pictographs, and Projections: Native American Rock Art in the Contemporary Cultural Landscape (University of Utah Press). It will be held at Bright Side Bookshop, 18 N. San Francisco St., Flagstaff AZ 86001 on Wednesday, November 7 from 6-8 pm. https://downtownflagstaff.org/do/petroglyphs-pictographs-and-projections-book-signing; Richard.Rogers@nau.edu

Lecture Opportunity, Phoenix AZ
Archaeologist Allen Dart will give a free PowerPoint presentation titled Ancient Southwestern Native American Pottery at the Juniper Library, 1825 W. Union Hills Rd., Phoenix, at 2:00 p.m. on Saturday, November 17. Supported by Arizona Humanities, this program shows and discusses Native American ceramic styles that characterized specific cultures and eras in the U.S. Southwest prior to about 1450 and talks about how archaeologists use pottery for dating archaeological sites and interpreting ancient lifeways. https://www.phoenixpubliclibrary.org/Locations/Pages/Juniper.aspx

Lecture Opportunities, Tucson Metro AZ
Historian Jim Turner will present The Peaceful Enemies: Tucson’s Apaches de Paz, 1786-1873 for Old Pueblo Archaeology Center’s November 15, 6-8:30 p.m. “Third Thursday Food for Thought” dinner at El Molinito Mexican Restaurant, 10180 N. Oracle Rd. in Oro Valley, AZ. Jim will discuss the Manso Apaches who in 1786 and later settled in a “peace camp” near the Tucson presidio and at San Xavier del Bac to assist the Spanish colonial government’s effort to pacify other Indian groups in what is now southern Arizona. No entry fee. Guests may purchase their dinners. Make reservations before 5:00 p.m. Nov. 14. https://www.oldpueblo.org/event/third-thursday-food-for-thought-the-peaceful-enemies-tucsons-apaches-de-paz-1786-1873/

The Arizona Archaeological and Historical Society (AAHS) is pleased to present Nancy N. Odegaard on Monday, November 19, at 7:30 p.m. in the University Medical Center’s Duval Auditorium (1501 N Campbell Ave, Tucson 85724), who will discuss Our Human Heritage: A Conservators Participation with Kennewick, Poisons, and Repatriation. Meetings are free and open to the public. For more information, please visit the AAHS website: http://www.az-arch-and-hist.org/, or contact John D. Hall at john.hall@terracon.com with questions about this or any other AAHS program.

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