Public Arch Midterm

What are some different kinds of public archaeology (7 types)?

1. Project that involves community members

2. By the public

3. Public sector/tax-payer funded

4. Educational Archaeology

5. Open Archaeology

6. Popular Archaeology

7. Academic Public Arc

What is archaeology that involves community member aid?

Aims to provide the public with skills in archaeology  

Involve both lab, field, and museum work  

What is archaeology by the public?

Amateur Archaeology

dates back the 1800s

ethics and standards vary

What is public sector archaeology?

Projects involving tax-payer funded groups like NPS or Forest Service or even CRM firms

Section 106

What is Archaeological Education?

Anything that teaches non-professionals about archaeology

Visitor interactions in museums or sites

Field Schools

What is open archaeology?

This involves opening archaeological work to the public

allowing tourists to visit sites or having lab work visible to the public

What is popular archaeology?

Education through media rather than education

can be social media posts, documentaries, or museum displays

What is Academic public archaeology?

Focus on ethics and critical aspects of the discipline

What are some goals of public archaeology?

1. Raise awareness with the public

2. assist indigenous people in protecting cultural items, ancestral remains, and heritage sites

3. positive public engagement

4. solve conflicts, not create them

Who is the public?

Anyone that isn’t a trained archaeologist

Tourists, descendants, landowners, community members, government officials and agencies, clients, religious stakeholders, indigenous stakeholders, development firms

Ex: Fort Ross

Challenges of Public Archaeology

managing different sectors of the public

maintaining positive engagement

What are some public perceptions of archaeology?

They think archaeology is either a science or a humanities (its both)

Think we study dinos

Think we are Indiana Jones/Tomb Raider

Don’t understand the extent of our work in preserving cultural things they take for granted

History of Public Archaeology (Origins)

Thomas Jefferson had his slaves dig into mounds

Smithsonian is founded in 1846 to preserve cultural and “natural” history

The Bureau of Ethnology is founded in 1876

• Believes that Native Americans are disappearing so they conduct ethnologies on them

In the 1890s Congress tasks the Smithsonian with solving the Moundbuilder question

History of Public Archaeology (Parks)

Land is set aside for National Parks, Yellowstone (1872), Other parks in 1890s. Expands to Civil War battlefields in 1890.

Concerned citizens stop development at Gettysburg, Mt. Vernon, and Independence Hall.

History of Public Archaeology (Early 1900s)

Antiquities Act of 1906

National Park Service created in 1916

Historic Sites Act created in 1935

What did the Antiquities Act of 1906 do?

Under Teddy Roosevelt the AA declared all historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and objects of historic or scientific interests on public lands to be national monuments

What did the Historic Sites Act of 1935 do?

created a Federal Policy encompassing historic structures, battlefields, and antiquities that determined that if they are of national significance must be preserved for public use and inspiration by the people of the US

The Creation of the National Parks (1916)

Parks prior to1916 were managed by the military, and not managed well. In 1916 Congress and Wilson created the Parks service.

History of Public Archaeology (New Deal)

To combat the unemployment of the Great Depression, the Government creates the Works Progress Administration (WPA) to carry out public works projects such as archaeology.

WPA carried out excavations like Irene Mound

Archaeologists had to learn business skills like budgeting and administration, setting the stage for CRM firms

All manner of people were hired to work on archeological projects, mostly salvaging material and data in advance of construction by the Tennessee Valley Authority and other agencies.

Four concerns Archaeologists had over the WPA

• a perception that government regulators and administrators imposed inappropriate bureaucratic expectations;  

•  the occasionally slovenly work that took place under deadline conditions; 

•  excavation for the sake of excavation and not for solution of research problems 

• the lack of analysis and publication

History of Public Archaeology (Post War)

Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956

Reservoir Salvage Act of 1960

National Historic Preservation Act of 1966

National Environmental Policy Act of 1969

Archaeological Resources Protection Act (1979)

Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act (1975)

NAGPRA (1990)

Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956

In theory protects archaeology sites from highway construction some states develop archaeology and salvage programs to mitigate harm to sites. In reality construction destroyed 100s of sites.

Reservoir Salvage Act of 1960

It directs federal agencies conducting reservoir projects to conduct archeological survey and recovery in areas to be impacted by dam construction and in areas to be flooded

National Historic Preservation Act of 1966

required that each governor appoint a State Historic Preservation Officer, who would develop state preservation plans and coordinate historic preservation activities in the particular state or territory;

required that all Federal agencies check to see whether actions enabled by their agency would potentially threaten properties, including archaeological sites, that could be listed on the National Register of Historic Places

established the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation (ACHP or “Council”), which would advise the president and Congress and on occasion serve an active role in the 106 Process

required each Federal Agency to establish procedures for identifying, inventorying, and evaluating the Register eligibility of historic properties

National Environmental Policy Act of 1969

a cultural resource management law, a natural resource management law, a pollution prevention law, a clean water law—requiring federal agencies to manage their impacts on the “human environment,”

If adverse impact is determined (Area of effect) the agency must take steps to mitigate these adverse effects to an area

Archaeological Resources Protection Act (1979)

ARPA was enacted “to secure, for the present and future benefit of the American people, the protection of archaeological resources and sites which are on public lands and Indian lands, and to foster increased cooperation and exchange of information between governmental authorities, the professional archaeological community, and private individuals having collections of archaeological resources and data which were obtained before October 31, 1979

Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act (1975)

allowed for Indian tribes to have greater autonomy and to have the opportunity to assume the responsibility for programs and services administered to them on behalf of the Secretary of the Interior through contractual agreements. The Act assured that Indian tribes had paramount involvement in the direction of services provided by the Federal government

NAGPRA 1990

Deals with any human remains, associated and unassociated funerary objects, sacred objects, objects with cultural significance/patrimony,

Either in collections involved with federal funding or excavated on federal or public land

NAGPRA (2024)

Less than 50% of remains have been fully repatriated

New revision that "culturally unidentifiable" is not an option any more for object and "Culturally unaffiliated" for remains will not accepted

Section 106

Part of the National Historic Preservation Act

Requires federal agencies to consider the impact of all their undertakings on historic properties listed or eligible for the NRHP as well as unknown sites that must be tested prior to the undertaking

1st Step of Section 106

Lead Agency must ask if the planned development (with federal funds) is worth the undertaking

• Any action that requires federal funding or permit 

If it is worth the undertaking then what historic/prehistoric properties will be affected

If undertaking is deemed worthy then background research is needed including a preservation plan

2nd Step of Section 106

Identify the area of potential effect

Establishing a boundary that the undertaking will affect everything within that boundary

3rd Step of Section 106 Process

Good-faith effort to identify historic properties that may be affected

Test for unknown cultural resources

Look for historic resources (buildings = 4 walls and a roof).

Step 4 of Section 106 Process

If historic properties are present, are they eligible for the NR?

Properties must have integrity and significance

National Register for Historic Places (NRHP)

created in 1966 by NPS as part of the NHPA 

• Must be significant to American history or associated with a person on historical significance  

• Properties embody the distinctive characteristics of a type, period or method of construction  

• Have or will provide information important to prehistory or history 

• Every field has different ideas on what it means to be eligible for the register 

• NPS sees the NRHP as the center of the US preservation program  

• Put sites at the same level  

• Mount Vernon is just as important to US story as an Mississippian Village  

What does significance mean according to the NRHP?

A. Associated with events that have made a significant contribution to the broad

patterns of our history.

B. Associated with the lives of persons significant in our past.

C. Embody the distinctive characteristics of a type, period, or method of

construction . . .

D. Have yielded or may be likely to yield information important in prehistory or

history

What does integrity mean for the NRHP?

• Location: the place where the historic property was constructed or the place where the historic event occurred.

• Design: A property's design reflects historic functions and technologies as well as aesthetics. It includes such considerations as the structural system; massing; arrangement of spaces; pattern of fenestration; textures and colors of surface materials; type, amount, and style of ornamental detailing; and arrangement and type of plantings in a designed landscape.

• Setting: Setting is the physical environment of a historic property It involves how, not just where, the property is situated and its relationship to sur rounding features and open space.

• Materials: Materials are the physical elements that were combined or deposited during a particular period of time and in a particular pattern or configuration to form a historic property. The property must be an original not a recreation. the physical evidence of the crafts of a particular culture or people during any given period in history or prehistory.

• Feeling: Feeling is a property's expression of the aesthetic or historic sense of a particular period of time. Pictographs

Workmanship: Examples of workmanship in prehistoric contexts include Paleo-Indian clovis projectile points; Archaic period beveled adzes; Hopewellian birdstone pipes; copper earspools and worked bone pendants; and Iroquoian effigy pipes.

• Association: Association is the direct link between an important historic event or person and a historic property

Phase 1 testing

• Identification of historic properties.

• Preliminary testing of a property for cultural resources

• SHIPO guidelines vary state to state

• standard is usually a 30×30cm shovel test every 30m going 80cm-1m deep or until there is subsoil*

  • *in some environments like the Delta subsoil does not mean below cultural dirt

• If a shovel test is positive is found delineations are required to establish if there is a site and what its boundaries are usually at 15m intervals

• “Level of effort. The agency official shall make a reasonable and

  good faith effort to carry out appropriate identification efforts, which may

  include background research, consultation, oral history interviews, sample field investigation, and field survey.”

Phase 2 Testing

When further investigation is deemed necessary, a phase 2 commences usually with a 1×1m unit being opened a going down a further m

possible usually large machinery to open trenches for looking for sites

further investigation is usually because a significant site is found: example a point discovered on Cumberland Island because lithic production was impossible due to lack of chert and rocks

Employes remote sensing to look for significant sites

the results of a Phase II study are meant to provide the review agencies with enough information to determine whether or not the site could be listed on the National Register.

5th step of section 106 process

If no resources present or none eligible, give documentation to

SHPO/THPO

6th step of section 106 process

If eligible cultural resources were identified, how will the undertaking affect them?

if these resources are going to be affected then what steps can be taken to mitigate or offset effects?

Adverse Effect

An adverse effect is found when an undertaking may alter, directly or indirectly, any of the characteristics of a historic property that qualify the property for inclusion in the National Register in a manner that would diminish the integrity of the property

Mitigation

Avoidance: redirect the undertaking to avoid the site

Data recovery: perform a phase III to learn about the site and preserve artifacts within the site

Alternative mitigation: Allow that site to be affected but go to a different site and protect that?

Landscape and Land Use History

Landscapes change over times: lakes are created, oceans expand, mounds get buried by run off dirt, the MS river buries sites

Advisory Council on Historic Preservation (ACHP)

advise the president and Congress on cultural matters and on occasion serve an active role in the 106 Process

six sets of “consulting parties” of 106 Process

SHPO, THPO, any Indian tribe or Native Hawai’ian organization that attaches religious or ceremonial importance to the property, local government, applicant for Federal funding/permit that is behind the undetaking, any others with demonstrated legal or economic interest.

SHPO

responsible for implementing national historic preservation programs at the state level. This includes reviewing and keeping a list of Register-eligible properties at the state level.

THPO

responsible for implementing national historic preservation programs at the tribal level. This includes reviewing and keeping a list of Register-eligible properties at the tribal level.

Project Report

Covers the history of the project

Starts with the history of the undertaking and property history (land usage, previouly known sites)

What has been done to mitigate damage to sites that may qualify for the NRHP

Any interviews conducted: local historians and residents, tribal members, landowners

Previous archaeolgoical investigations

Environmental report and ecological history

Memoranda of Agreement (MOAs)

signatory contract regarding the continued pursuance of the cultural resource process. It is meant to be a formal agreement between the agency and the SHPO or the THPO

An MOA is executed when cultural resources eligible for listing on the National Register were identified within the area of potential effects during the Phase II testing process.

Goals of an MOA

1. stating that a Register-eligible site or sites were identified during the Phase II process (or agreeing that the site already is listed or eligible for listing on the National Register),

2. considering whether the planned undertaking will have an effect on that site or sites,

3. summarizing what needs to be done to mitigate the effects on the site or sites from the undertaking, should those effects be considered adverse.

National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA)

requiring federal agencies to manage their impacts on the “human environment,” defined as “the natural and physical environment and the relationship of people with that environment.”1

Decolonial Theory

At base, decolonization involves taking seriously the critiques and theories of anthropology’s peripheral allies, such as feminist activists and policy makers.

Decolonization entails looking beyond the colonizers’ perspectives and using the frames of reference of those being studied.

It also raises questions about how researchers deal with the “Other,” that is, those who differ from the researcher, and their role in shaping anthropological knowledge.

Focus more on needs and voices of groups previously “Othered” by anthropology or ignored all together

Sovereignty

Involves self-determination by the tribes, and independence of their lands from the US

the concept of sovereignty has been co-opted by Tribal Nations to assert territorial control and associated powers over the promotion and protection of Indigenous languages, cultures, treaty rights, and economic goals

Critical of NAGPRA and tribal authority towards CR as being built in a Western Colonial framework