Professor Vincas Steponaitis

• Office: Alumni Building, Room 108
• Hours: Thursday 2:00 pm-3:00 pm, and by appointment (set up by email or call 962-6574)
• Email: vin@unc.edu

• Office: Battle Hall, Room 306
• Hours: Tuesday 9:00 am-12:00 pm, and by appointment (set up by email)
• Email: nyman@email.unc.edu

Course Description: This course will survey the archaeology of North America, with an emphasis on the eastern and southwestern United States.

Course Structure: There will be two lectures per week. Films and guest lectures will be scheduled at various times during the semester.

Meeting Times:  The course meets on Tuesdays and Thursdays, 9:30-10:45 am, in Peabody 104. In addition, recitation sections will meet on the following days:

• Tuesday-Thursday, January 24-26
• Tuesday-Thursday, February 14-16
• Tuesday-Thursday, March 13-15
• Tuesday-Thursday, April 3-5
• Tuesday-Thursday, April 10-12

Required Texts:
George Milner, The Moundbuilders: Ancient Peoples of Eastern North America (1st edition).
Stephen Plog, Ancient Peoples of the American Southwest (2nd edition).

Course Requirements: In addition to the assigned readings, course requirements will include the following: a midterm exam (25%, taken in class on 2/23), a 10-12 page term paper (30%, due on 4/24), and a final exam (40%, taken at 12 pm on 5/3). Note that you must also submit a term-paper prospectus (due 2/16) and a term-paper progress report (due 3/22), each no more than a page long; these assignments will constitute the remaining 5% of your grade.

Honor Code: Students are expected to adhere to UNC's Honor Code. All written work must be accompanied by a signed pledge attesting that the student has neither given nor received unauthorized aid in completing the assignment. (One can use the short form and simply write "Pledge" followed by a signature.)

Course Syllabus:  Click here for a PDF version of the latest course syllabus. Note that the paper syllabus does not contain all the information and links that appear here in the course web site.

Course Web Site: This web site contains not only all the information in the course syllabus, but also web versions of slide shows pertinent to the class and links to other relevant web sites. It will be continually updated throughout the semester. Note also that all the assigned and optional articles published in Science, American Antiquity, and Annual Review of Anthropology are available on the web from JSTOR, which can be accessed from any campus computer; to access this site from home, you must do so through the UNC Library catalog. Articles in Scientific American and American Scientist are also available electronically through the Library catalog.

E-Reserves Page: Electronic copies of most articles assigned as readings for this course can be accessed through the library's E-Reserves service on the Anth 450 course page.

Slides: For links to slide presentations shown since the start of the semester, click here.

Google Earth: To download the Google Earth placemark file for Chaco Canyon, click here. This is a "zip" file from which the actual placemark file, called Chaco.kml, must be extracted and placed on your hard drive. With Google Earth installed, just double-click on the placemark file, and Google Earth will take you to Chaco Canyon. Individual sites will be flagged with pushpins, and you can zoom into each by clicking on the site's name in the "Places" window on the left.
 

Schedule
1/10   Introduction.
1/12-1/17   Peopling of the Americas.
1/19-2/7   Paleoindian cultures.
2/9-2/21   Eastern Archaic cultures.   [Termpaper prospectus due 2/16]
2/23   Midterm Examination (in class)
2/28-3/1    Early and Middle Woodland cultures.
3/13-3/15    North Carolina archaeology.
3/20-3/27    Mississippian cultures.   [Termpaper progress report due 3/22]
3/29   Late Northeastern cultures.
4/3-4/5    The Southwest, AD 200-700.
4/10-4/12    The Southwest, AD 700-1130.
4/17-4/19    The Southwest, after AD 1130.
4/24    European incursions.   [Termpaper due 4/24]
5/3   Final Examination (12:00 pm)
 

Links
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Department of Anthropology, UNC-CH
Curriculum in Archaeology, UNC-CH
Research Laboratories of Archaeology, UNC-CH

Last modified 4/11/12.