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2008 Urbana Conference on the Early Paleoindian Colonization
of the North American Midcontinent
This invited conference and workshop, organized by Daniel Amick (Loyola University) and Thomas E. Emerson (ITARP), and hosted by the Illinois Transportation Archaeological Research Program, was organized to discuss perspectives on Late Pleistocene human occupation of the Midcontinent region and to debate their relevance for current anthropological models of New World colonization. Considerable progress in documenting the early archaeological record of this region has been accomplished in the past few decades, including accumulation of a robust record of Clovis occupation as well as identification of intriguing evidence that predates Clovis. Comparative evaluation of these adaptations within the changing environments adjacent to the Laurentide ice sheet offers an exceptional framework for learning how early human groups in North America moved into frontier areas and coped with rapid environmental changes.
The Urbana Conference on the Early Paleoindian Colonization of the North American Midcontinent
Participants
The scope includes theoretical arguments about origins, colonization and migration; organization of technology and settlement; economic adaptations and land use; time-space systematics; and evaluation of methodological strategies used to investigate these problems. The improved knowledge from this workshop about early technology and land use throughout the Midcontinent and adjacent regions will provide a stronger foundation for understanding human colonization of deglaciated landscapes as well as determining the origins of Clovis and the colonization history of North America.
Publication of an edited volume based on these proceedings will provide an essential contribution for understanding the significance of human colonization in this region and throughout the New World.
2004 Urbana Conference on the Archaic Societies of the Midcontinent
This conference, hosted by Thomas E. Emerson, Dale
L. McElrath, and Andrew C. Fortier, Illinois Transportation Archaeological
Research Program, UIUC, addressed one of the cutting edge issues that
has arisen in North American archaeology in the last 15years –
the social and political complexity of early peoples in the Eastern
United States. The early native inhabitants of North America have
long been thought of as living in family groups or small bands, having
an egalitarian lifestyle, and subsisting by hunting, gathering, and
collecting natural resources. The native lifestyle during the period
from about 8,000 to 1,000 BC has been characterized as one of “simple
societies evidencing traditional and unchanging technologies, i.e.,
colloquially, living close to Nature”. This view, especially
prevalent in the popular press, has to some extent also invaded academic
circles.
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The discovery of large mound complexes built in the third to fifth
millennium BC in the lower Mississippian River valley has dramatically
transformed scholarly views of these early societies. To assess
the impact of these new findings over three dozen of the top Archaic
period researchers assembled at the Levis Center in early December
2004. Participants included scholars from Canada to the Gulf Coast.
An intense two-day session of presentations, discussions, and artifact
examinations produced a conceptual revolution in our understanding
of early native societies. The newly presented evidence indicated
that Archaic groups were incredibly diverse and might range from
those that were politically, socially, and economically complex
to groups with very simple social organizations. The cultural evolutionary
model that dominates so much of North American archaeological was
shown to be intrinsically flawed and in serious need of revision.
The new evidence of Archaic societies indicates that many may have
been at least partially sedentary, had inherent inequalities in
the social and political realm, may have had at least situational
hierarchies, and often engaged in the construction of planned monumental
structures of earth.
The results of these new revisionist syntheses will be published
in a volume on Archaic Societies in the Midcontinent scheduled to
come out in 2007.
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Illinois
Archaeology Awareness Month Poster
September 2004 ITARP designed the poster for Illinois'
Archaeology Awareness Month Poster in 2004.The theme for this
year's poster was "Art and Archaeology: Spirit of the
Ancients." The theme was chosen to dovetail into Hero,
Hawk and Open Hand: Ancient Art of the Midwest and Southeast,
an exhibit which opened at the Art Institute of Chicago in
fall 2004.
Illinois Archaeology Awareness Month programs inform Illinoisans
about the state's cultural heritage as revealed through archaeology;
illustrate how prudent management of archaeological and historic
resources provides educational, cultural and economic benefits
to all citizens; and actively engage Illinoisans in the preservation
of these nonrenewable resources. |
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Illinois
Archaeology Awareness Month Poster
September 2003 This poster, prepared for Archaeology
Awareness Month, by the ITARP production office, helped to promote
Illinois Archaeological Awareness Month (IAAM). IAAM is held
each year in September. The overreaching goal of IAAM is threefold:
to inform Illinoisians about the state's cultural heritage as
revealed through archaeology; to illustrate how prudent management
of archaeological and historic resources provides educational,
cultural and economic benefits to all citizens; and, to actively
engage Illinoisians in the preservation of these nonrenewable
resources.
The 2003 theme–"Prairie Encounters Frontier Archaeology
in Illinois"–highlights the archaeology of the period
from initial contact between Native Americans and European explorers
in the seventeenth century, up to the closing of the Illinois
frontier around 1850.
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| Application
of a PIMA SPTM to Pipestone Flint Clay Studies of
Two Native American Cultures |
This poster was prepared for the Clay Minerals
Society meeting (June 2000) and illustrates the utilization
of the nondestructive PIMA instrument as an analytical tool
for identifying the source material of artifacts using near
infra-red reflectance spectroscopy. The Cahokia figurines, previously
analyzed by x-ray diffraction (Sourcing the Cahokia-Style Figurines),
served as the test subject for this new technique. This work
was a collaborative effort by the Program on Ancient Technologies
and Archaeological Materials (ATAM), ITARP, and ISGS; this material
is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation
under grant No. 9971179.
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This traveling exhibit of the Grand Villiage of the Illinois
opened in June 1998 and began its two-year tour of Illinois
the following month. The Grand Villiage of the Illinois, located
across from Starved Rock State Park, was the site of the historic
1673 meeting between French explorers Marquette and Joilet and
the Illinois Indians. The exhibit includes two display cases
of artifacts, and three-panel podium of images and text, and
a 1673 aerial view diorama of what is now known as Illinois.
This exhibit was a cooperative effert between ITARP and the
Illinois Historic Preservation Agency (IHPA) and largely funded
by James Gallop and his wife (of northern Illinois).
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Urbana
Late Woodland Cultures of the Midwest Conference This
conference, hosted by Thomas E. Emerson, Dale L. McElrath, Andrew
C. Fortier, and the Department of Anthropology UIUC, was conceived
through a need to revisit the older cultural-historical reconstructions
of the midcontinent Late Woodland period (ca. A.D. 400-900).
Such reconstructions suggested the Late Woodland was a period
of unending monotony and cultural stasis inhabited by groups
characterized as the "good gray cultures."
During the last decade large-scale and largely unsynthesized
cultural resource management research conducted across the Midwest
and Midsouth suggested serious revisions of his model. To this
end, more than forty regional scholars actively studying the
midcontinental Late Woodland cultures were invited to participate
in a working session on Late Woodland research at the UIUC campus.
Small groups of scholars presented papers on the "state
of the art" in their specialities over a three-day period. |
In addition to the paper presentation and discussion sessions, there
were opportunities for participants to examine large artifact assemblages
brought by regional specialists. These sessions and the assoicated
discussions have produced a new vision of the Late Woodland period
as one of intense social and political dynamics, dramatic population
increases, and cultural heterogeniety.
| The results of these new systheses, a twenty-six
chapter volume entitled, Late Woodland Societies: Tradition
and Transformation Across the Midcontinent, edited
by T. E. Emerson, D. L. McElrath, and A. C. Fortier is available
through the University
of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, Summer 2000.
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| Building
Illinois' Future, Preserving Our Past For
the 1996 Illinois State Fair, ITARP prepared an outreach exhibit
illustrating the successful 40-year partnership between the
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) and the Illinois
Department of Transportation (IDOT). Under this cooperative
venture, the UIUC has carried out archaeology all over Illinois
and made the results of the effort available to both professional
and public audiences. The artifacts included with the display
are from two archaeological sites and represent three stages
of Illinois history. The faience and stoneware are from Fort
de Chartres, the site of a military fort located in Randolph
County on the Mississippi River. The items from the exhibit
are from an occupation during ca. 1750-1763 and from a farm
site (Madison County) dating from the 1810's to 1860. The majority
of the artifacts are from the 1830-1850 component.
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Sourcing
the Cahokia-Style Figurines This poster display showcases
the local development of late prehistoric North American Cahokian
symbolism and art through the sourcing of the raw material used
in that art. "Sourcing the Cahokia-Style Figurines" discusses
the large stone figurines discovered on the FAI-270 Highway
Project. Originally thought to be from the Oklahoma area, research
by Randall E. Hughes, Illinois State Geological Survey, demonstrated
that the raw material used in their manufacture was actually
from the local Missouri area. This research was jointly sponsored
by ISGS, ITARP, and IDOT.
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| Harvesting
the Past The Museum of Natural History
housed the "Harvesting the Past" from 1999 to 2002.
This exhibit featured Native North American horticultural practices
and was divided into three parts: gathering, gardening, and
farming. The exhibit also highlighted how highway archaeologists
find, process, and identify prehistoric plant remains, while
focusing on (1) the evolution of plant usage; and, (2) tools
used by Native American Illinois groups to cultivate and gather
these plants. A variety of paneled photographs and illustrations
were employed, as well as actual artifacts and excavated plant
remains. The effort was part of a cooperative effort between
IDOT, UIUC, and the Museum of Natural History.
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Crops Before Corn
This exhibit, prepared for Mary Simon by ITARP production, was sponsored
by the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign (UIUC), the Illinois
Department of Transportation (IDOT), and the Illinois Transportation
Archaeological Research Program (ITARP). "Crops Before Corn" dispels
the common belief that corn and beans were the first crops grown by
native North American groups. Information in the exhibit includes
the parameters of paleoethnobotany, pre-corn crops, and the evolution
of early Illinois plants grown primarily for subsistence or technology.
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