Faculty Activities

Recent Faculty Activities (2007-2008)

John Relethford has published a review of the book “Mapping Our Ancestors: Phylogenetic Approaches in Anthropology and Prehistory,” edited by CP Lipo, MJ O’Brien, M Collard, and SJ Sheenan, in the latest issue of the American Journal of Physical Anthropology (136:243-244, 2008).
John Relethford is the author of an article in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology entitled “Geostatistics and spatial analysis in biological anthropology” (136:1-10, 2008). The paper applies and extends methods developed in geology for spatial analysis to biological data, showing ways of interpreting spatial variation in terms of microevolutionary processes. The methods are illustrated using a large data set of body and craniofacial measures from thousands of adult human males from 197 locations in Ireland. The results show that the major patterns of spatial variation correspond to historical settlement and immigration events and to the influence of Viking invasion.
John Relethford is the author of an entry entitled "Modern human origins: The 'Out of Africa' debate" in the online Encyclopedia of Life Sciences (John Wiley and Sons).
Don Hill has published an entry entitled "Ethnomusicology" in the International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, Vol. 3 (ed. by W.A. Darity, Jr.), second edition, 2008. Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, pp. 19-20.
Don Hill's research was highlighted in an article in The Tri-State Defender. The article outlines Hill's research on locating the heirs of blues singers recorded by Hill and others in the 1950s and 1960s. The article can be read here.
John Relethford presented an invited paper entitled “The State of the Art in the Origin of Humans” as part of a symposium on “Major Transformations in Evolution: The State of the Art and Public Understanding” at the 174^thannual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Boston, February 18. The purpose of this symposium was to present current developments in evolution biology with particular focus on what the public and the media need to know about major evolutionary transitions. The topics included presentation on major evolutionary changes, including the origin of life, the origin of body plans, and the origin of tetrapods. Relethford spoke on human origins, and described a “top-10” list of what the public and media should know about human origins and evolution.
John Relethford is the author of an article entitled "Genetic variation among populations" in Encyclopedia of Race and Racism, edited by J.H. Moore (Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, Volume 2, pp. 29-34.
Renee Walker was a coauthor of two papers presented at this years annual meeting of the Southeastern Archaeological Conference, October 31 to November 3, 2007, in Knoxville, TN. The first paper was presented by Dr. Walker (coauthored with Lara Homsey of Murray State University and Kandi D. Hollenbach of the University of Tennessee) was entitled "Investigating archaeological correlates for food processing at Dust Cave, Alabama." Dr. Walker was the third author on the second paper (coauthored with Katherine E. McMillan and Kandace D. Hallenbach, both of the University of Tennesee) which was entitled "Socioeconomic perspectives on the Late Paleoindian at Dust Cave, Alabama."
Don Hill is the author of a new book entitled Caribbean Folklore: A Handbook, published by Greenwood Press. This volume is designed as a reference work in Caribbean folklore. It touches on many aspects of folklore, including myths, folktales, festivals, music, dance, folk art and architecture, and theater.

Sallie Han presented a paper entitled "With a little help from my friends: The significance of friendships during pregnancy" at the 11th Annual Conference of the Association for Research on Mothering, October 18-20, 2007 in Toronto. This paper was part of a session entitled "Community and Maternal Well-Being," which was chaired by Dr. Han.
Cynthia Klink presented a paper entitled "Eschewing negative evidence: What Early Preceramic toolstone usage suggests about the colonization of the Lake Titicaca basin" at the 26th Annual Northeast Conference of Andean Archaeology and Ethnohistory in Ithaca, NY, October 12-14.
Renee Walker presented a lecture to the Delaware-Otsego Audubon Society entitled "Birds and Archaeology: The Role of Birds in the Study of Past Human Behavior" on September 21, 2007. This presentation explored what bird remains from archaeological sites can tell us about human behavior.
Renee Walker is the coeditor of a book entitled Bones as Tools: Current Methods and Interpretations in Worked Bone Studies, published through British Archaeological Reports. This volume, coedited with Christian Gates St. Pierre, includes work on bone tools from archaeological sites across the world. Dr. Walker also has a chapter in the book, entitled "A diachronic study of pre- and post-contact bone, antler, and shell artifacts from New York State.

John Relethford has published the seventh edition of his introductory textbook The Human Species: An Introduction to Biological Anthropology (Mc Graw-Hill, New York, 2008). The previous edition was used at 140 colleges and universities in 39 states. The text covers the major areas within biological anthropology, and consists of 17 chapters in four sections: 1. Evolutionary Background, 2. Our Place in Nature, 3. Our Origins, and 4. Our Diversity.

John Relethford is the author of a chapter entitled "Population genetics and paleoanthropology" that appeared in Handbook of Paleoanthropology, Vol. 1: Principles, Methods and Approaches, edited by W. Henke and I. Tattersall (Springer, 2007, pp. 621-641).
John Relethford wrote a presentation on "Race and global patterns of phenotypic variation" as part of a symposium on "Race Reconciled? How Biological Anthropologists View Human Variation," Maxwell Museum of Anthropology, May 24, 2007. His presentation was read by Keith Hunley, one of the symposium co-organizers.
Don Hill is the coauthor of a book and co-compiler of a ten CD set entitled West Indian Rhythm, published by Bear Family Records in Hamburg, Germany. The book contains essays on calypso, carnival, songs of World War II, West Indian song styles, and other topics. The authors of this collection recently won the 2007 ARSC (Association for Recorded Sound Collections) award for "best discography." The authors were also finalists in the category of "best history." The award was announced at the ARSC meeting on May 5, 2007 in Milwaukee.

Renee Walker recently participated in the annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, held in Austin, TX. She served as chair of a symposium entitled "Continuing the Legacy: Papers in Memory of Paul W. Parmalee." She also presented a paper entitled "Dogs in caves: Implications of dog burials in cave contexts" which was part of a symposium on "Rituals in U.S. Caves, Rockshelters, and Sinks." Dr. Walker also serves as a member of the Dienje Kenyon scholarship committee.
Brian Haley was Discussant in a session titled, “Identity and Colonialism in California, 1769-1848,” at the annual meetings of the Society for American Archaeology, held in Austin, Texas, April 25-29. He also presented a paper titled “The ethics of not questioning indigeneity” in a session on “Archaeologists as gatekeepers of Native American and Native Hawaiian identity.”
Cynthia Klink is author of “The Lithic Assemblage at Kasapata,” and joint author of “The Archaic Period of the Cuzco Valley,” both of which are chapters in Kasapata and the Archaic Period of the Cuzco Valley (Brian Bauer, ed., Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, University of California, Los Angeles). The site of Kasapata is the oldest excavated archaeological site in the Cuzco Valley, the heartland of the Inca empire. The site dates to 4950 BCE, and is the first site excavated in the region that was inhabited by pre-agricultural hunter-gatherers. Most of the materials recovered were stone tools and byproducts of their manufacture, which Ms. Klink was responsible for analyzing.
Don Hill is one of three faculty at SUNY College at Oneonta to receive a 2007 SUNY Research Foundation Research and Scholarship Award.
Brian Haley has been elected a Fellow of the Society for Applied Anthropology. Fellows of the Society are members who have demonstrated leadership in the field and assumed and executed responsibilities for the Society.
Don Hill is coauthor (with Ray Funk) of a chapter entitled "Will calypso doom rock 'n roll: The U.S. calypso craze of 1957" that appears in Trinidad Carnival: The Cultural Politics of a Transnational Festival, edited by G.L. Green and P.W. Scher (Indiana University Press, 2008).
Renee Walker is the senior editor of the book Foragers of the Terminal Pleistocene in North America, published by the Uni v ersity of Nebraska Pr ess (2007). The book is co-edited by Boyce Driskell of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Tennessee. The book reviews archaeological evidence showing that big-game hunting was only one of a number of different foraging strategies used by prehistoric Native Americans. In addition to being the senior editor of the book, Dr. Walker also wrote the introductory chapter (with Boyce Driskell) entitled "Introduction: New developments in Paleoindian subsistence studies" and a chapter on her Alabama zooarchaeological research entitled "Hunting in the Late Paleoindian Period: Faunal remains from Dust Cave, Alabama.
John Relethford attended the 2007 Annual Meeting of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists where he concluded his two-year term as President of the organization. He will spend an additional year on the AAPA Executive Committee as Past-President. Ten members of the Anthropology Club also attended the meeting.
Don Hill and colleague David Mangurian have received a grant from the Grammy Foundation for digitizing approximately 60 hours of blues, "old timey," jazz, and folk field recordings they made throughout the United States between 1958 and 1961. The Archive of the American Folklife Center of the Library of Congress has agreed to house the collection and make it available on a non-commercial basis to the public and to scholars, once it has been digitized and once all rights to the recordings have been cleared with the heirs of the musicians the recorded and with the composers of the songs they recorded.
Cynthia Klink has accepted an invitation from Professor Jose Luis Lanata, University of Buenos Aires, be an “associated investigator” of the Paleoindian Database of the Americas (PIDBA), a new international effort to compile, manage, and present data on Paleoindians from throughout the Americas. She will be in charge of Peru and Bolivia data, finding and reviewing data from these countries, and helping to plan and structure the data’s presentation.
Brian Haley has published an article entitled "Tribal synthesis or ethnogenesis? Campbell's interpretation of Haley and Wilcoxen" in The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute (13:219-222, 2007).
John Relethford is the author of a book chapter entitled "The use of quantitative traits in anthropological genetic studies of population structure and history" that appears in the volume Anthropological Genetics: Theory, Methods and Applications, edited by M.H. Crawford (Cambridge University Press, 2007, pp. 187-209).

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