Archaeologists and architects draw upon theoretical perspectives from their fields to provide valuable insights into the structure, development, and meaning of prehistoric communities.Architecture is the most visible physical manifestation of human culture. The built environment envelops our lives and projects our distinctive regional and ethnic identities to the world around us. Archaeology and architecture find common theoretical ground in their perspectives of the homes, spaces,...

A timely, comprehensive reevaluation of the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex.One of the most venerable concepts in Southeastern archaeology is that of the Southern Cult. The idea has its roots in the intensely productive decade (archaeologically) of the 1930s and is fundamentally tied to yet another venerable concept—Mississippian culture. The last comprehensive study of the melding of these two concepts into the term Southeastern Ceremonial Complex (SECC) is more t...

This volume provides a comprehensive, broad-based overview, including first-person accounts, of the development and conduct of archaeology in the Southeast over the past three decades.Histories of Southeastern Archaeology originated as a symposium at the 1999 Southeastern Archaeological Conference (SEAC) organized in honor of the retirement of Charles H. McNutt following 30 years of teaching anthropology. Written for the most part by members of the first p...

The book that launched environmental history, William Cronon's Changes in the Land, now revised and updated.Winner of the Francis Parkman PrizeIn this landmark work of environmental history, William Cronon offers an original and profound explanation of the effects European colonists' sense of property and their pursuit of capitalism had upon the ecosystems of New England. Reissued here with an updated afterword by the author and a ne...

The 1996 discovery, near Kennewick, Washington, of a 9,000-year-old Caucasoid skeleton brought more to the surface than bones. The explosive controversy and resulting lawsuit also raised a far more fundamental question: Who owns history? Many Indians see archeologists as desecrators of tribal rites and traditions; archeologists see their livelihoods and science threatened by the 1990 Federal reparation law, which gives tribes control over remains in their traditional territories. In this n...

"Randel is endlessly fascinating, and Holloway’s biography tells his life with great skill." —Steve Weinberg, USA TodayJohn Randel Jr. (1787–1865) was an eccentric and flamboyant surveyor. Renowned for his inventiveness as well as for his bombast and irascibility, Randel was central to Manhattan’s development but died in financial ruin. Telling Randel’s engrossing and dramatic life story for the first time, this eye-opening biography introduces an unherald...

This fascinating book tells the story of how one museum changed ideas about dinosaurs, dynasties, and even the story of life on earth. The Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History, now celebrating its 150th anniversary, has remade the way we see the world. Delving into the museum’s storied and colorful past, award-winning author Richard Conniff introduces a cast of bold explorers, roughneck bone hunters, and visionary scientists. Some became famous for wresting Brontosaurus, Tric...

Why are African Americans so underrepresented when it comes to interest in nature, outdoor recreation, and environmentalism? In this thought-provoking study, Carolyn Finney looks beyond the discourse of the environmental justice movement to examine how the natural environment has been understood, commodified, and represented by both white and black Americans. Bridging the fields of environmental history, cultural studies, critical race studies, and geography, Finney argues that the legacie...

**Winner of the 2015 PROSE Award for US HistoryA “fascinating, encyclopedic history…of greater New York City through an ecological lens” (Publishers Weekly, starred review)—the sweeping story of one of the most man-made spots on earth.**Gotham Unbound recounts the four-century history of how hundreds of square miles of open marshlands became home to six percent of the nation’s population. Ted Steinberg brings a vanished New York back to vivid, rich life. Y...

Louisiana, the Bayou State, is famous for many things, including savory cuisine, great music, and a resident population whose mantra is laissez les bons temps roulerlet the good times roll! The place is also noted for its historic architecture, which ranges from simple forms such as the shotgun house or the Creole cottage to the celebrated plantation homes along the River Road.Bayou Built: The Legacy of Louisianas Historic Architecture examines th...

A Smithsonian Book of the YearA Nature Book of the Year“Provides much-needed foundation of the relationship between museums and Native Americans.”—SmithsonianIn 1864 a US Army doctor dug up the remains of a Dakota man who had been killed in Minnesota and sent the skeleton to a museum in Washington that was collecting human remains for research. In the “bone rooms” of the Smithsonian, a scientific rev...

A masterly and beautifully written account of the impact of Alexander von Humboldt on nineteenth-century American history and cultureThe naturalist and explorer Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) achieved unparalleled fame in his own time. Today, however, he and his enormous legacy to American thought are virtually unknown. In The Humboldt Current, Aaron Sachs traces Humboldt's pervasive influence on American history through examining the work of four expl...