S/M Anth 207 Prehistoric
Cultures of North America
SUNY Geneseo
Spring 2013
Instructor:
Dr. Paul J. Pacheco
Office: 13D Sturges Hall Office Phone: 245-5275
Office Hours: T 10:00 am-2:00 pm; or by appointment
email address: pacheco@geneseo.edu
Description and Objectives:
In this course we will examine the rich diversity of social structures, political organizations, ecological adaptations, and religious-ideological systems created by the prehistoric cultures of North America. To achieve our objectives we will look in depth at the following topics: human migrations into the New World and the environmental impact of this migration, Paleo-Indian through Late Prehistoric cultures, maintenance of hunter-gatherer lifestyles, the origin and expansion of food producing economies, and the rise and fall of complex societies. Students will research an important topic in North American prehistory, make a presentation to the class, and write a series of essays, both in and outside of class, which will reinforce class topics.
Learning Outcomes:
(1) Students will demonstrate knowledge of North American origins through the writing of an in-class essay on the first exam.
(2) Students will demonstrate knowledge and understanding of variation in the cultures, religions, political organizations, social structures, and environmental adaptations of prehistoric North Americans in class discussion and through the writing of in-class essays on the final exam.
(3) Students will demonstrate their comprehension of North American cultural diversity, and cultural issues through development of an outside of class essay.
(4) Students will demonstrate their ability to communicate their research findings on an important North American site, by presenting their findings orally to the class and by creating a detailed annotated bibliography.
Accommodations:
“SUNY Geneseo will make reasonable accommodations for persons with documented physical, emotional or learning disabilities. Students should consult with the Director in the Office of Disability Services (Tabitha Buggie-Hunt, 105D Erwin, tbuggieh@geneseo.edu) and their individual faculty regarding any needed accommodations as early as possible in the semester.”
Social Science Core:
In addition to fulfilling your multi-cultural graduation requirement, this course also fulfills one course in the social science general education requirements. The guidelines for social science core courses stress the development of the following characteristics of a responsible member of society:
(1) an acquaintance with major empirical, analytical, or theoretical approaches to human behavior, institutions or culture;
(2) an acquaintance with social, economic, political, or moral alternatives;
(3) an acquaintance with major problems, issues, institutions, practices or trends in the social world;
(4) a capacity to express ideas clearly, coherently and grammatically in written form as
one component of the evaluation process. This written work must total at least 1500 words, at least half of which must be prepared outside of class.
Required Texts:
Thomas, David H. 2000 Skull Wars: Kennewick Man, Archaeology, and the Battle for Native American Identity. Basic Books (a member of the Perseus Book Group) ISBN# 0-465-09225-x
All other listed readings will be made available through the mycourses.geneseo.edu webpage as pdf files. Please login to the mycourses website using your e-mail id and password.
Course requirements, Grading Procedures, and Important Dates:
Exam 1 75 points March 8th
Exam 2 125 points May 10th (8-11 A.M.)
Skull Wars Essay 75 points Feb. 8th
Annotated Bibliography 100 points as assigned
Summary/Outline/Presentation 100 points as assigned
Participation 25 points class discussion
Grades will be assigned on a percentage basis out of 500 possible as follows:
A = 100 - 93% C+ = 79.99 - 77%
A- = 92.99% - 90% C = 76.99 - 73%
B+ = 89.99 - 87% C - = 72.99 - 67%
B = 86.99 - 83 % D = 66.99 - 57 %
B- = 82.99 - 80 % E = 56.99 - 0 %
There will be two non-cumulative exams in this course. Exams consist of essay and multiple choice questions, with an emphasis on essays. Exams will emphasize your conceptual grasp of the course material and the ability to clearly express your understanding in writing. Reading assignments are meant to reinforce and compliment the class lectures, images, and discussions and in no way replace them. Late assignments will be penalized 5 % per day, cumulative to 25% per week, but your presentation must occur on the day it is scheduled. You do not need permission, or excuses, to be late with your work, but all late assignments are subject to the penalty for whatever reason.
Skull Wars Essay:
Archaeologist Brian Fagan once wrote that “if we are ignorant of the past, someone will rewrite it for us.” Reflect and comment on this statement in relation to issues discussed in Skull Wars Chapters 1-17. How has the history of interaction between Native American people and their displacers (i.e. primarily people of European descent) shaped the way we approach and think of Native American prehistory? Creative responses are acceptable and encouraged.
Your paper is required to be 1000-1050 words long. Use your word processing Tools function to keep track of your word count. In addition to the hard copy turned in the day the essay is due, February 8th, an electronic version of your paper using Microsoft Word (either Vista or XP versions are fine) should be dropped into the appropriate Anth 207 mycourses.geneseo.edu drop box located under the Course Materials tab by the start of class on the day the paper is due. Use your last name as the file name for the electronic version of the paper (i.e. adams.doc or manson.docx). Failure to comply with the word count limits or to drop your essay into the mycourses page results in a 10 point deduction from your essay grade each. Submitted electronic files will be checked for compliance with the word count limit. Use normal margins and double-spacing. Please do not use a font size smaller than 10 point.
The hard copy of your reaction paper must be stapled to a cover sheet that includes your name, and the title of your essay. Do not place your name, or the paper title, anywhere but on the cover sheet. Please include page numbers, but do not number the cover page or citations page (if you include one). Your paper will be graded on the following five components: format (as outlined above), structure (includes sentence construction and organization), grammar (includes spelling errors and typos), clarity (are your ideas expressed clearly?), and content (are your comments perceptive, have you explored significant issues?). Please note that this paper functions as part of the writing requirement for Social Science core, which means that grading emphasizes your writing in addition to content. A bibliography is not necessary if you only refer to sections of the Skull Wars text, however, you should fully credit Thomas when you are quoting or paraphrasing him (i.e. something like Thomas 2000:34). Likewise, if you reference any other sources, you should include a bibliography. Any style of referencing is acceptable as long as citations are complete.
Research Project and Presentation:
Your assignment is research an important topic in North American prehistory which has been assigned to you and a partner. There are several distinct aspects of this project. First, you will conduct a reasonably thorough literature search. The literature search will be used to create a detailed annotated bibliography, a 3-5 page outline listing/summarizing the key information that you will be presenting, and an informative 20 minute in-class PowerPoint presentation followed by 5 minutes of questions.
Student presentations begin Week Ten and then run through the end of the course. Your presentation topic will be decided on Wednesday Jan. 25th. Please do not read your presentation to us. Instead try to communicate using no more than note-cards. Time limits will be strictly enforced so a good presentation will be practiced and timed. Send a copy of your presentation to me by e-mail if it isn’t too big, bring it to me on a thumb drive, or drop it into my Inbox (located on all school networked computers under \\files\Inbox\Anth\Pacheco) no later than 4:00 P.M. the day before your presentation (Monday presentations are due on Fridays). Use the topic name to name these files (i.e. Meadowcroft.ppt and Meadowcroft.doc). Failure to meet the 4:00 P.M. deadline will result in a 10 point penalty and failure to present your research on your assigned date will result in a zero for the presentation grade. There is no flexibility once the schedule is set. Presentations will be graded on the following:
1) Style – treat this as a professional presentation.
2) Organization and Clarity – create a clear, coherent, logically structured presentation.
3) Information - limit the writing on screens, but provide an informative presentation (classmates can use your outlines for notes).
4) Images - a good PowerPoint presentation consists of high quality images instead of large blocks of writing. Present your information orally, summarize with bullet points, and concentrate on a well organized stream of images.
5) References – demonstrate your thorough research and document your sources; all images in the presentation must have shorthand references (i.e. Thomas 1992:32) on the slide that contains the image which ties into a full bibliography at the end of the PowerPoint unless they are your own private pictures.
Annotated bibliographies will be due in two stages. The first draft will be due two weeks before your scheduled in-class presentation, except if your presentation is in week 11, in which case they will be due on March 15th because of Spring Break. Your bibliographies will be turned in via the mycourses.geneseo.edu website into a designated drop box under the Course Materials tab. These will be reviewed by Librarian Kim Davies-Hoffman. She will specifically check the completeness of your entries, the thoroughness and appropriateness of your sources, and whether or not your references are in the appropriate style. We will be using American Antiquity style for all bibliographic references (note: Kim will be discussing this style during our scheduled visit to the library to meet with her on Feb. 6th). Kim will return your bibliographies with comments and an initial grade out of a possible 50 points. Revised annotated bibliographies are due one week after your presentation unless you are presenting the day of Exam 2 (the final). In that case they will be due the following Monday, May 13th. A drop box for revised bibliographies will also be created on the mycourses page under Course Materials. Revised bibliographies will be graded out of another possible 50 points. Annotations should consist of a concise paragraph providing details about what the source covers. Please note that it is expected that you will respond to the suggestions made on your first draft. If you fail to make the suggested changes your score on the final draft will go down.
Your 3-5 page (max) summary/outlines are due at the same time as your revised annotated bibliographies and Presentations. A drop box will also be created on the mycourses page under Course Materials for the outlines. Your goal in the outlines is to convey the critical information about your topic in summary form; essentially this is the outline that you are using to make the presentation. Ideally these would look like the notes someone would take on your presentation and will serve as such for your classmates. Hard copies of the annotated bibliographies and summary/outlines do not need to be submitted. All presentations and outlines will be posted in folders under the Course Materials tab on the mycourses webpage for access by your classmates.
Class Schedule Reading:
Week 1 Introduction
Jan 23rd - Welcome and Syllabus -
Jan 25th - Perspectives on North American Prehistory Thomas Forward & Prologue
Week 2 Intro continued – begin Skull Wars
Jan. 28th – Perspectives on Archaeological Research Thomas Ch. 1-2
Jan. 30th – Assign and discuss research topics Thomas Ch. 3-6
Feb. 1st – Discuss Thomas Ch. 1-11 Thomas Ch. 7-11
Week 3 Skull Wars
Feb. 4th – Discuss Thomas Ch. 12-17 Thomas Ch. 12-17
Feb. 6th – Research Info Day – meet in Milne 104 with Kim Hoffman Thomas Ch. 18-24 &
Epilogue
Feb. 8th – Discuss Thomas Ch. 18-24 Skull Wars essay due
Week 4 First Americans
Feb. 11th – Timing, Routes of entry/Beringia and NE Asia -
Feb. 13th - Solutrean connection? Bradley and Stanford pdf
Feb. 15th – continued – discussion Straus, Meltzer, and Goebel pdf
Week 5 First Americans continued
Feb. 18th - Evidence of early sites -
Feb. 20th - First Americans video Waguespack and Surovell pdf
Feb. 22nd - Clovis culture Mosimann & Martin pdf
Week 6 First Americans continued
Feb. 25th - Extinctions Grayson pdf
Feb. 27th – video “The Last Extinction – What Killed the Mammoths?” Firestone et al. pdf
March. 1st – discussion Broeker pdf
Week 7 Arctic and Subarctic - Midterm
March 4th - Late Paleoindians -
March 6th - review -
March 8th – Exam 1 -
Week 8 Post Pleistocene – Arctic, Subarctic, NW & Pacific Coast, and Great Basin
March 11th - Post Pleistocene Arctic and Subarctic Friesen and Arnold pdf
March 13th – Northwest & Pacific Coasts -
March 15th – Great Basin Overview Bettinger and Baumhoff pdf
Week 9 Spring Break – No Class March 18th – March 22nd
Week 10 Southwest and Great Basin
March 25th - Southwest Overview -
March 27th – Food Production in Southwest Leonard pdf
March 29th – Presentations #1 & #2 -
Week 11 Southwest and Great Basin
April 1st - “Range Creek” video & discussion -
April 3rd - Presentations #3 & #4 Abbot et al. pdf
April 5th – Chaco Canyon Renfrew pdf
Week 12 Puebloan Culture
April 8th - “Cannibalism in the Canyon” video Lekson pdf
April 10th - Southwest Cannibalism Discussion Billman et al. pdf
April 12th - Late Puebloan Culture -
Week 13 Eastern Woodlands
April 15th – Eastern Woodlands Overview Smith pdf
April 17th – Presentations #5 & #6 Brown pdf
April 19th – “Secrets of the Moundbuilders” video Dancey pdf
Week 14 Eastern Woodlands continued
April 22nd - Ohio Hopewell Pacheco and Dancey pdf
April 24th - Presentations #7 & #8 DeBoer pdf
April 26th - Cahokia and Mississippian culture Benson et al. pdf
Week 15 Mississippian and Iroquois
April 29th – Presentations #9 & #10 -
May 1st – Presentation #11 & 12 -
May 3rd – Northern Iroquois origins and culture Snow-a pdf
Week 16 Iroquois concluded & end of class
May 6th - N. Iroquois discussion & review Crawford and Smith pdf and Snow-b pdf
May 10th - Presentations #13 – N? & Exam 2 (8:00 – 11:00 A.M.)