Introduction by Jane E. Buikstra
Recognizing that 20th- and 21st-century bioarchaeology rests on earlier foundations, Chapter 1 begins by considering selected 18th- and 19th-century examples, chosen because these studies of skeletal remains are keenly grounded in problem-oriented research. As restudy to validate the results of earlier research is essential in scientific inquiry, the curation histories of these collections and the Harvard Peabody holdings are traced to illustrate the highly variable strategies of that period. The most satisfying approaches emerge as those that described remains individually, keeping burial-specific information on grave lots and conserving records, remains, and objects within the same institution. Such strategies facilitate reexamination, as well as the exploration of new problem sets.
2Chapter 1 then turns to two figures, Aleš Hrdlička and Earnest A. Hooton, whose significant contributions to early 20th-century physical anthropology included both the recovery of human remains from archaeological contexts and the creation of significant research collections. Even so, there were key differences between them in problem orientation and their consideration of archaeological contexts. These disparities are illustrated here, important because they keenly influenced later 20th-century scholarship.
Subsequent chapters in Section I are ordered chronologically, beginning with Cook’s penetrating discussion of typological, craniological approaches to interpreting the origins and diversity of American Indians in Chapter 2, “The Old Physical Anthropology and the New World: A Look at the Accomplishments of an Antiquated Paradigm.” Importantly, at the outset, she urges an evaluation of our intellectual ancestors within their social and historical contexts rather than within our own.
Cook’s careful, contextually sensitive evaluations of primary texts in relationship to recent critiques deftly free Johann Blumenbach from the weight of racist and sexist attributions. Blumenbach’s view of human variation emphasized continuity, and his widely cited ranking of races in his 1775 De generis humani varietate nativa appears overinterpreted by most scholars, including Gould (1994). Cook argues that Blumenbach was innovative in the way he conceptualized human variation as well as in the manner through which he studied it, also contributing the modern use of the term “anthropology” to the literature.
Influenced by Blumenbach, Samuel Morton appears to Cook much less the phrenological, polygenetic, racist than many critics would have us believe. To her mind, Morton’s refutation of the Moundbuilder myth was his major contribution. She also notes that his argument for two races among American Indians was influenced by John Collins Warren’s 1822 monograph.
Cook also reports that the late 19th-century craniological contributions of scholars such as Daniel Wilson, J. Aitken Meigs, Harrison Allen, Frederick Ward Putnam, and Putnam’s students tend to be neglected. While Putnam himself did not publish extensive craniological treatises, he clearly encouraged the craniology of students and colleagues.
In her careful treatment of Hrdlička’s craniology, Cook emphasizes his continued dedication to a fundamental unity in the American “race.” This never wavered throughout his long and distinguished career. Hooton opposed this stance and just as steadfastly maintained that the diversity he observed could only be explained through multiple migrations.
Cook also cites the little known and comprehensive work of Paul Rivet on facial prognathism. Rivet, working in France during the first part of the 20th century, examined facial angle variation in a wide range of primates, primarily but not exclusively humans. He effectively demolished any scientific basis for ranking races by facial angle.
3Cook then turns to Bruno Oetteking, who trained in the German tradition with Rudolf Martin and collaborated with Franz Boas at both the American Museum of Natural History and at Columbia University. As Cook emphasizes, however, Oetteking’s craniology lacks the innovative elements of Boas’ anthropological approaches.
Finally, Cook considers the typologist Georg Neumann, her faculty predecessor at Indiana University. Neumann was, indeed, the last firmly committed typologist whose monumental dissertation was widely published and critiqued. Cook’s penetrating observations close with a brief discussion of the shift toward a statistically sophisticated perspective on human variation. She ends by explicitly addressing the manner in which scholars who study inheritance and human variation, including the typologists, have been glossed as “racist.”
Chapter 3, “The Changing Role of Skeletal Biology at the Smithsonian,” by Douglas Ubelaker, begins with a discussion of Hrdlička’s background, the breadth of his research interests, and his contributions in building the Division of Physical Anthropology at the Smithsonian. Hrdlička was succeeded by T. Dale Stewart, who both expanded collections and published extensively on subjects ranging from paleoanthropology to paleopathology. J. Lawrence Angel, a student of Hooton’s and, like Hooton, classically trained, then joined the department. Both Stewart and Angel’s work moved Smithsonian scholarship away from its prior focus upon race and craniology. Others who made key contributions to skeletal biological research at the Smithsonian include Lucile St. Hoyme, Marshall Newman, and William Bass. Ubelaker closes his discussion with a description of the early 21st-century status of skeletal biology at the Smithsonian, including the impact of repatriation legislation.
As Beck underscores in Chapter 4, “Kidder, Hooton, Pecos, and the Birth of Bioarchaeology,” Hooton’s approach to skeletal biological study at Pecos and his association with A. V. Kidder have been enormously influential. Beck’s chapter considers the Pecos project in detail, beginning with Hooton’s participation in archaeological fieldwork. She argues that Hooton was one of the first to consider how the human community, reflected in the Pecos burials, changed over time. In her detailed discussion of Hooton’s Pecos report, she cites multiple methodological and inferential advances, such as explicit concerns for taphonomy, innovative statistical approaches to paleodemographic reconstructions, and population-based discussions of health status.
Rakita’s Chapter 5, “Hemenway, Hrdlička, and Hawikku: A Historical Perspective on Bioarchaeological Research in the American Southwest,” reports that despite promising early contributions by Matthews and Hooton, an integrated bioarchaeology, as understood today, has been late to arrive in this region. Presenting in detail the collaborative efforts of Cushing’s Hemenway Expedition, Rakita underscores the significance of the Matthews, Wortman, and Billing’s (1893) report and physical anthropologist ten Kate’s (1892) 4craniological research. Hrdlička’s studies of both living groups and archaeological samples are summarized, as are Hodge’s excavations at both historic and prehistoric sites, which were sponsored by the Heye Foundation and the Museum of the American Indian in New York. Hodge’s failure to include physical anthropological expertise within his field crew, the division of the collection between museums located in the United States and abroad, and selective skeletal recovery are cited as key factors limiting the quantity and quality of bioarchaeological research possible using these collections.
Rakita notes that the 1930s and 1940s saw important biological distance studies designed to test conventional archaeological models that specified population replacement at the Basketmaker–Pueblo transition. These craniological investigations supported an alternative interpretation, one of genetic continuity. Few bioarchaeological studies were conducted in the Southwest during the 1940s through the 1960s. With renewed interest during the late 1960s through the 1980s, biodistance research again prevailed, along with growing interest in population health and disease. During this period, the development of large multidisciplinary projects encouraged integrated bioarchaeological research. Additional studies in the closing decade of the 20th century have included fine-grained investigations of inheritance, health, diet, warfare, and cannibalism. Rakita closes with a call for increased collaboration among bioarchaeologists, archaeologists, and Native American communities.
As stressed by Milner and Jacobi in Chapter 6, “A New Deal for Human Osteology,” vast archaeological field projects, including burial excavations, were completed during the period from 1933 to 1942. When World War II abruptly closed processing and analytical laboratories, many materials had not yet been cleaned, let alone studied. Most of the thousands of skeletons recovered by WPA teams originated from the southeastern United States, including well-known collections from Indian Knoll and Moundville. Milner and Jacobi describe the quality of field data and skeletal recovery as fairly good, given the standards of the time. Osteological reports tended to be descriptive, emphasizing tables of measurements and observations of pathological conditions. Hooton’s students were conspicuous among the physical anthropologists involved in WPA work, where standardization of observation protocols became a stated goal. Unfortunately, typological perspectives drove research designs. Cultural and physical types were thought to coincide and differences were assumed to reflect migrations. Milner and Jacobi close their discussion by emphasizing the excellent potential WPA remains hold for today’s bioarchaeological problem solving.
Section I closes with Chapter 7, by Powell and colleagues, which examines the contributions of women to late 19th- and 20th-century bioarchaeological research. Included here are brief biographies of individuals whose contributions to bioarchaeological research are commonly under reported and/or underappreciated. The first woman to be so recognized is Cordelia Studley, mentored by 5Putnam, whose 5-year association with the Peabody involved both archaeological field recovery and skeletal analysis (Studley, 1884). Other firsts are Susanna Boyle-Hamilton, the first Canadian female physical anthropologist, and Juliane Dillenius, the first woman to earn a doctorate in physical anthropology in the Americas. Ruth Wallis studied with both Hooton and Boas; influenced by the latter, she contributed bioarchaeological research that questioned the simplistic craniological race constructs of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Mentored by Harris Hawthorne Wilder at Smith, Marian Knight Steckel contributed both to the craniological literature and to the facial reconstructions published by Wilder. Mildred Trotter and Alice Brues, who served as the first and second woman presidents of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists, respectively, are best know for developing bioanthropological methods (Trotter) and theories (Brues) that subsequently figured heavily in bioarchaeological research. Brues also wrote insightfully concerning infectious lesions observed in ancient skeletons that could be attributed to syphilis, although it is the work of Adelaide Bullen that is most visible in reports on American treponemal disease. Madeline Kneberg, as noted in Chapter 6, figured prominently in WPA archaeological initiatives.
More recent bioarchaeological scholarship has been notable for its interpretations based upon multiple lines of evidence, including that of Lucile St. Hoyme and Bullen, whose sensitive use of ethnohistoric materials enhanced their respective interpretations of early peoples of Virginia and Florida. Mary Frances Eriksen’s histological research pioneered comparisons between modern anatomical materials and ancient remains. While Sheilagh T. Brooks’ bioarchaeological efforts focused primarily on paleopathological analyses of archaeological series from the Great Basin, she is most widely known for questioning the Todd standards for age estimation and working with her colleague, Judy Suchey, to develop a more accurate system for evaluating the pubic symphysis. Louise Robbins’ career exemplifies a scholar who adapted fully to changing intellectual climates as she moved from thesis research in the craniological mode of her mentor, Neumann, to a broader biocultural perspective (e.g., Robbins, 1977). Audrey Sublett’s brief career was innovative in its emphasis upon excavating and recording historic period Indian remains and developing collaborative initiatives with Native Americans. Her article (with Rebecca Lane, Lane and Sublett, 1972) on kinship and residence among the historic period Seneca continues to be cited as a creative, pioneering effort.
The chapter authors also provide briefer sketches of other women scholars, perhaps less well known but with active careers in bioarchaeology. Katharine Bartlett’s original interest in physical anthropology was redirected primarily toward education and museum collections curation, although she also analyzed numerous skeletal series from archaeological excavations during her long and productive career at the Museum of Northern Arizona. Grete Mosny, an Austrian 6by birth, devoted her career to education and museum conservation at the University and National Museum of Chile, her adopted country. Marília Carvalho de Mello e Alvim, a scholar associated with the Museu Nacional in Rio de Janeiro, taught large numbers of students at the University of Rio de Janeiro. Her scholarly contributions include research on the early South Americans from the Lagoa Santa site. Lilia Maria Cheuiche Macado, another Brazilian scholar, spent her long productive career championing an integrated biocultural approach to the study of past peoples.