Good Times

I just wanted to say that it was good to see the crew during my recent trip to Provo. It was good times, really good times...

Also, I wanted to solicit some feedback on the trip. Do you think it went well? Specifically, what did people think about the research I presented and my stand up material in 110 or the grad lunch.

ETD Tips

After such ground-breaking BoM proofs have been revealed and more than one faithful truth-seeker has been so uplifted, I feel very useless sitting here with my porcelain fragments and barrel straps...

None the less, I just went to the library's little ETD training class and since I don't get to talk to most of you in person very often and don't have a clue where most of you are at in the process, I thought I'd share this in the hopes of being useful...This is the gist of the class and it’s all you’ll get going to the library class, so I wouldn’t bother going.

So here we go…

1. In Word, set your personal styles as you’re going for Chapter, Sub-chapter, Table, etc (all needed to show up in bookmarks). This is only useful if you do it as you write, rather than after it’s all done. If you’ve already got a near-finished typed-up product, the trainer says to just create a pdf and make the bookmarks there. Styles in Word will only save time if you do them as you go for most of your document.
2. Create a pdf (in Windows 2007, use PDFMaker and go to Preferences to choose which styles to import as bookmarks and set the level of priority.
3. Check bookmarks reference to the correct location.
   
1. If not, got to set destination and click the actual place it belongs for each incorrect bookmark. The multi-media lab has Acrobat Professional, which is what you need, but it has a bug where it tends to make the wrong destination, so be sure and check.
4. To Create Another Bookmark within the PDF, highlight the text for the bookmark and click create. To change order of bookmarks, drag around in bookmark tab. Also can nest (so all Chapter 1 subheadings are nested within Chapter 1 bookmark) by dragging to icon or to text.
5. Before saving, go to File Properties and select that it show page and bookmark tab when opened initially. The Library just prefers that.
6. If you want to import several pdfs into a single pdf document, choose Create From Multiple Files. Choose all you want, put them in the desired order and create.
7. If you’ve created your pdf and then you find an error, go into your original Word Document, fix it and not which pages are changed. Make this a new pdf. Go to the pages tab in your pdf, right click and choose replace with page from new pdf. Choose which pages from old and new documents to change out and click ok.

*If you have questions, the multimedia lab in the No Shhh Zone of the library is the best place to find answers on the pdf process. That’s also the main place on campus where you’ll get access to Acrobat Professional, which you’ll have to use.

Additional Resources:

As a reminder, there are templates, examples, and lists of requirements on the Grad Studies website (they’re forms ADV 11 and 12, various parts).

BYU’s Online Tutorial for Creating an ETD ready pdf—really slow and boring, though!

Download a free trial of Acrobat Professional

Microsoft’s Walk-Through on Creating Quick Styles in Word 2007

The Land of King Lamoni Discovered

While at work on Monday, I made what I feel is a significant discovery regarding BoM archaeology. Normally, I would reveal my discovery in a more appropriate venue, but since word has made it around the OPA office so quickly, I thought I would reveal the discovery here on FOF.
While sifting through notes of PVAP architecture, there was a pithouse at Paragonah which was listed as having one burial and 15 additional human arms. Fifteen is certainly "not a few" as we read in Alma 17:38. After a brief consultation with Lane, I learned that on the Sand Hollow survey, OPA workers identified King Lamoni's throne. Therefore, I surmise that King Lamoni's land stretched as far north as the Parowan Valley and nearly to the Saint George Basin (or farther) to the south-I also have an inkling that the route on which King Lamoni and Ammon were when they ran into King Lamoni's father was likely the I-15 corridor.
This will certainly alter the PVAP research design and possibly my thesis focus. If any of you PVAPers (current or former) have noticed any other connections between the PV and BoM, please let me know and we can discuss publication.
(Perhaps now the Parowan Valley Archaeological Project will finally gain long-deserved respect among BYU bigwigs.)

Back on Campus

As most of you probably know, I will be on-campus this week giving some research presentations in anticipation of Joel's retirement. I thought I'd put up the tentative schedule as well as some descriptions of the research I am going to be presenting.

Wednesday February 20

6:00 PM -- Arrive Salt Lake Airport
6:00-8:00 PM -- Dinner with Grandparents in SLC
8:00 PM -- Bum a ride from someone from SLC to Provo (any takers?)

Thursday February 21

Pre 11:00 AM -- Either hanging out at OPA or feverishly finishing presentation
11:00 AM -- Research Lecture 919 SWKT My Thursday presentation is entitled "Agricultural Labor, Class, and Population Circulation among the Phoenix Basin Hohokam," in which I argue for the presence of a landless class of attached laborers that contributed to the operation of an extremely productive canal-based agricultural system in a small-scale society in the American Southwest, along with an attendant theoretical discussion.
12:00-? -- Lunch with faculty
?-5:00 PM -- Hanging out at OPA/feverishly finishing lecture for following day
5:00-? PM -- Dinner with Joel

Friday February 22

Pre-10:00 AM -- OPA or feverishly finishing lecture
10:00 AM-11:00 AM -- Lecture to 110 class in B-190 JSFB based on my dissertation research, which is currently entitled "In Search of Alliance: The Organization of Production and Exchange in 14th Century Central Arizona." In this research, I am investigating the conditions under which higher-order political alliances emerge (or do not emerge) in small-scale agricultural societies using data I have gathered on the production and exchange of ceramic vessels. In addition to presenting my own research, I intend to discuss archaeological models, the problem of equifinality in archaeological interpretations, and issues pertaining to my specific analytical methodology.
11:00 AM-12:00 PM -- Great Basin Seminar
12:00 PM-1:00 PM -- Lunch with Grad Students
1:00-3:30ish -- Bum ride to Airport (I think Evie said she would pay someone to take me)
3:30ish -- Arrive SLC
4:40 -- Depart SLC

Looking forward to seeing the crew.

UPAC and Utah Arch

A most of you know, Chris and I are attempting to become the new Utah Archaeology editors. At the business portion of the UPAC meetings we discussed the issue and some have asked that I do a post explaining where the issue sits. At the meeting we discussed how Utah Arch needs to get back up and running and that it should have institutional support if at all possible. Although no one with institutional support is willing to step up. Most agree that there should be some type of editorial board headed by an editor(s). The board would be made up of specialists and when an article was sent to Utah Arch the primary editor(s) would send it to the specialist who would then pick out a couple of reviewers and take care of the reviewing and revision process and then send it to the editor when it was ready to go. The editor would then put the issue together. Lori H. (the president of UPAC) had me stand and talk for a bit about Chris and I being willing to be co-editors. In the end nothing was decided and Lori said we should continue the discussion on a message board. After the meeting Dr. J and I talked with Lori and she committed to send us everything Jason Bright had for the next issue (2005) which is supposedly almost ready to be printed. But I have yet to hear from Lori (despite an email to her on Tuesday) and am doubtful about how 'close' the next issue really is. All of this in my mind epitomizes the problems with using a board, put a lot of people in charge of doing something and nothing ever really gets done, or it gets done very slowly. Anyway, we'll see how it turns out, but I don't have too much faith that it will be resolved anytime in the near future. C'est la vie.

Sweet sweet ABD

Ah yes my friends......it cometh. I just found out yesterday that I passed my Comprehensive Exams. Yea! For those of you who don't know I took my exams in the beginning of Dec, passed two of my questions but failed one. My committee allowed me to rewrite the one I had a problem with and this time I passed. I'm not officially ABD yet as I have to defend my proposal, but I'll be doing that sometime in February. This puts me one step closer to graduating and buying that double-wide I always promise Sally!

Buy, Sell, Trade!!!

Thought everyone would like to know that one of the best investments right now are looted artifacts!!! So get your shovels.....

http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1693792,00.html

By the way, I've failed to publicly congratulate Aaron on his marriage to his new beautiful bride. Amie and I couldn't be happier, and we're excited to meet her.

Lay-tar

Mr. Freeman

Just a quickie. I've been cleaning out my email inbox, and found an email that Craig Freeman sent. I ran into him a few months ago. This email contains his contact information. If anyone is interested in getting into contact with him, let me know and I'll forward it. Otherwise, I'll delete it.

To the Imminent and Eminent Thesisers...

Is anyone among the BYU crew planning on attending one of the ETD Library classes that Joel forwarded to us this week? I'll be out of town the whole week, but would love to still get this information! I'll pay the note-taker in evil holiday goodies, if that's any motivation... =)

Thanks!

As an apology to those for whom this has no application, I present the latest findings at Hierakonpolis, courtesy of the Forest Service's own Tom Flanigan. Don't nobody say that ye weren't warned!

Hope everyone enjoyed their turkey!

A Lesson from Virgin Ceramicists

This weekend I attended the Virgin ceramics conference with Dr Allison at the Museum of Northern Arizona. It was pretty interesting to see archaeological decision-making that was actually productive (as opposed to arguments that persist through decades in article form). The ultimate goal of the conference was to produce a ceramics field manual for the Virgin area (or North and West of the Colorado River, as Margaret Lyneis prefers) that could also work as a guide back in the lab.

The general format of the conference was as follows:
A panel sat at the front of the room and a ware (lower case "w") was brought up as the topic (gray wares, white wares, red wares). Then the panel and audience discussed the various Wares (capital "W") and defined them as far as their paste and temper were concerned. Then, topics were brought up such as whether or not a certain brown ware was a just misfired gray ware, etc. and decisions were actually made! They were crossing out Wares and Types left and right! The most impressive part of the conference (at least to cynics like me) was when the panel and audience could not reach a consensus (usually because the data was sparse), they assigned four or five people to a subgroup who will be reporting back with more data and a recommended conclusion in less than a year.

As I sat and watched all of this, I couldn't help but think about how this needs to be done with projectile point typologies (I know you are all laughing right now thinking, "Yeah, right," but so was I when I heard about this conference, and surprisingly it is possible to get these professionals to agree on things when the end goal is mutually desired). The two additional problems that would exist with a proj point conference that didn't with this conference is that (1) the projectile points cover a much larger geographical area-and, therefore, would include many more professionals; and (2) that years ago Colton set up the MNA to be an arbitrator for such discussions and no equivalent institution exists to regulate or house such a conference.
I just wanted to let you all know about the conference this weekend and also see what you all thought about it.

Book of Mormon Stories

Hey all,

I was reading in the Daily Herald and came across this article.

To me, it feels a little like vindication for all those times I've had to tell people that Lehi and Co. could not have populated all of the Americas, and that there were other people that arrived much earlier.

Of course, we can expect a significant backlash from the Antis, but I think it's a great change.

Extra! Extra! Read All About It!!

Well hello, everybody!

Did dinosaurs ever live on earth with man?

How did ancient artists know what dinosaurs looked like?

When and where was the last dinosaur sighting?

The answers to these questions and more can be found in the following website:

http://www.discoverynews.us/

Oh, man. For those of you who have been in the office lately, you have had the pleasure of viewing some literature that I brought in from GJ that talks about this stuff. I just wanted to provide the website for those of you who have not had the opportunity to look at the articles in person. It's kinda along the same lines as a post that Aaron posted awhile back.


Enjoy.

Three Corners Conference Roll Call

The Three Corners Conference is coming up next weekend:

http://www.nvarch.org/3corners/3Corners2.pdf

Joel, Cady, and I are on the program with a paper on Fremont Exchange. Yoder and I are going, is anyone else planning on attending?

Utah Geology -- a GIS Fest

Scott and I stumbled onto the following website with a bunch of free GIS and pdf maps of the geology of Utah.

http://geology.utah.gov/maps/gis/index.htm

Check it out all of you GIS-ers.

Southwest Symposium - 20th Anniversary

Hello all,
Just thought you may be interested in the upcoming SW Symposium held at ASU in January. All the infomation can be found at this link...
http://www.public.asu.edu/~ndwilso1/
It should be a good conference. They will be discussing foraging, mobility and migration, social power and interaction, the protohistoric, and the history of Southwest archaeology, understanding human movement, landscape change, and the connections among groups at local and pan-Southwestern scales. Check it out and I hope to see you all there. Lay-tar.
Mike

Heat-Treated Purple Obsidian!

Enjoy:

http://www.macuahuitl.com/pb/wp_98514d3c/wp_98514d3c.html

http://aztecswords.com/

A Fond Farewell to Cady Waldrom (Reinhold) Jardine

Officially, I think that Cady and fam left this morning, but she came into the museum yesterday to say goodbye. You will be missed Cady. The student office won't be the same without you. No longer will we be able to talk turquoise and exotics, nor will we be hounded for details and photos of marriages, dates, and babies:) In all seriousness, it was great having you around to bounce ideas off, to offer advice, and to share sources.

I (and I'm sure the rest of us) wish you and your family the best as you start a new life in D.C.

I'll have to add your name to those for whom we pour out a little Fresca when we're in the field.

New BYU Anthropology Website

Dear FOF,

Just as an FYI, the new BYU Anthropology website is now live and running. It still has some minor fixes but for the most part is ready to go. Take a look here and let me know if you find any problems. Thanks!

Scott

Sand Hollow II - Take 2

Well, I'd have to agree with everything Dave mentioned. I had a blast with old friends and met some fun new people. Sand Hollow was everything Aaron said it would be...hocking sand. But, at the same time, Scott and I finally got to test the Panasonic Toughbook for digital mapping in the field and it worked great! Thanks to Scott and his persistence on the acquisition of the computer, we will likely be presenting a "product review" at the SAAs in Vancouver. Stay tuned.

As for the flooding, just look at the pics. The apartment with the most water was where two of the male crew members were staying. Some of the girls and I were able to salvage all the site maps, field notes, Topcon, and laser levels in the boss's apartment due to our quick feet and "bags-in-the-cracks-of-the-door" quick thinking. Not to mention, we saved a lot of Dave's dissertation material from the floor of his room (Just make sure to put us in your acknowledgments, Dave).

And in reference to the Andrew Johnston Collection, I was blown away. Dave and I were able to photograph sandals for his dissertation project and I photographed and did a cursory analysis of the Casas Grandes pottery. The pictures say it all. I really was waiting for Vincent Price to come out of the corner and talk in his creepy, old man voice.

SandHollow II

Well, my time at SandHollow has come to a close; although Rich and Lane are still working down there and will be until the end of August. For those of you who have not been to Sand Hollow, it can generally be summed up as HOT, sandy, and ephemeral. Most of the time we were digging wickiups and hearths, although we did excavate a pithouse or two as well. One of these had a lot of adobe wall and roof fall, no ceramics, and a piece of corn came out of the bottom. So all signs point to Basketmaker, which would be really interesting. That was definitely the highlight of the season. Mike Searcy and family were also there for a good chunk of the summer, which was great. It was good to be back in the field with a Friend of the Fremont.

The day I was leaving St. George got flooded by a thunderstorm. Two of the apartments we were renting got a couple of feet of water in them. Mike will have to post some pictures; it was crazy. He and I also got to check out the Andrew Johnston private collection in Kanab. I'll have to post on that another time; it was a sweet/creepy experience. Now I'm down at North Creek for Dr. J's last year there. We took out the back fill (a monumental task) and have started excavating. Already we have found two new pits and two hearths on the Early Archaic use surface and some tools down at 3.30 meters below ground surface. That hole is DEEP. It's not field school though, so we are all being careful.