2021 Lecture Series
On the second Friday of each month, the NAHAR working group hosts a virtual lecture. This event serves as an opportunity for scholars to come together to find common research threads and develop action items that address heritage at risk.
Below is a list of past lectures with links to recorded content.
Climate Change and Human Response: Strategies for Saving our Cultural Heritage
Dr. David G. Anderson, University of Tennessee
9:00am, Friday, January 15, 2021
Climate change is erasing the record of past as well as present human culture at an alarming rate. Major inter-related challenges facing all those responsible for saving our shared cultural heritage include (1) determining what will be lost and deciding what will be saved; and (2) developing diverse and iterative approaches to our response, including consideration for collaboration among multiple stakeholders, capacity building/personnel training and involvement, cultural and research considerations, information management and curation, fieldwork and analysis efforts, and synthesis and reporting/interpretive efforts. A proactive approach emphasizing long term strategies and solutions, rather than short term and ad hoc responses, is what is needed.
Because Climate Change Itself has a History: Working with Climate Stories in/for Historical Archaeology
Dr. Marcy Rockman, International Council on Monuments and Sites
9:00am, Friday, February 12, 2021
Climate stories as presented here draw from the National Park Service (NPS) project “Every Place has a Climate Story.” The premise of this project – that through the lens of how people have lived in a place, whether it is via changes in material objects they left behind, changes in life ways and knowledge that continue, insights on how they interacted (or not) with environmental change around them, or through present-day outcomes of their decisions and actions, it is possible to connect any place that has ever been a home to people to current anthropogenic climate change – is held as true. And so is the importance and effectiveness of organizing sound scientific information about these changes, insights, and contributions in a clear narrative arc. But the deep focus will be on the unique capacity of historical archaeology to find and share stories about how the contemporary climate change situation has come to be, and the urgency that it do so. This presentation will bring together experiences from the NPS, a video climate stories session at the 2021 Society for Historical Archaeology annual meeting, collaboration with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), and – forewarning – will have far more questions than answers. Hopefully it will be a next piece in what will become a much longer conversation.
Mapping and Quantifying Coastal Dynamics: Coastal Geology Research in South Carolina
Katie Luciano, South Carolina Department of Natural Resources
9:00am, Friday, March 12, 2021
Conducting geologic research in dynamic coastal areas presents unique logistical challenges, yet also lends itself to opportunities for multi-disciplinary collaboration. This talk focuses on strategies used to map and understand the geology of coastal areas in South Carolina, framing current research in the context of the onshore and offshore geology of the Southeastern US.
Coastal Heritage at Risk – a view from Scotland
Tom Dawson and Joanna Hambly, SCAPE
9:00am, Friday, April 9, 2021
SCAPE (Scotland’s Coastal Archaeology and the Problem of Erosion) has been working with threatened coastal heritage for a very long time. We share similar threats and management challenges to coastal heritage at risk with our friends and colleagues in the USA. But there are also differences in how we approach the issue, often dictated by structural and societal factors beyond our control, and cultural differences we may not even be aware of. This presentation starts off with an overview of what SCAPE has learnt about the coastal heritage resource in Scotland over the past twenty years and how we got there. We’ll go on to look at the conditions which enable SCAPE’s volunteer centred approach to succeed, and also consider some perennial difficulties. Finally, we have had the privilege to visit some stretches of the beautiful Atlantic seaboard of the USA and encounter some of its eroding heritage. We’d like to share with you what the opportunities and challenges presented look like through SCAPE’s eyes as the basis for discussion about how we can draw on our combined experience to think about what approaches work in which contexts.
Open Context: Publishing Spatial Archaeological Data on the Open Web
9am, Friday, May 14, 2021
Archaeology faces many challenges in preserving and sharing digital data in ways that are ethical, usable, and meaningful. Many forms of archaeological data are small, complicated, and collected under very different conditions, different sampling protocols, and with very different kinds of security and cultural sensitivity requirements. Since archaeological data are often deeply embedded in many types of context, any form of data reuse, especially aggregation to the scale of big data, offers great methodological and interpretive challenges.
Open Context (https://opencontext.org) attempts to navigate these challenges by combining human expertise in data curation with a common technical platform for the open access publishing of primary field data in archaeology. Since its launch in 2007, Open Context has published structured data, field notes, images and other media from over 130 projects and collections across the world. Analogous to conventional journals, Open Context has adopted a model of “data sharing as publication” and provides editorial services to review and improve data quality.
The Iron Age in the Plastic Age: Anthropocene signatures at Castell Henllys
Harold Mytum, University of Liverpool
9am EST, Friday, June 11, 2021
Plastic entering the archaeological and geological record may be the defining signature of the Anthropocene. Amidst the growing awareness of the role of plastic in marine pollution, this study demonstrates its terrestrial ubiquity. The excavation of two experimentally reconstructed roundhouses built on their original sites at Castell Henllys Iron Age fort, Wales, reveals evidence of 30 years of heritage interpretation and visitor activity. The nature and extent of the cultural material recovered accurately reflects known activities at this heritage site, but also reveals an unexpected amount of plastic debris in archaeological contexts, indicating how, even in well-managed contexts, plastic is entering terrestrial deposits.
Community Archaeology on a Heritage at Risk Site, Pockoy Island Shell Rings on Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve, Charleston County South Carolina
Meg Gaillard, South Carolina Department of Natural Resources Heritage Trust Program
9am EST, Friday, July 9, 2021
The Pockoy Island Shell Ring Complex, composed of two Late Archaic period shell rings, is the latest archaeological discovery on Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve, a South Carolina Department of Natural Resources (SCDNR) managed area on Edisto Island, Charleston County, South Carolina. The rings were found using LIDAR in 2017 following Hurricane Matthew. Pockoy Ring 1, the first of two shell rings that makes up the complex, is the oldest known shell ring in South Carolina –dating to approximately 4,300 years ago. Since 2017, the SCDNR Archaeology team has organized hundreds of visitors, community members, students and professional archaeologists in an intense excavation effort of the Pockoy Island Shell Ring Complex as erosion of the site increases. Land loss on the windward side of Pockoy Island is occurring at an estimated rate of 15.5 m/year, and land loss to the marsh side is slowly increasing. For nearly 70 years, Botany Bay Plantation has experienced one of the highest rates of erosion in coastal South Carolina. The shoreline has moved as much as three quarters of a mile inland in some locations. Heritage at Risk sites like the Pockoy Island Shell Ring Complex present interesting challenges and opportunities for archaeologists. While intense, triage-level archaeological investigations are required on sites like the Pockoy Island Shell Ring Complex before they are lost, these archaeological sites also present an opportunity for local community engagement, education, and heritage tourism to take place.
An Irish perspective on North Atlantic maritime cultural heritage at risk from climate change
9am EST, Friday, August 13, 2021
The CHERISH (Climate, Heritage and Environments of Reefs, Islands, and Headlands) project has been recording coastal cultural heritage sites at risk from climate change in Ireland and Wales since 2017. These eroding sites include shell middens, graffiti, rock art, forts, castles, towers, ports and shipwrecks involving fishing, religion, seafarers and smuggling activities. This talk will concentrate on vulnerable archaeological sites recorded by survey and excavation around Ireland. It will emphasise their maritime links around the North Atlantic with promontory forts found from Scotland to Spain; early medieval saint sea connections including Brendan the navigator; Viking island settlement; ship ballast associated with the exploration of the NW Passage; Napoleonic Towers; and Irish tourism and emigration graffiti. It will discuss possible links and similar issues affecting communities and archaeological sites on both sides of the north Atlantic.
Stephanie Gandulla, Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary
9am EST, Friday, September 10, 2021
In the United States, managers of cultural resources in national marine sanctuaries and marine national monuments contend with the impacts of climate change such as rising water temperatures and sea levels, water that is more acidic and contains less oxygen, shifting species, and altered weather patterns and storms. While all of our sanctuaries and monuments face these global effects of climate change, each is affected differently. Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary (TBNMS), located in the heart of the Great Lakes, protects a nationally significant collection of historic shipwrecks. As an inland sanctuary site, TBNMS works to empower people to engage in solutions to mitigate climate impacts in our Inland Seas.
Climate Change within a Cultural Context: What We are Doing and Why
Michael Newland, ESA Northern California Cultural Resources Director
9am EST, Friday, October 8, 2021
North Norwegian Heritage at Risk (NNHAR)
Vibeke Vandrup Martens, Norwegian Institute for Cultural Heritage Research
9am EST, Friday, November 12, 2021
Cultural Heritage Sites in Coastal Areas. Monitor, Manage and Preserve Sites and Landscapes under Climate Change and Development Pressure (CULTCOAST) is an interdisciplinary research project funded by the research Council of Norway, Environmental research programme, 2019-2023. CULTCOAST aims to assess the possibilities for long-term preservation of legally protected archaeological and built cultural heritage sites in the context of these combined threats, and to suggest innovative tools for risk assessment, mapping, evaluating, prioritising, adaptation and sustainable management of these sites. Our interdisciplinary approach combines archaeology, architecture, geography, quaternary geology and climate science. CULTCOAST combines site analyses, meteorological data, climate scenarios and geo-hazard studies to produce management strategies on cultural heritage preservation and adaptation for sites, nationally and globally.
The Climate Fresk: Learning Climate Literacy and Empowering Action through Play
Sheila Suarez de Flores, Climate Fresk USA CoLeader and Textile Impact Game Co-Creator
9am EST, Friday, December 10, 2021
42 cards to understand the complexity of Climate Change and act! The Climate Fresk game workshop cards summarize the UN-backed IPCC report. Participants band together to link the cards, learn from each other, express themselves through art and then connect what they can do about climate change, individually and collectively. Played by 230k people around the world since 2018 (thanks to 10k citizen facilitators), the game empowers participants to become facilitators, as the tool is in open commons for educational use.
Learn about the workshop’s methods and pedagogy, including tips for teaching climate change, and play a teaser version of the Fresk.
2021 Student Series
On the last Friday of each month, the NAHAR working group will host a virtual session focused on content for students or presented by students. The goal of this series to grow student interest in issues surrounding climate change archaeology as well as provide opportunities for students to present on their research.
Below is a list of past workshops with links to recorded content.
Using GIS Predictive Modeling
Dr. Lindsey E. Cochran, University of Georgia
9:00am, Friday, January 29, 2021
This presentation is geared towards a general student audience—no technical knowledge or specialized programs necessary! During this time, I’ll introduce the fundamentals of archaeological predictive modeling, a kind of inferential spatial statistic used to estimate aspects of past human habitation, travel, and resource acquisition. Sound complicated? It’s not…don’t worry. We’ll discuss common questions that can be asked and answered using these spatial statistical techniques as well as common pitfalls and lessons for the future. Ways to get started and get involved will be at the center of the conversation.
Ocean Acidification Lesson Plan and Project Results
McKenna L. Litynski, St. Mary’s College of Maryland
9:00am, Friday, February 26, 2021
McKenna Litynski is a senior at St. Mary’s College of Maryland (SMCM) double majoring in (1) Environmental Studies and (2) Anthropology with an Archaeology Concentration and minoring in Museum Studies. Her interests include zooarchaeological research during the prehistoric and protohistoric periods and protecting cultural heritage threatened by climate change. Active in public outreach, Litynski created and disseminated educational materials including a high-school lesson plan/experiment on ocean acidification and archaeology; created a two-page handout on ocean acidification and archaeology; and completed a data summary based on responses to a questionnaire by state and federal organizations and universities addressing climate change and archaeological resources. Currently, Litynski is organizing a virtual conference concerning climate change and maritime heritage through interdisciplinary perspectives to take place in April of 2021.
Changes in coastal Gopher Tortoise burrow characteristics following hurricanes: implications for conservation planning
Kyra Liedtke, Flagler College
9:00am, Friday, March 26, 2021
The Gopher Tortoise, Gopherus polyphemus is iconic, yet threatened throughout its range in the southeastern United States. It is a burrowing, herbivorous tortoise whose upland habitats have been greatly reduced by habitat destruction, fragmentation and/or reduction in quality due to anthropogenic changes in the disturbance regimes, such as fire, that are necessary to maintain quality habitat. Importantly, Gopher Tortoises are well documented keystone species supporting numerous conspecifics that are dependent upon or regularly use their burrows.
While this species has been much studied in its inland habitats, it also thrives in coastal sand dune environments where little is known about its behavior, ecosystem role or conservation status. Coastal natural areas in the state of Florida, USA have been significantly reduced by human activity, and are now additionally threatened with accelerated sea level rise and more frequent and intense storms. However, as resilient as this population may be, it is running out of room due to sea level rise and habitat loss and fragmentation. Such implications for this and other species should be considered in conservation planning for coastal species of concern.
Articulating Loss: Using interactive documentaries to open dialogue between heritage professionals and the wider public
Tanya Venture, University of Exeter
9:00am, Friday, April 23, 2021
Throughout history the coast has been an exciting place to live, work and visit which has led to a wealth of archaeological and built heritage presented all along the coast. However, coastal heritage is in danger of being lost through natural processes, such as erosion, and this is only going to be exacerbated further by the effects of climate change. Discussions around how to deal with assets in when loss is understood to be inevitable, are only just now being addressed within the professional sector. This presentation is based on on-going PhD research between the University of Exeter and Historic England looking at not how to save, but conversely, how to lose better. This presentation starts by looking at the language that is used around loss through exploring the framework developed during this research. Then it goes on to look at how methods such as filmmaking and interactive documentaries can be used to help open dialogues between heritage professionals and the wider public around the sensitive issue of heritage loss. Engaging with loss in a more positive way is a key aspect in embracing the opportunities presented by an ever changing coast.
So, your data are published. Now what?
Leigh Lieberman, The Alexandria Archive Institute
9am EST, Friday, May 28, 2021
Repositories that provide open access to data promote broader participation in the research process. Yet accessibility does not inevitably lead to discovery, and discovery does not necessarily lead to usability. Although open data practices have gained prominence in archaeology, those producing and working with archaeological data still frequently lack the institutional support to fully realize the value of these models for their research, their teaching, and their outreach. Moreover, the organizations that fund archaeological fieldwork typically undervalue the myriad benefits associated with sharing research data, which can promote check-box compliance rather than real engagement with the data publication process. Data management and process documentation, if supported at all, is often an afterthought, which can make data reuse more difficult to accomplish.
Today we’ll consider some of the computational, collaborative, and pedagogical outcomes that can result from real engagement with the data publication process. These outcomes—which focus on the quantitative analysis of big data, the facilitation of genuine interdisciplinarity, and the assessment of data literacy in students at all levels—have the potential to revolutionize archaeological research and teaching. By focusing on these outcomes, we can begin to develop standards that not only incentivize open data publishing in archaeology, but also prioritize the creation of sustainable, scalable models for the organizations that maintain these repositories.
Ashes from Ashes: Recovering Human Cremated Remains from Catastrophic Wildfires
Alex DeGeorgey, Alta Archaeological Consulting and Alta Heritage Foundation
9am EST, Friday, June 25, 2021
Drought-like conditions in the western United States have contributed to a series of massive catastrophic wildfires. Indeed, the most destructive wildfires in California history have occurred in the past few years devastating whole communities, causing billions of dollars of damages, and resulting in the loss of life. Oftentimes families keep the cremated remains of previously deceased family members within the home in urns or other vessels, which become lost when the wildfire destroys their home. Human cremains are endowed with significant sentimental meaning and the loss of these heirloom objects contributes to the emotional trauma suffered by wildfire victims. A volunteer group of archaeologists and specially trained dogs are working within wildfire disaster areas to help fire victims recover the cremains of family members. Archaeology can play an important and active role in the recovery process following a wildfire disaster event. This effort represents a new application for archaeology that fulfills an important and previously unrecognized need. Given the current climate trends throughout the United States, this new application will likely grow in importance in the coming years.
Photogrammetry 101
Emily Jane Murray and Emma Dietrich, Florida Public Archaeology Network
9am EST, Friday, July 23, 2021
Digital heritage is a growing field used to collect and curate data, create public outreach tools and more. Photogrammetry is just one technique to create 3D models using simple photo equipment and software. Learn the basic workflow of this process from taking photos to uploading or printing the final model. Sample data set and trial software available to try for yourself!
Reconstructing Pottery from the Pockoy Island Shell Ring Complex
Cate Garcia, South Carolina Department of Natural Resources Heritage Trust Program
9am EST, Friday, August 27, 2021
Four thousand years ago, Late Archaic peoples along the coasts of South Carolina and Georgia accumulated mollusk shells into enormous, circular structures known as shell rings. The purpose of these rings has been a subject of archaeological debate for decades, with no clear consensus as to whether they are accidental accumulations of domestic refuse, or intentionally constructed landscape markers with ceremonial or symbolic meaning. This paper presents the results of a morphological and functional analysis of ceramic vessels excavated from the Pockoy Island Shell Ring Complex, a double shell ring site located on the shore of Edisto Island, South Carolina, in order to understand the social activities that took place there. Digital modeling software was used to identify vessels and their potential functions, in order to expand our understanding of Late Archaic ceramics and what they can tell us about the social activities that took place at the site. The results suggest an assemblage of vessels of generally greater size than those normally found at coastal Late Archaic sites, as well as the presence of previously undescribed vessel forms. From a social perspective, the results also suggest that Pockoy Island was much more than just a habitation site.
Envisioning a Database of Biocultural Heritage Towards Climate Action: Library Best Practices in Relation to Archeology
Martha Lerski, Leonard Lief Library, Lehman College
9am EST, Friday, September 24, 2021
Site Stewardship and Climate Change
Beth and Chris Padon, Partners for Archaeological Site Stewardship and Discovery Works, Inc.
9am EST, Friday, October 22, 2021
The Partnership for Archaeological Site Stewardship promotes protection of archaeological and historical resources by training and supporting members of the public who volunteer as site stewards. They regularly visit assigned sites and record changes, catching problems before more damage is done. We present examples in California where volunteer site stewards help protect sites from damage caused by climate change. The next CASSP volunteer training workshop will be held on October 23; register at www.cassp.org. We also review how site stewardship programs in other states work together to prevent damage to cultural resources that are caused by climate change. The second national site stewardship workshop is a free webinar on November 2-3 that will focus on Community Site Stewardship; register at www.sitestewardship.org.
Exploring Eroding Heritage at the Edge of Wales: Tackling Climate Change in Ireland and Wales through the CHERISH Project
9am EST, Friday, November 19, 2021
The EU-funded Ireland-Wales CHERISH Project has had a busy 2021. With excavations at two eroding coastal forts (c. 400BC – AD200) and an C18th undersea shipwreck, we are starting to understand how changes in our climate are directly impacting our fragile coastal sites. This talk will look at our investigations on remote islands and cliff tops at the very edge of Wales.