Talking about Southwest Cultures -

Bird Migration To ASM Archives

Posted by falk on 01/17/2013

ASM Library

Today’s blog was written by Arizona State Museum’s archivist Amy Rule. She can be found working alongside the rest of the Library and Archives staff in the beautiful second floor reading room at ASM providing preservation and access to over 1500 linear feet of archival and manuscript holdings.

Bird-lovers are heading out to Willcox, Arizona, to watch the majestic Sandhill Cranes stopping off to eat during their migration to northern lands. But a special variety of migrating birds are to be seen right here in the ASM Library. … » Read more »

Posted in Exhibits, Objects and their Stories | Tagged anthropology, Arizona State Museum, ASM 120th birthday, ASM Library, birds, Clapper Rail bird, Curve-billed Thrasher bird, Herbert Brown, Northern Bobwhite bird, Tucson Audubon Society

Repatriation and Collaboration: Opening Our Doors to Indigenous Communities

Posted by falk on 01/04/2013

Today’s blog is written by Dr. John McClelland, Lab Manager for ASM’s Osteology Lab and NAGPRA Coordinator.

Most people think of museums as places where things are preserved in perpetuity. It may surprise you to learn that my job at the Arizona State Museum is to find ways to give things back! As Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) Coordinator, I supervise efforts to account for Native American human remains, funerary objects, sacred objects, and other objects of central importance to tribes and to facilitate their return as required by federal law.

For tribes, this process is not only about the return of their ancestors and objects of spiritual importance, but also about restoring the social and spiritual bonds that were severed when a burial was excavated or a sacred item was removed from tribal control. Working with tribal representatives on repatriation projects has helped me to gain new perspectives on the past and present. … » Read more »

Posted in Museum Jobs, Projects and Programs | Tagged anthropology, archaeology, Arizona State Museum, museum, NAGPRA, Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act

Happy GIS Day!

Posted by falk on 11/12/2012

In honor of GIS day, ASM research specialist Shannon Twilling wrote today’s blog. Shannon is the Assistant Manager of the AZSITE Database and ASM’s Archaeological Records Office. AZSITE is the official geographic information system for managing cultural resources in the state of Arizona.

November 14, 2012 is the annual celebration of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and its nearly limitless applications. While the concepts of cartography, topography, and geography go back centuries, when the first computerized GIS program was developed in the 1960s, it was like nothing the world had ever seen. No other software can be as applicable to such a wide variety of fields. You can apply GIS to anthropology, hydrology, crime analysis, fire prevention, real estate, education, zoning, census data…and pretty much everything in between!

So what is this GIS, and how does it work? … » Read more »

Posted in Projects and Programs | Tagged anthropology, archaeology, arizona, Arizona State Museum, AZSITE, geographic information systemss, GIS, museum databases

Secrets in Stone

Posted by falk on 10/03/2012

Arizona State Museum Deputy Director Dr. Irene Bald Romano reports on her summer 2012 research in Italy. Dr. Romano came to ASM and the University of Arizona last February. She is a specialist in Greek cult practices, Greek and Roman sculpture, terracotta figurines, and Hellenistic pottery, and is the author/co-author of five books and numerous articles on those topics. Dr. Romano has conducted fieldwork in Spain, Italy, Greece, and Turkey. She currently serves as a senior archaeologist with the Mt. Lykaion Excavation and Survey Project in Greece.

This past summer I was deeply immersed in ancient Italian sculpture! Not so unusual since my area of scholarly expertise is Greek and Roman sculpture and the use and presentation of classical sculpture in various contexts. My summer’s research in Italy was mostly picking up loose threads of work that I had begun in previous years — in Rome, the Alban Hills, the Bay of Naples region, and Umbria. … » Read more »

Posted in Research/Reports from the Field | Tagged anthropology, archaeology, Arizona State Museum, Greece, Italy, Mt. Lykaion, Puteoli, Sanctuary of Zeus

Snake Season in the Library

Posted by falk on 08/31/2012

“Reports of rattlesnake bites in Arizona on rise,” proclaimed the Arizona Daily Star on August 21^st. Recently, I had an encounter with a rattler—stepped on it while running one evening. So when ASM Archivist Amy Rule submitted her latest blog titled Snake Season in the Library I feared that even while at work I might have to keep a sharper eye out for snakes. Read on to discover ASM’s snake story. –Lisa Falk, blog editor … » Read more »

Posted in Objects and their Stories | Tagged anthropology, archives, Captain Lorenzo Sitgreaves, Samuel Washington Woodhouse, snakebite, snakes, Zuni

Cool Culture

Posted by falk on 07/03/2012

As Tucson’s temperatures soar in continuous triple digits, many of us seek out the AC. If you haven’t been to ASM in a while, perhaps now is when you’d like to enjoy some cool culture. Our AC is on full, and as students are gone for the summer, parking is easy. So come spend a cool afternoon in ASM’s galleries. Parking and other visit info is on our website.

Currently on display are exhibits showcasing Native basketry, American Indian pottery (we’ve added more cases of pots), Hopi quilts, Mexico’s history, and photographs of Southwest landscapes, along with our core Paths of Life exhibit about Native peoples of the Arizona and northern Mexico. Be sure to pop into the museum store for a choice of items to take home with a story.

Curious about all that we did this (fiscal) year? Check out the Director’s report.

For those far away, enjoy a cool afternoon at home or in a library browsing our website. You’ll find virtual exhibits, research reports, games, podcasts (including interviews with American Indian artists and recordings of some of our past programs), and more.

And stay tuned for a full array of programs and new exhibits in the fall. Hints of things to come: Coffee with the Curators talks, book signing by Caroline O’Bagy Davis and discussion, Hopi quilt programs, la frontera/border photographs, basketry lectures, Native Eyes film showcase, Woodbury estate sale/auction, and more!

Stay cool: appreciate culture!

Lisa Falk, ASM Director of Education/Blog Editor

Posted in Introduction | Tagged American Indian culture, anthropology, Arizona State Museum, baskets, cool things to do in Tucson, Native American culture, pottery

Whose Hand Made Those Markings?

Posted by falk on 06/19/2012

It is not every day that a 150 year-old book in the ASM Library can precipitate controversy and debate, but this happened recently when a visiting scholar examined Henry Rowe Schoolcraft’s book, The Indian Tribes of the United States. … » Read more »

Posted in Museum Experiences, Objects and their Stories, Research/Reports from the Field | Tagged Algonquin, anthropology, archaeology, Arizona State Museum, David Vogt, Dighton Rock, Henry Rowe Schoolcraft, Objects and their Stories, petroglyphs, rock art, Scandinavian rock art

Traversing the Continent in Fulbright Style, Part II: Mexico

Posted by falk on 06/13/2012

Today’s blog is written by Dr. Michael Brescia, Arizona State Museum’s Associate Curator of Ethnohistory, who is on sabbatical. A Fulbright-Carlos Rico Award for North American Studies has taken him to Canada and Mexico. Last fall, he wrote about his teaching and research activities in Canada. This post focuses on his research on water rights in Mexico’s Biblioteca Palafoxiana, a rare book library founded in 1646. He returns to ASM later this summer.

It’s the ultimate of intellectual sensations, standing in the library that was founded in 1646 by the Spanish bishop, Juan de Palafox y Mendoza, and surrounded by a beautifully crafted three-tiered cedar bookcase that holds over 50,000 volumes. Take just a few moments to gaze at the impressive collection of books, manuscripts, incunabula, and ephemera, and you’ll understand why the celebrated Italian author, Umberto Eco, could imagine old manuscripts conversing with one another in a medieval monastery. In the Biblioteca Palafoxiana, located in the city of Puebla, I have eavesdropped on some of those conversations taking place between books—sometimes not so discretely, I might add—and they have informed my research on the living legacies of Spanish and Mexican water rights in the greater Southwest. … » Read more »

Posted in Research/Reports from the Field | Tagged Arizona State Museum, Biblioteca Palafoxiana, Fulbright, Mexican water rights, Mexico, Michael Brescia, Puebla, Spanish water rights, water rights

A Slow Look, A Short Poem

Posted by falk on 06/05/2012

Today’s blog is written by Lisa Falk, Arizona State Museum’s Director of Education, and this blog’s editor.

People come to museums for a variety of reasons, but chief among these are to see objects, the art and artifacts on display. But according to those who study visitors in museums, visitors spend very little time actually viewing the objects. Different studies suggest that most people give items a casual glance of about 2 seconds or for something more familiar (say the Mona Lisa) perhaps 15-32 seconds. Of course some art or artifacts will draw specific viewers in for a longer look. By looking longer, a visitor can make a more meaningful connection with an object—you can see more, sense more, imagine more, learn more. … » Read more »

Posted in Objects and their Stories, Projects and Programs | Tagged anthropology, Arizona State Museum, Basketry Treasured, Culture Craft Saturday, haiku, looking at art, Many Mexicos, Mexico, museum education, Native American baskets, Objects and their Stories, Poetry Center, Slow Art Day, Tucson Values Teachers event, UA Teacher Day, visual literacy

A Surprise in the Archives

Posted by falk on 04/25/2012

Today’s blog is written by Arizona State Museum’s archivist Amy Rule. She can be found working alongside the rest of the Library and Archives staff in the beautiful second floor reading room at ASM providing preservation and access to the over 1500 linear feet of archival and manuscript holdings.

In my job as the archivist for ASM each day is predictably unpredictable. You might think every researcher who walks in the door is seeking information about archaeological sites, ethnographic objects, or information on southwestern Native cultures. This is true for some visitors, but an amazingly wide range of questions come my way. In recent weeks I have assisted people with research topics on baseball, newspaper cartoonists, the anthropology of garbage, peyote rituals, mission bells, and library architecture. Even basic questions about the archaeology of the southwest sometime take me down unexpected archival avenues.

For example, recently I was looking into the Edward H. and Rosamond B. Spicer Papers, a collection known for its wealth of information about Yaqui culture. I was surprised to find … » Read more »

Posted in Museum Jobs, Objects and their Stories | Tagged anthropology, Arizona State Museum, Dorothea Lange, Edward H. and Rosamond B. Spicer Papers, Farm Security Administration, Great Depression, Japanese internment camps, Objects and their Stories, photography, WPA

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