Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

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Open Access
A genomic investigation of bonobo (Pan paniscus) and chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) divergence
(University of Oregon, 2021-09-13) Brand, Colin; White, Frances
Our closest living relatives are two species in the genus Pan: bonobos and chimpanzees. Chimpanzees are further divided into four subspecies. While there are a number of phenotypic similarities between bonobos and chimpanzees, there are also a number of differences, particularly in social behavior. Additionally, some phenotypes are highly variable among chimpanzees and within each of the five lineages. The absence of an extensive bonobo and chimpanzee fossil record means that genomic data provide the best window into their evolutionary past. This dissertation uses reassembled and remapped autosomal genomic data from all five Pan lineages to answer questions about adaptation and demography in the time following lineage divergence, ~ 1.88 Ma. We find evidence for positive selection in deep time within genes related to the brain, immune system, musculature, reproduction, and skeletal system. Most of these patterns are lineage specific and only one candidate gene was shared across all chimpanzee subspecies and another two were shared across all five taxa. We also observe that recent positive selection is largely the result of variable environmental conditions acting on standing genetic variation rather than de novo mutation in the four Pan lineages we could analyze. Finally, we consider previous models for the demographic history of these taxa. The best fit model includes a single introgression event from bonobos and central chimpanzees. We also find that the common ancestor of chimpanzees is older than previously estimated. Our results collectively broaden our understanding of the complex evolutionary history of the Pan genus. The identification of positively selected genes both recently and earlier during lineage divergence as well as understanding the processes that drove recent positive selection in these taxa contributes to better estimating the timing of lineage-specific adaptations, reconstructing the behavior and genetics of the Pan common ancestor, and recognizing potential selective pressures for these adaptations during key time periods in chimpanzee evolution. Estimates of demographic parameters can also offer further insight into adaptation and other evolutionary processes in these species and more broadly. This dissertation includes previously unpublished co-authored material.
Open Access
A Paleoethnobotanical Approach to 14,000 Years of Great Basin Prehistory: Assessing Human-Environmental Interactions Through the Analysis of Archaeological Plant Data at Two Oregon Rockshelters
(University of Oregon, 2018-10-31) Kennedy, Jaime; Lee, Gyoung-Ah
Well-preserved plant remains recovered from archaeological deposits at the Paisley Five-Mile Point Caves and Little Steamboat Point-1 Rockshelter in southcentral Oregon provided a rare opportunity to study ancient plant resources used by northern Great Basin indigenous groups and their ancestors with Western Stemmed technologies. Macrobotanical analysis of cultural features and vertical columns spanning the Terminal Pleistocene and Holocene epochs in the rockshelter repositories yielded thousands of seeds and charcoal fragments that can be attributed to human activities. Data generated in this analysis have provided evidence of paleoenvironments along with the diets and social behaviors of people visiting northern Great Basin rockshelters as a stopover on their seasonal subsistence rounds. The preponderance of upland shrubs and herbs in the assemblages at both archaeological sites indicates vegetation in the immediate vicinity of the rockshelters was fairly stable over the past 14,000 years. The macrobotanical data complemented local and regional pollen analyses to refine the paleoecological proxy data and address uncertainties regarding the proximity of wetland plants and pine (Pinus sp.) to the rockshelters in the past. Samples originating from Younger Dryas deposits at the Paisley Caves and Late Holocene deposits at the Paisley Caves and LSP-1 Rockshelter suggest increased visitation frequency in these periods. The diverse assemblage of cultural plant remains during these times also indicate a broad diet breadth for Great Basin foragers, which included small seeds, nuts and berries, and root vegetables. The presence of an earth oven feature dating to the Terminal Pleistocene/Early Holocene (TP/EH) in Paisley Cave 5 further demonstrates sophisticated traditional knowledge of plant foods and cooking techniques as early as 12,000 cal BP. This study also generated data chronicling the deep historical roots of traditionally valued economic plant foods. Cheno-ams, grasses (Poaceae), and tansymustards (Descurainia sp.) are well-represented in fire hearths at the Paisley Caves and LSP-1 Rockshelter through time. Analysis of a bushytailed woodrat (Neotoma cinerea) nest in deposits dating to the TP/EH demonstrates rodents living in the Paisley Caves routinely scavenged resources from cultural activity areas, and raised questions about whether people recognized the woodrats’ nests as a reliable resource of cached edible seeds.
Open Access
Almost Nowhere: Problematizing the Exclusivity and Coloniality of American Wilderness and Thru-Hiking
(University of Oregon, 2019-09-18) Cox, Nikki; Scher, Philip
American wilderness is constructed as a space free from human contact. We know objectively this cannot be true: humans have relationships with landscapes and cultural systems of meaning and significance for the outdoors. It is through investigating the origins of American public lands and the reverence frequently practiced for the outdoors in American culture that we can come to identify the systems of exclusion that police the outdoors. Looking specifically at the example of thru-hiking and the identity categories of race, gender, and class, it becomes clear the intersections at which the privileged few gain access to these pristine and profound places while others do not. Moreover, by exploring these systems on can deny the universalized and dominant narrative of the outdoors, instead recognizing the diversity of experiences and realities of human engagement with landscape. Ultimately, this work suggests that by being more representative, accessible, and inclusive public lands, and the agencies which manage them can be more equitable to the public they serve.
Open Access
An Emic Investigation on the Trajectory of the Songgukri Culture during the Middle Mumun Period (2900 - 2400 cal. BP) in Korea: a GIS and Landscape Approach
(University of Oregon, 2020-02-27) Kim, Habeom; Lee, Gyoung-Ah
This study embraces an emic view on the trajectory of the Songgukri culture in Korea. It examines how past people may have experienced the archaeological phenomenon currently understood as the Songgukri transition. That is, when the Songgukkri culture emerges and expands to major parts of the southern Korean peninsula. This phenomenological aspect of the Songugkri transition has been investigated by examining how Songgukri people maintained a sense of common belonging through visibility and movement patterns in their landscape. The study focuses on visibility and movement because the analysis of these two landscape elements can reveal the patterns of perceptive association shared among the Songgukri people. Through a series of GIS-based analyses, my study abstracts the Songgukri settler’s landscape experiences quantitatively, and then compares them by regions. The result of my analysis yields a new synthesis on the process of the Songgukri expansion. It reveals that the intensity of Songgukri expansion varied by region. A multitude of factors, including the presence of natural barriers, the landscape preference by Songgukri people, and the mode of cultural transmission, are proposed as responsible for the regional variations of the Songgukri expansion. My study discusses how these factors may have influenced the experiences of the Songgukri migrants and the indigenous Early Mumun population during the Songgukri expansion, and explores why these regional variabilities in the expansion pattern have been observed. My synthesis of Songgukri expansion proposes an emic understanding of the Songgukri transition. The Songgukri culture may not have been a single homogenous cultural entity. Rather there were diverse communal regional groups, which came to accept certain elements of the Songgukri material cultures for different reasons. My study suggests that the archaeological phenomenon recognized as the Songgukri transition may not be characterized as one singular process applicable to all regions at the same time.
Open Access
Ankle Morphology: Interface of Genetics, Ontogeny and Use
(University of Oregon, 2013-10-03) Turley, Kevin; Frost, Stephen
A central concept in Evolutionary theory is the character trait. It provides a context in which to explore differences and similarities among taxa, both extant and extinct. It is expanded in scope in Evolutionary Developmental theory to functional units with a biological role, "evolutionarily stable configurations." The talo-crural joint is such a configuration, a highly canalized structural unit in primates forming the interface between organism, and foot and substrate. It is a microcosm in which to examine the relationship of shape with environment and function and the interplay of genetics, ontogeny, and use. Geometric Morphometric analysis of landmark data was employed in studying the articular surfaces of the talus in a diverse sample of adult specimens in nine catarrhine taxa. The influence of four factors on talar shape was examined: superfamily, a proxy for phylogeny; size and mass, a proxy for physical attributes; and substrate preference, a proxy for behavior. All significantly affected shape, and substrate preference was unrelated to the others. Appositional articular morphology, the shape of the subchondral bone surfaces of the talo-crural joints in an expanded sample of 12 taxa, showed a significant effect of the four proxies on the tibial and talar components, and substrate preference was weakly related to the other proxies in each. Singular Warp analysis of the cross-covariance matrices of the joints demonstrated sorting of taxa by substrate use and signals of convergent and divergent evolution among hominoids and cercopithecoids in joint shape. The ontogeny of the appositional articular shape was examined using adult and subadult specimens grouped by molar eruption. Singular Warp analysis demonstrated a genetic signal in the subadults, strongest in the slowly maturing African hominoids, and an epigenetic signal across taxa to substrate use in the adults. The talo-crural joint, a highly canalized, modular, and integrated "evolutionarily stable configuration," provides a model for the study of the evolution of shape. The epigenetic signal observed is consistent with plasticity or developmental plasticity in response to the interaction of the joint complex with the environment due to a behavioral effect, substrate use. This dissertation included previously unpublished, co-authored material.
Open Access
Assessing Phenotypic Variation and Ecological Versatility in Selected Catarrhine Primates
(University of Oregon, 2020-02-27) Eller, Andrea; Frost, Stephen
Generalist and specialist species can be broadly distinguished by their ecological tendencies to utilize many available resources, or a selected few. Those organisms with more ecological versatility may have an advantage in the face of environmental fluctuation or rapid ecological change (Turley and Frost 2018; Antón, Potts, and Aiello 2014; Kuzawa and Bragg 2012; Davidson, Jennions, and Nicotra 2011; Ash and Gallop 2007). Developmental plasticity may provide a mechanism for fluctuating environmental pressures to impart increased phenotypic variation to an adult population (Antón et al 2016; West-Eberhard 2003). The aim of this dissertation is to evaluate whether more ecologically versatile species will exhibit greater phenotypic variation. Eighty-one skeletal traits were analyzed across cranial, dental, and postcranial anatomic regions, using a total sample of 4084 individuals in six selected catarrhine primate species. To do this, I reported measures of variation for each skeletal trait (sample variation, standard deviation, and the coefficient of variation), assessed variation using principal components analyses, and ultimately tested for significant differences between taxa using general linearized models. The main hypothesis of this dissertation, that ecological versatility positively correlates with phenotypic variation, was not supported among the majority of skeletal features examined. Where significant results did occur, such as cranial differences between male Pan troglodytes and Homo sapiens (Chapter One), where Homo sapiens displayed more variation, or long bone length differences in Papio and Theropithecus (Chapter Two), where P. hamadryas displayed more variation, the patterns were subtle and sometimes contradictory. Chapter Three results indicate that sample sizes required for accurately detecting patterns of phenotypic variation range from 30-52 individuals for molar areas, 10-16 individuals for femoral lengths. These sample sizes are substantially larger than those offered by Antón, Potts, and Aiello (2014), indicating that the ability to detect increased intra-taxon variation within more ecologically versatile species may be beyond currently available hominin fossil sample sizes. Future investigations should focus on traits which are developmentally plastic, such as long bone lengths, as informative for understanding the adaptive relationship between ecological versatility and phenotypic variation. A complete list of specimens used in this study is available in Supplemental Files.
Open Access
The Avian and Mammalian Remains from Nightfire Island
(The University of Oregon, 1973-03) Grayson, Donald Kenneth
Excavated in 1967, the Nightfire Island site yielded large amounts of artifactual, floral, and faunal data. This report presents the analysis of the bird and mammal segments of this large collection. While a fragmentary part of the archaeological record provided by Nightfire Island, these remains suggest a number of hypotheses, some of wide import, which may be tested by other categories of data from the site.
Open Access
Before winter comes : Archaeological investigations of settlement and subsistence in Harney Valley, Harney County, Oregon
(University of Oregon, 2006-12) O'Grady, Patrick Warren, 1959-
Many archaeological researchers that have conducted investigations in the Harney Valley of southeastern Oregon use the ethnographic description of the seasonal round of the Harney Valley Paiute reported by Beatrice Blyth Whiting in her 1950 work Paiute Sorcery as a framework for discussions of prehistoric human use of the area. Archaeological investigations of seven sites, situated in areas identified as having been utilized by the Harvey Valley Paiutes, were conducted to test the relationship between Whiting's ethnographic account and the archaeological record. Data recovery excavations occurred at the Hoyt (35HA2422), Morgan (35HA2423) and Hines (35HA2692) sites near Burns, and test excavations occurred at the Knoll (35HA2530) site in the Silvies Valley, the RJ site (35HA3013) in the Stinkingwater Mountains, and the Broken Arrow (35HA2735) and Laurie's (35HA2734) sites near Malheur Lake. Studies of the cultural materials recovered during the excavations were undertaken to evaluate the content and complexity of each site. Analyses included typological considerations of the chipped stone tools, ground stone, bone tools, and shell, bone, and stone beads. Radiocarbon dating, obsidian sourcing and hydration, and zooarchaeological and paleobotanical analyses were also conducted when possible. Based on the results of the analyses, the seven sites reported herein were primarily used during the past 2000 years, with periods of less intensive use extending beyond 4000 BP. The results of the archaeological investigations indicate that there is a strong correlation between the late Holocene prehistoric record and Whiting's ethnographic description. However, the relationship between human use of the centrally-located lakes and wetlands and the neighboring uplands is clearly more complex than the ethnographic record suggests. Patterns of settlement and mobility revealed through the archaeological record indicate that central places, located closer to wetlands and lacustrine settings but within relatively easy reach of the uplands, may have figured more prominently in the behavior of prehistoric populations than the seasonal round as described by Whiting. Future research will benefit from explorations of central place foraging, emphasizing the role of behavioral ecology in the placement of sites and patterns of site use within the Harney Valley and the northern Great Basin at large.
Open Access
Behavior and socioendocrinology of bonobos (Pan paniscus): mechanisms that contribute to the evolution and maintenance of social structure in the other Pan species
(University of Oregon, 2018-04-10) Boose, Klaree; White, Frances
Research into the origins of our own social behavior begins with understanding how environmental elements lead to complex social interaction. Social structure emerges from these interactions as a bottom-up process, whose patterning constitutes the very framework of a society. Studies of behavioral mechanisms are important in determining the full repertoire that results in the social and dominance structures of a species. Hormones such as oxytocin and cortisol facilitate and fluctuate in response to social interactions and measuring their relative values among individuals is a valuable tool in testing functional hypotheses of behavioral mechanisms. The objective of this dissertation is to investigate several fundamental, under-, or previously unstudied behavioral mechanisms and hormonal correlates that shape the unique social system of bonobos. The first study describes the pattern of expression of harassment behavior among immatures and tests predictions generated by the Exploratory Aggression and Rank Improvement hypotheses. Results demonstrate that immatures use harassment to test the nature of existing inter-individual relationships and to explore the parameters of aggressive behaviors and furthers our understanding of juvenile development of aggression and integration into the dominance hierarchy. The second study describes the pattern of occurrence of infant handling and tests predictions generated by several functional hypotheses, including examining the relationship between oxytocin and handling behaviors. Results show a significant sex difference in expression of handling where, during adolescence, male interest in infants sharply declines whereas females continue to handle infants, the expression of which was correlated with oxytocin. These results primarily support the Learning-to-Mother hypothesis and provide insight into the role oxytocin may play in facilitating care-giving behaviors in young females. The final study explores the patterning of female sexual behavior and male aggression, and investigates whether male constraint of female choice imposes a cost to females through induction of a stress response. Results show that while females exercise unconstrained mate choice through proceptive behaviors, males influence female receptivity through aggression and sexual coercion, shedding light on the degree to which rank related asymmetry in male mating success reflects female choice vs. constraint of choice. This dissertation includes previously published and unpublished co-authored material.
Open Access
Belonging: Place, Care, and Masculinities Among "Criminal Alien" Men Deported to Mexico
(University of Oregon, 2019-09-18) Hansen, Tobin; Stephen, Lynn
In what ways do long-time U.S. residents come to belong to families, local communities, and nations before and after deportation to Mexico? And how are they perceived not to belong? This dissertation explores the relationships between social and legal membership, identity formation, and belonging to place in the context of noncitizen criminalization, forcible expulsion, and place-making after deportation. It provides insights into the hardships of deportation and how people attempt to cope. This study is based on 19 months of ethnographic work. It examines the lives of long-time U.S. resident men who the U.S. government designates “criminal aliens” and deports to Mexico. The men at the heart of this research migrated from Mexico as children and grew up considering the United States home. Fifty-seven deported men contributed to this community-based research, shedding light on the impact of deportation on their lives by giving extensive interviews and allowing participation in their day-to-day activities. The dissertation elucidates multiple ways in which deported men come to belong and not belong, to populations and territories, across their life histories. Study participants were, as adults, incarcerated in U.S. prisons, designated “criminal aliens,” and expelled over the northern Mexico border by the U.S. government, experiencing various legal, social, and embodied exclusions. This research considers their participation in U.S. social and cultural life and how, in unfamiliar northern Mexico receiving communities, they navigate the social marginalization of family separation and, as stigmatized post-prison, “Americanized” Mexicans, encounter alienation, a lack of work, and embodied violence. They carve out narrow spaces of belonging by mobilizing U.S. Latinx identities, building solidarity with other deportees, harnessing memory, and struggling to make home in northern Mexico. Regional and personal histories, cultures, and interpersonal relationships enable limited social inclusion despite rigid and exclusionary U.S. immigration enforcement. In the present-day context of broad illegalization and criminalization of migrants, refugees, and other noncitizens around the globe, this dissertation suggests that social and cultural aspects of belonging must be better understood.
Open Access
Bioarchaeology of violence and site abandonment at Casas Grandes, Chihuahua, Mexico
(University of Oregon, 2009-06) Casserino, Christopher Michael, 1967-
The objective of this dissertation is to address violence at the archaeological site of Casas Grandes (Paquimé) in northwest Chihuahua, Mexico. The reasons for the abandonment of Paquimé are uncertain. The prevailing theory claims this geographic area endured centuries of warfare, ritual sacrifice, and at least one massacre; this theory is supported by numerous unburied bodies recovered at the site. These assertions of violence have never been corroborated by osteological data. Data were collected from a sample of Medio period (A.D. 1200-1450) human skeletal remains recovered from the 1958-1961 excavations at Casas Grandes. These data were synthesized with accelerator mass spectrometry radiocarbon dates, fluoride ion dates, population demographics, and burial context. Frequencies of ante-, peri-, and postmortem trauma were compared to other studies from the Old and New Worlds. I argue that warfare was not endemic to this region and that a massacre did not occur. Moreover, cannibalism and probably human sacrifice were practiced. I assert that these activities may have been related to the proliferation of the Mesoamerican ballgame in the American Southwest and to Paquimé's role as the distribution center of the region's ritual and exotic goods. This dissertation underscores the importance of including skeletal analysis with other lines of archaeological inquiry when answering questions about human behavior.
Open Access
Camas Bulbs, the Kalapuya, and Gender: Exploring Evidence of Plant Food Intensification in the Willamette Valley of Oregon
(University of Oregon, 2000-06) Kramer, Stephenie
Open Access
Canoes, Kava, Kastom, and the Politics of Culture on Aneityum
(University of Oregon, 2021-09-13) Wood, Latham; Scher, Philip
This dissertation explores questions concerning contemporary socio-political formations on Aneityum—the southernmost island of the Republic of Vanuatu—as Aneityum firmly establishes itself on the tourism world stage. “Mystery Island”—the islet just south of Aneityum, receives over one-hundred cruise-ship calls a year, and tourism is the primary way the Anejom population—of approximately 1,400 people— participate in the global market economy. In Anejom—the vernacular of Aneityum island, “cruise ship” is signified as nelcau—“canoe”, but the word “nelcau” signifies more than just the marine vessel, it is also a metaphor for socio-political groups on the island, and the geographical places those groups currently reside or once resided. These geographical and social “canoes” have become the focus of Aneityum’s “traditionalist”—kastom movement. The Anejom signifier “nelcau” is pivotal to both national as well as global economic and political processes on Aneityum, while also being central to local understandings of kinship. Analogous to the way “kava”—the ancestral drink of Vanuatu —is being commoditized for both national and global sensibilities alike, the commoditization of “culture” innovates the way people think about themselves in relation to things and the world. In sum, this work interweaves understandings of global processes with indigenous perspectives, life-worlds, and kinship—to contribute to critical understandings of post- colonial socio-political movements, and the politics of “culture” in a global political economy.
Open Access
Caribbean Hinduism on the Move
(University of Oregon, 2018-04-10) Pillai, Rupa; Karim, Lamia
This dissertation is an ethnographic study of how members of the Indo-Guyanese community traveled from Guyana to New York City, carrying with them distinct understandings of Hinduism informed by their multiple dislocations and how they utilize religion as ideology and practice to help cultivate their identities as Indo-Guyanese Americans. I argue religion as a mobile concept, what I have termed as ‘religion on the move,’ gives a theoretical frame to understand how devotees adapt religion to help them navigate their identities in unknown territories. By studying more than devout individuals in places of worship, I have followed Caribbean Hinduism and Indo-Guyanese Hindus in New York City to various sites to appreciate how religion informs their experiences, operates on different scales (spatially, politically, and temporally), and negotiates power structures. I found that the Indo-Guyanese Hindu community asserts their ethnicity through Caribbean Hinduism to become visible, to overcome marginalization and to claim belonging in the United States.
Embargo
Ceramic Specialization and Exchange in Complex Societies: A Compositional Analysis of Pottery from Mahan and Baekje in Southwestern Korea
(University of Oregon, 2018-04-10) Walsh, Rory; Lee, Gyoung-Ah
The societies of Mahan and Baekje occupied Korea’s southwestern region from approximately first through seventh centuries CE, but their origins, geographical extent, and internal cultural variations have been poorly understood from archaeological and historical data. Baekje is considered the first state to develop in the region, but Mahan has proven more difficult to categorize. This dissertation explores the social structures related to craft production in both societies through geochemical analysis of pottery remains from Mahan and Baekje sites. First, an overview of existing research on Mahan and Baekje is provided, followed by a discussion of the state concept in archaeology and more recent theories regarding heterarchy in complex societies. The methodologies deployed in this study include stylistic analysis, Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis (INAA), and thin-section petrography on pottery fragments from Mahan and Baekje sites. The eight sites included in this study cover a wide range of the Mahan/Baekje region, including settlements in modern Seoul, Incheon, Wonju, Jincheon County, and Gwangju. Geochemical data from INAA which are subjected to multiple statistical analyses to detect patterns of chemistry related to clay sources and processing methods, revealing information on pottery manufacture and exchange. This dissertation finds that the production and consumption patterns of pottery in the Baekje kingdom bear a strong resemblance to those in Mahan, differing primarily in scale. Although Baekje is often studied in terms of its relationship with China, the findings presented here suggest a deep cultural relationship between Mahan and Baekje. Mahan’s role in the history of this region is currently undergoing reassessment, making this work part of mounting evidence of Mahan’s contribution to later Korean civilizations. Looking at Baekje as a complex society with the expectation of both hierarchical and heterarchical organization reveals a political economy with multiple nodes of power and control, resulting from local people making decisions in a locally situated cultural context.
Open Access
Citizenship, refugees, and the state: Bosnians, Southern Sudanese, and social service organizations in Fargo, North Dakota
(University of Oregon, 2010-09) Erickson, Jennifer Lynn, 1974-
This dissertation is a comparative, ethnographic study of Southern Sudanese and Bosnian refugees and social service organizations in Fargo, North Dakota. I examine how refugee resettlement staff, welfare workers, and volunteers attempted to transform refugee clients into "worthy" citizens through neoliberal policies aimed at making them economically self-sufficient and independent from the state. Refugees' engagement with resettlement and welfare agencies and volunteers depended on their positioning in social hierarchies in their home countries and in the United States. Refugees had widely variable political, educational, cultural, and employment histories, but many had survived war and/or forced migration and had contact with many of the same institutions and employers. Bosnians in Fargo were either white, ethnic Muslims (Bosniaks), or Roma (Gypsies), who had a darker skin color and were stigmatized by Bosniaks. By interrogating intersections of race, class, gender, and culture, I explain why social service providers and the wider public deemed Bosnian Roma as some of the least "worthy" citizens in Fargo and black, Christian Southern Sudanese as some of the worthiest citizens. In so doing, I highlight the important roles of religion, hard work, education, and civic duty as characteristics of "good" citizens in Fargo. The dissertation is based on a year of ethnographic research in Fargo (2007-08). It also builds on previous research with Roma in Bosnia (1998-2000) and employment with a resettlement agency in South Dakota (2001-2002). I relate this analysis to anthropological theories of the state with a particular focus on refugee resettlement in the context of the neoliberal welfare state. Following Harrell- Bond's argument that refugees are often portrayed as mere "recipients of aid," I argue for a more nuanced understanding of refugees as active citizens in Fargo. I view refugee resettlement organizations, welfare agencies, and volunteers as powerful actors in shaping refugees' lives, but I also take into account the ways in which refugees in turn shaped these actors. I show how refugee resettlement called into question hegemonic forms of citizenship in the relatively culturally and racially homogenous city of Fargo.
Open Access
Contested Nation, Global Space: Tourism and the Politics of Tuareg Heritage in Mali
(University of Oregon, 2014-09-29) Montague, Angela; Silverman, Carol
This dissertation takes an ethnographic perspective on competing global discourses and contested nationalisms in a postcolonial, multicultural nation. Using the Festival au Desert, in Mali, West Africa as a case study, I investigate the complexities of using cultural productions and tourism to achieve political, economic, and social goals. I critically assess several projects of Tuareg Intangible Cultural Heritage preservation to show the contested nature of collective identities. Neoliberal development in the Global South necessitates niche markets such as tourism centered on culture; however these markets are inherently unstable due to historic and contemporary global economic practices. The Festival au Desert was opened to the world just a few years after an armed rebellion between Tuareg separatists and the state of Mali was suppressed. On the first full moon of 2001, the Festival brought Malian musicians and citizens together in celebration. It became a symbol of peace and reconciliation between formally opposed groups, most notably southern sedentary populations and northern nomadic groups, such as the Tuareg. It also became an important factor in income generation in Mali, and it was a space where international tourists and their Tuareg hosts came into contact and shared dialogue. Tuareg hoped that through the Festival the world could know who they were outside of the rebellion. But in 2012, a renewed rebellion was staged and subsequently co-opted by supporters of Al-Qaeda who instituted Shari'a law in Timbuktu sending the Festival into exile, and Mali's growing tourist economy came to a devastating halt. The Festival provides a rich case study of the benefits and perils of tourism in multicultural states and in wider globalizing frames. It highlights the contradictions in using tourism as a development strategy, as prescribed by international institutions such as the United Nations World Tourism Organization, as it is a fragile enterprise subject to the whims of the market, environment, and global and local politics. However, the research also shows the importance of the Festival for Tuareg identity and how it provided a space for nomads to continue a tradition of gathering after seasonal migrations to negotiate marriages, discuss politics, and celebrate together.
Open Access
The Coquille Indians and the cultural "black hole" of the southwest Oregon coast
(University of Oregon, 1994-12) Wasson, George B.
Open Access
Courage, Cooperation, Perseverance: Exhibit Interpretation and Educational Programs at the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center
(University of Oregon, 2019-09-18) Turbin, Jonathan; Scher, Philip
The National Underground Railroad Freedom Center (NURFC) is a museum located in Cincinnati, Ohio. It anchors a riverfront development project where, beginning in the late 1990s and early 2000s, cities and towns in southern Ohio and northern Kentucky invested in areas around the banks of the Ohio River. NURFC therefore serves multiple purposes as a tourism draw taking advantage of waterfront property, an educational institution, a monument, a place of employment, and a “museum of conscience” akin to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC and the Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles. As a “museum of conscience,” NURFC is devoted to telling the story of abolitionists fighting African American chattel enslavement prior to the US Civil War and human trafficking in the present day, as well as facilitating racial reconciliation in contemporary Cincinnati. Its mission is as lofty as it is multifaceted and daunting. This dissertation is the result of a year and a half of participant observation, surveys, and ethnographic interviews. It explores NURFC’s various missions and provides a set of evaluative criteria regarding them.
Open Access
Covid, Climate Change, and Carework: Mesoamerican Diasporic Indigenous and Latino Communities in the Willamette Valley
(University of Oregon, 2022-10-04) Herrera, Timothy; Stephen, Lynn
Community-based agriculture is not only concerned with the cultivation of food, but also with the cultivation of connection, care, and exchange. This dissertation is based on fieldwork with a non-profit organization that operates seven community garden sites in Lane County, Oregon. Most of my research activity occurred at the largest garden site which happens to also be the oldest garden site, with some families having the same garden plot for two decades. I also travelled to all seven sites to either volunteer or attend workshops. In addition, I draw on my participation as an analyst and interviewer in the COVID-19 Farmworker Study (COFS) of Oregon, a collaborative research project involving twelve community-based organizations that serve farmworkers in Oregon. My research examines the experiences of multigenerational immigrant families in Oregon engaged in preserving traditional foodways and collective care through community gardening. The primary goals are to investigate the historical relationships between foodways and emotional carework within Latino and Mesoamerican Indigenous communities in diaspora. It examines how foodways shape community well-being despite the many challenges and traumas of migration. Participation in community gardening can serve as a social, emotional, and health resource for immigrant Latino families, functioning as a nexus of care and source of hope. This research is urgent since disproportionate food insecurities have only been exaggerated by the global COVID-19 pandemic. Using ethnographic methods such as participant observation, formal interviewing, and informal conversational interviewing, I document some of the integrated physical, emotional, mental health, and social impacts of the pandemic. These impacts include getting infected with COVID-19, losing loved ones, living in uncertainty, and experiencing significant loss of income that affected people’s ability to pay rent, utilities, food, and other expenses, producing what I call stress proliferation. Being exposed to the virus or having the virus forced people into two-week quarantines or even longer periods of recovery when many could not work, and if sick were physically debilitated. The precarity of Latino workers’ economic situations and the stress that comes from that precarity was inflated during the pandemic and left many struggling to catch up even after recovery and quarantine. Because the research has taken place both before and during the pandemic, I demonstrate how the caregiving practices forged through community gardening may continue to benefit families and communities after the pandemic through ideas such as curar y pertencer, caring and belonging, identified by my study participants. I also demonstrate how care practices might have shifted from pre-pandemic times to pandemic times.