Department of Anthropology

  • New article in The Conversation co-authored by Associate Professor Gabriel Wrobel on epidemics in the archaeological record

    Department of Anthropology Associate Professor Dr. Gabriel Wrobel recently co-authored an article in The Conversation with colleagues Dr. Charlotte Roberts (Durham University) and Dr. Michael Westaway (The University of Queensland) titled, “What the archaeological record reveals about epidemics throughout history—and the human response to them.” The article discusses what bioarchaeologists can reveal about diseases in humanity’s past by analyzing human skeletal remains.

    Read the full article at: https://theconversation.com/what-the-archaeological-record-reveals-about-epidemics-throughout-history-and-the-human-response-to-them-138408

  • Associate Professor Ethan Watrall co-authors article on the Enslaved Ontology in Journal of Web Semantics

    Department of Anthropology Associate Professor Dr. Ethan Watrall recently co-authored an article in Web Semantics: Science, Services and Agents on the World Wide Web with several colleagues, including first author Cogan Shimizu (Kansas State University), corresponding author Dr. Pascal Hitzler (Kansas State University), and fellow members of MATRIX: The Center for Digital Humanities and Social Sciences. The article is titled “The enslaved ontology: Peoples of the historic slave trade” and presents the Enslaved Ontology (V1.0). The Enslaved Ontology is a modeling approach for the Enslaved: People of the Historical Slave Trade project, for which Dr. Watrall is a Co-Principal Investigator, and brings together data to model the lives and movements of peoples in the historical slave trade.

    Read the full article at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.websem.2020.100567

    Abstract: “We present the Enslaved Ontology (V1.0) which was developed for integrating data about the historic slave trade from diverse sources in a use case driven by historians. Ontology development followed modular ontology design principles as derived from ontology design pattern application best practices and the eXtreme Design Methodology. Ontology content focuses on data about historic persons and the event records from which this data can be taken. It also incorporates provenance modeling and some temporal and spatial aspects. The ontology is available as serialized in the Web Ontology Language OWL, and carries modularization annotations using the Ontology Pattern Language (OPLa). It is available under the Creative Commons CC BY 4.0 license.”

  • PhD candidates April Greenwood and Brian Geyer publish on photographic practices in rural Kenya and “relational objects” in CSCW/HCI

    Department of Anthropology PhD candidates April Greenwood and Brian Geyer recently co-authored an article with Dr. Susan Wyche (MSU Department of Media and Information) in Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction titled, “Exploring Photography in Rural Kenyan Households: Considering “Relational Objects” in CSCW and HCI.” The article discusses the photographic practices in rural households in Bungoma County, Kenya, and the concept of “relational objects” in computer-supported cooperative work/human-computer interaction research (CSCW/HCI).

    Read the full article at: https://doi.org/10.1145/3392852

    Abstract: “Domestic and personal photography are topics of longstanding interest to CSCW and HCI researchers. In this paper, we explore these topics in Bungoma County, Kenya. We used interview and observation methods to investigate how photographs are taken, displayed, organized, and shared, in 23 rural households. To more deeply understand participants’ photography practices, we also gave them digital cameras, observed what they did with them, and asked them to engage in a photo-elicitation exercise. Our findings draw attention to the ways photographs are “relational objects” – that is, material objects that support the maintenance, reproduction, and transformation of social relations. We then describe these relations: economic (i.e., working as cameramen producing and distributing printed images); family (i.e., parents and children using printed images to tell family histories); and community (i.e., people using printed images to present an idealized self). The introduction of digital cameras into these households did not appear to change these practices; instead, it reinforced them. We discuss how considering relational objects in CSCW/HCI is useful for balancing the technologically determinist perspectives that are the basis of many prior studies of photography in these fields. In particular, we detail how considering the concept provides new perspectives on materiality, as well an alternative to the individualistic perspective, which underlies these communities’ understanding of photography.”

  • Department of Anthropology Statement on Racism, Anti-racism, Diversity, and Inclusion

    The Department of Anthropology at Michigan State University denounces the systemic, institutionalized racism, violence, and oppression enacted against Black Americans in the United States. We abhor acts of police violence, and we mourn the senseless deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and the many others who died as a result of excessive police force. We condemn the institutions that have continued to turn a blind eye to the seemingly endless violence committed against Black communities over the course of U.S. history. We decry the criminalization of peaceful protests that seek to draw attention to institutional racism and bring about positive institutional change. We recognize that all of this has happened within a global pandemic which has disproportionately affected Black communities and has laid bare the underlying inequalities that pervade our society. We stand in solidarity with our Black students, faculty, staff, alumni, and community members and with the Black Lives Matter movement who are fighting to change these unjust systems.

    As anthropologists, we understand how inequality emerges and how people, in the past and present, have resisted and undermined such structures. We understand our own disciplinary history as being rooted in European colonization and the oppression of Black, Brown, and Indigenous people. We call upon our students, alumni, and colleagues to draw upon their disciplinary training and join us in working towards identifying and dismantling the insidious structures of power that continue to enable such violence and racism.

    While we have been working together as a department to identify and address inequities, we realize that work has not had the impact we envisioned. We recognize we cannot simply “do more,” but that we need to take a hard look at our own capacity to act and imagine new ways of challenging existing structures. In particular, we recognize the glaring lack of Black department faculty, staff, and graduate students, and a deficit in our graduate and undergraduate curricula regarding courses on Black experiences in the U.S. and in the African Diaspora, and on race and ethnicity more generally. We commit to pursuing avenues to recruit, support, and retain diverse faculty, staff, and students. Though our university faces significant budgetary constraints amid the COVID-19 pandemic and our department has limited control over new faculty lines, we will reach out to MSU administration and look externally as well to support our efforts. We recognize that MSU as an academic institution, anthropology’s history as a discipline, and academia more broadly undergird existing structural inequities. We will support faculty and students working to advocate for changes to these institutions. As a department, we will create opportunities for our faculty, staff, and students to reflect upon, critique, and change our disciplinary and sub-disciplinary cultures. Guided by this document the faculty will develop an action plan over the course of the upcoming year.

    We realize that our words are not enough and we need to do things differently going forward.

    We will build on our department’s strengths to take immediate, concrete actions, and, where possible, identify clear goals and metrics in our department to redouble our efforts to combat the structural, disciplinary, and institutional racism and violence that has pervaded our society since the European colonization of North America. In collaboration with the faculty we will develop a specific plan for positive change using this provisional list of actions as foundation:

    1. Asking every faculty member to do an equity audit of their syllabi to ensure scholars of color are represented in their assigned readings. The department will provide guidance and resources on the process of doing an equity audit, in addition to setting guidelines and expectations for these changes.
    2. Asking every faculty member to examine and, when appropriate, revise the content of their courses to examine the history of race as a concept and the ways in which anthropology, as a discipline, has contributed to this history.
    3. Continuing to hire paid outside facilitators at our annual faculty retreat every summer to train faculty in equity and inclusion and how it can be embedded in their research, teaching pedagogies, and mentoring.
    4. Providing the resources and mentorship to help strengthen retention of minority faculty members in the department, and advocate for increasing the number of underrepresented minority faculty members across the university overall. We will work toward creating an environment in which a free and open discussion of diverse perspectives can occur, with attention to power differentials that may work to silence differing opinions.
    5. Intensifying efforts to actively recruit and support BIPoC graduate students including providing a space for students to voice existing concerns within the department.
    6. Holding an annual Responsible Conduct of Research (RCR) workshop dedicated to issues of race and racial bias in social science research.
    7. Hosting listening sessions with our students in the coming academic year to identify how we can better address the needs of our diverse student body and to engage with the larger campus community. We will use an outside facilitator who is not affiliated with the department to protect the anonymity of our students and who will communicate this feedback to our faculty. 
    8. Committing to implementing training regarding how we engage with communities with whom we work. We will address and incorporate the research questions and interests of local communities into our research, and embed community members in our research when possible. We will focus on data dissemination and knowledge sharing beyond our narrowly defined scholarly communities.
    • Archaeological research in our department will be conducted with a recognition toward histories of ancestral, traditional, and contemporary land use. We strive to build ethically sound, authentic relationships with the communities linked to these places as we conduct fieldwork and in our long-term curation practices. Department of Anthropology archaeologists are having discussions during Fall Semester 2020 regarding recommendations for changes to collections policy and inclusivity in the classroom, and will be reaching out to Michigan Tribes. The MSU Campus Archaeology Program has outlined the changes it will seek to implement on their June 7, 2020 blog: http://campusarch.msu.edu/?p=8125
    • Sociocultural research within our department will acknowledge the history of the discipline and its role in the oppression of BIPoC communities. Our researchers recognize that they are guests within communities and will ensure that their work is designed according to the needs of and in collaboration with their hosts. We will work to make sure that human subjects protections are relevant and reasonable to the specific community with whom we work. Finally, we will amplify the voices of community members in their ongoing work for social and racial justice. 
    • Biological anthropology research within our department will be conducted with our knowledge that human biology, variation, and history shows that race does not have roots in biology but in policies and practices of colonialism and oppression.
    1. Developing pre-field training for our students and faculty in preventing and reporting harassment and discrimination in addition to the required Title IX training from MSU. This will include reading, reviewing, and discussing recent literature on the history of sexual harassment and discrimination in field school, study abroad, and fieldwork settings.

    This statement was developed in consultation and collaboration with faculty and graduate students in the Department of Anthropology at Michigan State University. It is a living document and will be altered and updated as discussions and events develop.

    Dr. Todd Fenton Chair

    Dr. Stacey Camp Associate Chair

    Dr. Mindy Morgan Graduate Program Director

    Dr. Andrea Louie
    Chair of Undergraduate Programs and Curriculum Committee

    Department of Anthropology Graduate Student Letter to the Department of Anthropology Faculty

    The process of crafting the above Department of Anthropology statement was partially driven by a letter sent by the department’s graduate students, calling on the department to commit to specific changes the department would take to create positive changes. In the spirit of transparency, equity, and respect, we have included the letter below (at the request of those who originally submitted the letter)

    Dear Department of Anthropology,

    We, the graduate students of this department, are writing to strongly encourage you to address the current state of our country by sharing your stance on equality, justice, and inclusivity, while also committing to specific actions the department will take to create positive change. We are saddened and deeply disappointed that a unique statement from you, the faculty, who hold power in our universities and academic communities is absent. As social scientists and experts in the field on human diversity in its many forms, we have the responsibility to use these credentials in support of social movements like Black Lives Matter. This recognizes not just the power that the department and faculty have in the academic realm, but also on the broader scale of society as experts and knowledge creators. When people in power are silent during social unrest, they are appearing to choose the side of the oppressor despite supporting the suppressed, and inadvertently become an actor in the systemic racism plaguing our country. We ask you to not only declare your position on these issues to the department and the university, but we ask you to provide a plan to use your power to implement change. Taking a stance and committing to improving the future of our field is imperative for other faculty at the university, graduate students, and, especially, our large student body of undergraduates.

    We ask the department to collectively address the following three objectives:

    First, we ask the department to make an official statement on the current state of our country. We ask you to consider the following in the statement: an explicit recognition that Black Lives Matter; that the department denounces racism and oppression in all forms; and the department does not condone acts of police violence. We urge your statement to be sent to all faculty, staff, graduate students, and undergraduate students, which will show the department’s support at all levels.  We also urge you to share the department’s statement with the deans of the College of Social Science.  We ask for your statement to be broadcast across social media to show our support to those outside the department. We recommend that you post this letter, or a portion of it, to our department website and/or social media to show incoming and existing students the strength and unity of our department and the intentions of our graduate base. In addition to reaching those already a part of MSU, this will allow prospective students to feel the inclusive nature of our department fostering a more open community, and we would welcome an ongoing dialogue on these issues together. 

    Second, we urge faculty to use your professional and personal connections in the field to push for real change in professional anthropology associations. We urge you to speak to your colleagues and put pressure on executive and diversity-focused committees within professional organizations (e.g., AAA, AAPA, SAA, etc.), as well as the presidents of your academic associations to address the structural and institutionalized racism and exclusion of Black people and other POC in the field, rather than falling back on a blanket statement. Those organizations who have made statements available broadly address methods of support, but not all organizations have addressed the unique position of Anthropology in the construction and perpetuation of systematic racism and oppression in the United States and around the world. Use your insider status to open up discussion at your conference’s business meeting to ask them to provide a platform to give Black, Indigenous, & POC (BIPOC) individuals a voice. We encourage you to urge leadership to make clear their stance on increasing inclusivity and diversity at the undergraduate level to the tenure-track professorship level. This includes asking professors and administrators to contemplate their role in admissions, mentorship, and retention of students in Anthropology. We ask professors to seriously contemplate: who they mentor; how they help non- white students access opportunities in higher education; to what extent their research perpetuates or combats the problematic aspects of our discipline; understand how to be an ally to their mentees and advocate for first generation, low income students; and work toward making Anthropology, a discipline primarily grounded in fieldwork, financially accessible and safe for BIPOC students. These reflections must extend to graduate students, post-doctoral fellows, and early career academics.

    Third, we need to recognize and address the shortcomings in our department and acknowledge that Anthropology, as a discipline, was founded on the systematic oppression and marginalization of BIPOC groups. This is necessary to move beyond performative allyship. One improvement we propose is for the department to invest in starting anti-racists workshops that are mandatory for all faculty. Second, we ask that leadership provide an anonymous department-wide platform for students to anonymously share experiences/stories/general feelings about their experience as a minority in our field. This platform can provide an opportunity to learn what good and bad experiences BIPOC have had in the department, specifically undergraduates first entering our field. In this way, we can listen and learn from the BIPOC experience. We ask you, does our department have a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) committee and are these individuals, especially if BIPOC, compensated for this work? What are the demographics of our undergraduate courses and how can we improve diversity at these entry levels? What is our department doing to diversify hiring practices? What are our policies on bringing awareness to all marginalized social issues, such as racial, cultural, religious, and political issues? What can our department do in order to make these spaces safe and inclusive for BIPOC? Many of the methods and theories that we use today in our scholarship were influenced by and are a direct result of colonization, which served to legitimize the inferiority of BIPOC. No branch of the discipline is innocent, and a statement recognizing this is not just performative.

    Making active decisions to decolonize your course content and scholarship so that diverse voices are amplified in our teaching is essential. We compel you to look at your course goals and urge you to keep the following points in mind when teaching:

    • Aim for cultural understanding
    • Awareness of how diversity emerges within and across cultures
    • Reflect on experiences with diversity to demonstrate knowledge and sensitivity
    • Examine the connections between social institutions and underlying values and belief systems of a community different from one’s own

    We look forward to learning and discussing how you all will work collaboratively to make a plan towards enacting positive change in our department.

    Please find an attached list of all graduate students who stand with this letter (not included for the sake of privacy). We urge you to use your voice for the good of your community, your students, the field, and all humankind. Sincerely,

    The Graduate Students of Anthropology

    Resources and Departmental Information

    Michigan State University occupies the ancestral, traditional, and contemporary Lands of the Anishinaabeg–Three Fires Confederacy of Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi peoples. The University resides on Land ceded in the 1819 Treaty of Saginaw. For a statement of our larger commitment and information about land acknowledgements see Land Acknowledgement

    We encourage all of our community to become more aware of the issues, both historical and contemporary, that have contributed to the racial inequities in the U.S. and globally today. There is a vast amount of important scholarship and writing on these issues. The following are suggestions to begin and facilitate these conversations immediately:

    Courses in Anthropology with Significant Material relating to Race and Racism:

    ANP 236 The Anthropology of Peace and Justice
    ANP 310 Archaeology of Human Migrations
    ANP 320 Social and Cultural Theory
    ANP 321 The Anthropology of Social Movements
    ANP 325 Anthropology of Environment and Development
    ANP 330 Race, Ethnicity, and Nation
    ANP 364 Pseudoarchaeology
    ANP 410 Anthropology of Latin America
    ANP 417 Islam in Africa
    ANP 419 Anthropology of the Middle East
    ANP 420 Language and Culture
    ANP 426 Urban Anthropology
    ANP 436 Globalization and Justice
    ANP 437 Asian Communities: A Global Perspective
    ANP 439 Human Rights: Anthropological Perspectives
    ANP 461 Method & Theory in Historical Archaeology
    ANP 491 Heritage Tourism 

    Resources on Racism and Inequalities in the United States

    Resources to Support Protesters

  • Dr. Gabriel Sanchez Awarded National Geographic Grant

    Dr. Gabriel Sanchez portrait

    The Department of Anthropology is pleased to announce that Dr. Gabriel Sanchez has been awarded a National Geographic Early Career Grant in support of his research project, “Archaeology as Conservation Science: Investigating the Historical Range of California’s Endangered Coho Salmon.” Dr. Sanchez joined the Department as a College of Social Science Dean’s Research Associate and specializes in Indigenous and environmental archaeology. Working through the lens of historical ecology, he studies ancient fisheries along the Pacific Coast of North America and how data from archaeological sites can inform contemporary resource management and conservation.

    The National Geographic Society funds “bold, innovative, and transformative projects” through a highly competitive grant program, with a particular focus on projects aligned with conservation, research, education, technology, or storytelling. The National Geographic Early Career Grant is a one-year funding award, which offers an exceptional opportunity for early career scholars to join an international community of National Geographic Society Explorers.

    Sanchez and students sifting at an archaeological site
    Dr. Sanchez (front) and University of California, Berkeley graduate and undergraduate students excavate site CA-SMA-184 adjacent to Butano Creek in Pescadero, CA to recover ancient salmon remains.

    Dr. Sanchez’s collaborative eco-archaeological project employs archaeological datasets and molecular archaeology methods, such as collagen peptide mass fingerprinting and ancient DNA analysis, to define which salmon species were historically present in California streams over the last ~7,000 years. This research is pertinent for the endangered Coho salmon as their historical biogeography is debated; researchers argue that Coho salmon are not native south of the San Francisco Bay, while others suggest Coho are native as far south as Santa Cruz County. The field of archaeology is uniquely situated to inform the debate of salmon biogeography given the preservation of animal remains in archaeological sites and the broad use of resources by Native Californians, which provides a wealth of baseline environmental information prior to the arrival of Euro-Americans and subsequent landscape-level transformations.

    This research project will define which salmon were native to coastal streams and illuminate their genetic diversity as a means of helping tribal and state resource managers prioritize salmon restoration, stream protection and restoration, water allocation, and also inform land-use practices.

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  • Assistant Professor Kurt Rademaker publishes in the journal Cell on reconstructing deep population history of the Andes

    Department of Anthropology Assistant Professor Kurt Rademaker co-authored a recently published article in the journal Cell with colleagues around the world, including first author Nathan Nakatsuka (Harvard-MIT) and senior authors David Reich (Harvard) and Lars Fehren-Schmitz (UCSC). The article is titled “A Paleogenomic Reconstruction of the Deep Population History of the Andes” and discusses the changes to the genetic landscape in the Central Andes over 9,000 years. The article also investigates the correlation between changes in population structure and archaeologically detected periods of cultural, political, and socioeconomic shifts.

    Read the full article at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cell.2020.04.015

    Abstract: “There are many unanswered questions about the population history of the Central and South-Central Andes, particularly regarding the impact of large-scale societies, such as the Moche, Wari, Tiwanaku, and Inca. We assembled genome-wide data on 89 individuals dating from ~9,000-500 years ago (BP), with a particular focus on the period of the rise and fall of state societies. Today’s genetic structure began to develop by 5,800 BP, followed by bi-directional gene flow between the North and South Highlands, and between the Highlands and Coast. We detect minimal admixture among neighboring groups between ~2,000–500 BP, although we do detect cosmopolitanism (people of diverse ancestries living side-by-side) in the heartlands of the Tiwanaku and Inca polities. We also highlight cases of long-range mobility connecting the Andes to Argentina and the Northwest Andes to the Amazon Basin.”

  • Fieldwork Photography Contest Winners 2020

    The results of the 2020 Anthropology Fieldwork Photography Contest are in! Thank you to everyone who entered photos and to our judges from across the department. The photos were truly amazing and are a stunning reflection of the fieldwork in this department. Congratulations to our winners:

    Photo of Syrian Refugee Settlement in Lebanon by Marwa Bakabas
    1st Place
    “Seeking Beyond Spatial Refuge in an Informal Syrian Refugee Settlement in Lebanon, a Stone-Throw Away From Home” (Beqaa, Lebanon, 2019)
    Marwa Bakabas, Graduate Student

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    Photo of Colorful Alfombra during Holy Week in Antigua by Anna Martinez-Hume
    2nd Place
    “Colorful Alfombra during Holy Week” (Antigua, Sacatepéquez, Guatemala, 2019)
    Anna Martínez-Hume, Graduate Student

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    Photo of stick bridge over Majes River in Peru by Emily Milton
    3rd Place
    “Extreme Water Sampling, Bridge of Sticks Edition” (Majes River, Peru, 2019)
    Emily Milton, Graduate Student

  • PhD Alumna Kathryn Frederick, Alumna Rebecca Albert, and Professor Emeritus William Lovis publish on actualistic replication of acorn processing facilities

    Department of Anthropology PhD alumna Kathryn Frederick, undergraduate alumna Rebecca Albert, and Professor Emeritus William Lovis recently published an article in the Wisconsin Archeologist titled, “The Green Site Acorn Parching Feature: Analysis and Actualistic Replication of an Early Late Woodland Acorn Processing Pit.” The article discusses the several experiments designed to replicate a 1200-year-old acorn parching facility, part of an ongoing project into indigenous Great Lakes subterranean food storage (MSUStore) protocols and practices.

    The full article is available from the authors.

    Abstract: “The Green site, in Shiawassee County, Michigan is an Early Late Woodland locale with a single deep, burned, circular pit feature, 130 cm in diameter, consisting of a thin 20 cm layer of hundreds of carbonized acorns and oak wood. It is hypothesized that the Green site feature was an acorn processing pit—used to dry acorns to prolong their shelf life; a necessary first step before subterranean caching. A median 14C age of cal AD 783 reveals substantial time depth for the process of parching acorns for preservation. Features such as this, revealing the technology for such processing, have only been identified at a handful of sites and therefore are still poorly understood. Two replicative archaeological experiments were conducted to inform on the method behind this approach to acorn drying and charring. We summarize the excavation, analysis, and replicative experimental results of the Green site feature.”

  • Congratulations to the Class of 2020

    Congratulations Class of 2020 banner

    From the Chair, Dr. Todd Fenton:

    “On behalf of the entire Department of Anthropology, we offer our sincerest congratulations to the Michigan State University Class of 2020 graduates. We are so proud of all that you have accomplished during your time here and look forward to your future achievements. It has been an honor and joy to watch you grow, both academically and personally.

    As we entered your final spring semester here at MSU, we envisioned ending this journey as it began—together. Although we may not be gathered in one place, we are still celebrating you and your successes as a community. While you are taking this time to reflect upon the memories you made here your professors, mentors, and fellow students are also thinking of you. The resilience, determination, and camaraderie that you have demonstrated throughout your academic career at MSU is what we, as Spartans, strive to represent. Thank you, Class of 2020, for continually inspiring us and congratulations on this impressive milestone!”

    MSU will be holding a virtual commencement ceremony via their Facebook page beginning at 10am EDT on Saturday, May 16th. The ceremony can also be accessed at www.msu.edu for those who choose not to use Facebook. Members of the 2020 class, their friends, families, and Spartans everywhere are invited to gather online and make this the largest MSU commencement ever, as university leadership recognizes graduates and confers their degrees. The ceremony will feature remarks from President Stanley and the interim provost, as well as musical performances from students in the College of Music.

    Traditionally, the Department of Anthropology holds a luncheon following the commencement ceremony in which we honor each of our graduating seniors. We are still hoping to have this celebration in conjunction with an in-person commencement in the future. We ask that you please stay tuned for updates on this important event.

    The College of Social Science has developed a virtual space where our graduates can express the pride and fulfillment that comes with their achievements. You are invited to take a look here: socialscience.msu.edu/class2020. This site includes inspirational messages from Interim Dean Designee Mary Finn, our student commencement speaker, outstanding seniors, and others from our Spartan family.

    Among these messages, you will find a heartfelt congratulatory video from Clara Devota, our Anthropology Outstanding Senior, to the Class of 2020. Clara, who was featured in our Fall/Winter 2019 newsletter, majored in Anthropology and minored in American Indian and Indigenous Studies. This summer, Clara was selected to be an intern at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C. She will assist in the construction and installation of a new permanent exhibition designed through Indigenous perspectives of life-ways and materialities. As our Outstanding Senior, Clara is recognized by the MSU administration for her commitment to academic excellence, and is among the top College of Social Science graduates celebrated for their perfect 4.0 grade point average.

    Please join us in congratulating our graduates and, as always, Go Green!

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  • Associate Professors Stacey Camp and Ethan Watrall Awarded National Park Service Grant to build a digital archive of WWII Japanese internment and incarceration

    The Department of Anthropology is pleased to announce that Associate Professors Stacey Camp and Ethan Watrall have been awarded a 3 year National Park Service Japanese American Confinement Sites (JACS) grant for $379,017 to develop The Internment Archaeology Digital Archive (IADA), an open digital archive that will host, preserve, and provide broad public access to digitized collections of archaeological materials, archival documents, oral histories, and ephemera that speak to the experiences of Japanese Americans incarcerated during World War II in the United States. This digital archive, which will be accessible to descent communities, scholars, students, and the general public, will focus on two sites of World War II incarceration: (1) Idaho’s Minidoka National Historic Site (the site of Minidoka War Relocation Center), a War Relocation Authority (WRA) facility that incarcerated over 9000 predominantly Japanese American citizens and (2) Idaho’s Kooskia Internment Camp, a Department of Justice (DOJ) prison that incarcerated over 260 Japanese American men deemed “alien enemies” by the United States government. 

    Established in 2006, the National Park Service’s Japanese American Confinement Sites (JACS) grant program is focused on the preservation and interpretation of U.S. confinement sites where Japanese Americans were detained during World War II.

    Long Shot of Buildings at Kooskia, Kooskia Internment Camp Scrapbook, Digital Initiatives, University of Idaho Library

    A collaboration with Michigan State University’s internationally recognized MATRIX: The Center for Digital Humanities & Social Sciences where Watrall also serves as Associate Director, The Internment Archaeology Digital Archive (IADA) will make a critical intervention in the preservation and interpretation of the digital record of World War II incarceration in several key ways. First, IADA will be the first digital archive to disseminate, interpret, and make legible archaeological and material culture from sites of WWII Japanese American incarceration. IADA will focus on several themes that crosscut the archaeological data and materials from two sites of incarceration, including recreation and leisure, dining and foodways, healthcare, and education. Unlike photographs that were censored or governmental documents that present an incomplete or biased picture of the internment and incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II, archaeology provides a unique window into the actual material realities of prisoners’ lives. 

    Second, IADA will provide unique insight into the lives of first generation Japanese migrants, also known as Issei, who are largely neglected in historic and archival records. Because Issei were unable to naturalize due to the exclusionary immigration laws of the time and, as non-citizens and important members of the Japanese American community prior to the war, were seen as a threat by the United States government, they were considered prisoners of war (POWs). As such, they were treated under the conditions outlined in the Geneva Convention of 1924. IADA will provide a mechanism to compare and contrast the experiences of Japanese American non-citizen Issei at Kooskia, a Department of Justice (DOJ) prison that has been studied archivally and archaeologically by Camp since 2009, to the experiences of Japanese American citizens imprisoned at Idaho’s Minidoka War Relocation Center. 

    The project will take advantage of the Department of Anthropology’s Digital Heritage Imaging and Innovation Lab in order to do 3D scans of diagnostic and particularly noteworthy archaeological material – all of which will be accessible on the IADA website when it launches at the end of the grant period.  

    Men on bench outside building in Kooskia, Kooskia Internment Camp Scrapbook, Digital Initiatives, University of Idaho Library

    Beyond the digital archive of archaeological materials, archival materials, and oral histories, the project will include robust and freely available educational materials and lesson plans for use by educators. The IADA will also include a robust “People Search” feature that will allow users to search for information on individual prisoners incarcerated at the two project sites. Each prisoner will have a dedicated record page that will feature a timeline of the events in the prisoner’s life, photographs of or associated with the prisoner, associated relatives, artifacts and possessions associated with the prisoner (when available), oral histories from the prisoner (when available), and a map illustrating the prisoner’s place of birth, place(s) of residence prior to incarceration, location(s) of incarceration, and place(s) of residence after incarceration.

    While IADA is primarily designed to address the immediate needs of Kooskia and Minidoka’s descent communities, Japanese Americans, and scholars of Asian American studies and incarceration, the project’s audience extends well beyond these groups. In its broadest, IADA will provide testimony and material evidence of the trauma wrought by incarceration and discrimination.

    Ultimately, the project’s long-term goal is to provide a platform for the inclusion of archaeological collections from other sites of confinement and incarceration.  


    Image of Men playing game at Kooskia, Kooskia Internment Camp Scrapbook courtesy of University of Idaho Library, Digital Initiatives

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