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Wyoming Contributions to Anthropology |
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Volume 4 (1995) Table of Contents (click here for .doc) Jam Sessions and Song Performances: Musical Expressions in Bridger Valley, Wyoming Sharon Poulson
ABSTRACT: Ethnomusicology is the study of music in culture. Discoveries made through ethnomusicological field research in Bridger Valley, Wyoming are described in this article. Two main types of musical behavior are group performances known as “jam sessions” and more personal singing performances. Various personal backgrounds are expressed musically in these situations. Analysis attempts to identify basic underlying behavioral concepts which produce certain forms of music.
Internment Camps as “Social Laboratories”: A Critical Appraisal of Applied Anthropology during World War II Barbara J. Hickman
Teacher Training in One Wyoming Community: An Argument for Anthropologists’ Involvement in American Schools Ruth Osterweis Selig
For Us Men, and For Our Salvation: Attitudes Concerning Inclusive Language in a Religious Context in the American West Laura L. Scheiber
ABSTRACT: The significance of language in our everyday lives cannot be underestimated. People unconsciously send messages and signals through their speech with almost everything they say – in their pronunciation, vocabulary, and simply by the way they form sentences (Hudson 1980). People choose words that best communicate a message to an intended recipient. The issue of inclusive language reflects upon using words which consciously or unconsciously reflect gender-associated biases. Testing within a Western community demonstrates a variety of attitudes pertaining to the way language should be used to describe people and to describe God.
Sex Determination of Pre-Adolescent Skeletal Remains from the Ilium Lori F. Tigner-Wise and George W. Gill
ABSTRACT: The innominate bone is the primary skeletal indicator of sex in adults. The sacro-iliac aricular surface area of the ilium shows distinct non-metric differences between sexes in adult skeletal remains; this distinction is also partially discernible in foetal, infant and children’s ilia. This trait has been observed, bimodally distributed, in a sample of twenty-three pre-adolescent Caucasians of undetermined sex. Records are available on this skeletal population, and a few probably personal identifications have been made. It appears from this sample that it may be possible to determine the sex of pre-adolescents from their ilia; this technique is currently being tested on individuals of known sex from several collections in the United States. At this point, it appears likely that a technique can be developed for determination of pre-adolescent gender by examination of the non-metric characteristics of the sacro-iliac auricular surface.
Squatting Facets on the Northwestern Plains Collection Deborah J. Wyatt and Laura L. Scheiber
ABSTRACT: Morphological changes on the human talus and tibia attributed to squatting behavior are examined with emphasis on sociocultural diversity and geographical concerns. Results of talar and tibial facets on the Northwestern Plains osteological collection are presented and compared to previous studies conducted on Europeans, Punjabi Indians, Japanese, Egyptians, and Australian Aborigines. Although a variety of different positions may contribute to the presence of “squatting facets” and other means of analyzing differential posturing do exist, the Plains populations demonstrate distinguishable posturing behavior attributed to Plains lifeways.
Debitage Patterning as a Clue to Functionality in Late Plains Archaic Sites of the Powder River Basin of Wyoming P. Jaye Gemberling
ABSTRACT: The Powder River Basin of Wyoming contains many Late Plains Archaic archaeological sites. However, not much has been postulated on the actual activities which took place there. A survey of such sites is undertaken; several with especially good maps are selected. Prescriptions which deal with site patterning and function (such as Binford’s and Yellen’s) are applied in an attempt to determine site function. Absolute conclusions are difficult to make and many problems must be considered to avoid hasty inferences.
The Mill Creek Site, (48LA1104), A Late Archaic Bison Kill in Southeastern Wyoming: An Analysis of the Faunal Assemblage Michael R. Peterson
ABSTRACT: The Mill Creek bison kill is located along a tributary of Horse Creek in southeastern Wyoming. The site was tested by the University of Wyoming High Plains Archaeology Project in the summer of 1988. The site was being severely impacted by erosion and vandalism. About 25% of the site was salvaged in 1988 and 1989. The excavations revealed the remains of a procurement-processing area containing Late Archaic corner-notched projectile points, chipped stone tools, debitage, and bison skeletal elements. The objectives of this paper are briefly to describe the site and to evaluate the faunal assemblage. This will be accomplished by focusing on spatial distribution of identifiable elements, analysis of spiral fracturing and other evidence of butchering, and quantification of bone and enamel fragment weights.
Ink Bottles of Southeast Wyoming and Northeast Colorado: An Attempt to Get to the Bottom of the Subject Martha A. Rogers
As study of the ink bottle collection of the University of Wyoming was made in an effort to determine patterns of change through time, the potential for developing a chronology, commodity flow patterns, and a range of variation. The sample ink bottles came from sites in southeast Wyoming which were primarily historical middens and from a private collection bought in an auction house in northeast Colorado. They were measured and evaluated by use of the University of Wyoming bottle coding format and dated by manufacturing technique, manufacturers marks and ink manufacturers. A characteristic shape and size was indicated as well as a pattern of change through time in shape and variation in size. |
