Previously Funded Projects

QRC members lead and participate in a wide range of disciplinary and interdisciplinary research projects from the study of past earth climates and glaciations to shifts in the geographic distributions and evolution of vegetation and faunal communities, to the evolution and dispersals of the genus Homo and the increasing scales of human modification of earth environments through the Holocene. QRC provides a venue for meeting and collaborating with scholars across Quaternary disciplines. We are also fortunate to be able to provide seed funding and small grants for member research projects. We are especially happy to support grad student and junior scholar research activities, much of which leads to larger, external funding from agencies like the National Science Foundation.

4 projects in Culture All Projects
  • 2018-19 | |
    • Yoli Ngandali, Student
    • Sara Gonzalez, Member

    Low-Impact Recording Methods in Rock Art Studies

    Abstract: This collections-based dissertation project includes a suite of complementary, non-destructive, or low-impact data collection methods such as archival research, collaborations with cultural advisors and elders, digital data collection, and regional spatial analyses to analyze Chinookan-Columbia River ground stone artifacts, or belongings. The focus of this investigation is to examine carved and painted portable rock art and connect them to important places on the Lower Columbia River landscape by identifying distinct artistic styles, motifs, geochemical signatures, and/or practices unique to historically documented communities. The spatial distribution and temporal range of Chinookan-Lower Columbia art forms, belongings, and associated exchange networks can help us better understand the Lower Columbia River regional dynamics of social change, group affiliation, group identity, and the histories of learned practices over many generations.

    Previous research of ground stone tools and ground stone art belongings focused on stylistic differences observed by the naked eye, but my digital and multi-spectral techniques extend the range of optical imaging, thus providing a more detailed fine-grained analysis of the practices of groundstone production, trade, use, and discard.

    This season I will conduct multi-spectral imaging and digital data collection (Technical Imaging, Ultraviolet Fluorescence, Infrared Reflectography, Visible-Induced Luminescence, Reflection Transformation Imaging, 3D photogrammetry). I will capture a collection of technical images with a modified digital camera sensitive to the spectral range of 360-860 nm to detect surface modifications such as paint preparation, evidence of use-wear, carving, and paint deterioration. These data allow me to examine the relationships and exchange networks of community art traditions, explore their connections to group identity, and analyze past land and resource use in the Lower Columbia River Region.

  • 2017-18 | |
    • Li-Ying Wang, Student
    • Ben Marwick, Faculty
    • Julian Sachs, Faculty

    A pilot geochemical analysis of food residues on ancient pottery from Kiwulan, Taiwan

    Abstract: Our current knowledge of indigenous settlements in northeastern Taiwan suggests a relatively complex social system in the 17th century, around the same time as European contact (Chen 2007; Cheng 2008; Li 2014). I am investigating that whether European contact in this region stimulated a change in indigenous social organization by examining the archaeological evidence at the Kiwulan site (600 to 100 BP, i.e. AD 1400-1900), a major late Iron Age settlement in northeastern Taiwan (Chen 2007). In order to examine the social changes that occurred as a result of the European contact, I am comparing multiple lines of archaeological evidence between the pre-contact and post-contact periods.

    This project proposes to further examine one of my foci, locally made pottery, which can reflect prehistoric socioeconomic patterns and enable me to explore the emergence of social inequality. I plan to test the hypothesis that European contact in northeastern Taiwan stimulated a change in social organization, which transformed food consumption at Kiwulan. My model predicts that one of the effects of social-economic inequality induced by European contact was greater differentiation of food consumption after European contact. I will use well-established isotope geochemistry methods to identify the types of foods stored in pots found at Kiwulan.

    Report: [pending]

  • 2016-17 | |
    • Erin Gamble, Student
    • Ben Fitzhugh, Faculty

    Northern Hokkaido Cultural Chronologies and Environmental Reconstructions from Hamanaka 2, Rebun Island, Hokkaido, Japan

    Abstract: Excavations at Hamanaka 2, a multi-component archaeological shell-midden located in Northern Japan began in 2011 as part of the joint international efforts of Dr. Andrzej Weber at University of Alberta and Dr. Hirofumi Kato at Hokkaido University. The two main focuses of the project are the life histories of hunter-gatherers using bioarchaeological methods and the formation processes of the Ainu culture. Additionally, the project is interdisciplinary and aims to combine archaeological data with environmental reconstructions of micro-regions. During the 2014 field season, a team from Institute of Geological Sciences, Section Paleontology, Freie Universität Berlin extracted a lake sediment core and collected paleobotanical remains to reconstruct the environmental archive on Rebun Island. While the sediment core has provided 57 radiocarbon dates for analysis with paleoenvironmental data spanning the last c. 17,000 years, the stratified sediment at Hamanaka 2 did not contain enough carbon below layer III to date (Muller et al 2016). Thus leaving most of the sites occupation uncorrelated with the lake core. I propose to use Optical Stimulated Luminescence (OSL) and thermoluminescence (TL) of sediment and pottery, respectively, from Hamanaka 2 to complete the comparison of the core analysis to the archaeological dates discovered on Rebun. My research will contribute “to understanding of late Quaternary climate changes and habitation environments of northern hunter-gatherers in the Hokkaido Region of Japan” (Muller et al 2016). This research also serves as a pilot project for my future dissertation research.

    Report: missing

  • 2015-16 | |
    • Sara Gonzalex, Member

    Preserving the Past Together:
A Seminar in Cultural and Environmental Heritage Management

    Abstract: This year long seminar will bring together archaeologists at the University of Washington with a diverse group of heritage professionals outside of academia. Seminar participants will discuss the current challenges and future possibilities for developing inclusive approaches to heritage management that integrate the needs of multiple stewards and stakeholders within the Pacific Northwest. Organized as a series of public lectures with discussion panels, workshops and a capstone conference, the seminar will include participants and representatives from tribal governments, local, federal, and state institutions and agencies, and professionals employed within private cultural resource management (CRM) firms. Our objectives are to build new networks of knowledge sharing among these diverse stewards and stakeholders that will result in a series of pilot community-based partnerships that address critical needs associated with preserving and protecting history and heritage within our region. From these dialogues and projects we will create an archive of best practices and guidelines for community-based approaches to archaeological practice and heritage management.

    The University of Washington is uniquely positioned to host and facilitate this dialogue. Combined with the campus’ ongoing commitment to strengthening its relationship with local tribal nations and campus initiatives designed to retain and train Native American and other indigenous descendent students, UW faculty in Anthropology, History, and AIS are currently engaged in a number of community-based heritage partnerships with tribal nations in Washington and Oregon. This seminar will draw upon these strengths, using them to provide national leadership in this critical aspect of heritage management and archaeological practice.

    Report: na

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