CONTEXTS

The Annual Report of the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology Volume 42 Spring 2017

1 1
 About the Museum
The mission of the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology is to inspire
creative and critical thinking about global cultures, past and present,
and to foster interdisciplinary understandings of the material world.
Established in 1956, it sponsors original research, innovative teaching,
and public education while stewarding a collection of over one million
archaeological and ethnographic objects. The Museum serves Brown
Universitys students and faculty, the city of Providence, the state of
Rhode Island, and the general public.
The museums gallery is in Manning Hall, 21 Prospect Street, Providence,
Rhode Island, on Browns main green. The museums Collections
Research Center is at 300 Tower Street, Bristol, Rhode Island.

Manning Hall Gallery Hours:

Tuesday Sunday, 10 a.m. 4 p.m.

Collections Research Center:

Hours: by appointment

Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology

Box 1965
Brown University
Providence, RI 02912
(401) 863-5700
haffenreffermuseum@brown.edu
www.brown.edu/Haffenreffer
www.facebook.com/HaffenrefferMuseum
www.twitter.com/HaffenrefferMus
www.instagram.com/Haffenreffer_Museum

Contexts
Editor: Kevin Smith
Designed and produced in partnership with Brown Graphic Services
2017 Brown University

On the covers: Front cover: Whirling Return of the Ancestors: Egngn Masquerade
Ensembles of the Yorub exhibition at the RISD Museum. Back Cover: Detail from the
birchbark kayak on exhibit in the Northern Horizons, Global Visions: J. Louis Giddings
and the Invention of the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology exhibition at Manning Hall.

2 2
 These are challenging times for the museum
community. As of this writing, it is not clear what
From the Director
funding levels will be approved for our national
arts and science organizations. At the same time,
there is greater need than ever before for
museums to help foster intercultural
understanding, environmental awareness, and
the value of diversity to democracy and civil
society. The Haffenreffer Museum is committed
to these principles and seeks to realize them
through our exhibitions, lectures, workshops,
research, teaching, and public outreach.

Last year from May 31-June 2, the Haffenreffer

Museum hosted the fifth of six Arctic Horizons
workshops funded by the National Science
Foundations Arctic Social Science Program.
Coordinated by Deputy Director Kevin Smith, the
workshop brought together nearly 40 researchers
working on multidisciplinary natural/social science
projects in the North with policy makers focused on
Northern issues. Some of the questions addressed
included: What are the most important changes
affecting the Arctic now and in the coming decades?
What have been the most crucial advances in
Arctic social sciences over the past two decades?
What key questions remain unanswered regarding
integrated social and social-ecological systems in
the Arctic that require concerted research effort
in the next 10-15 years? The answers to these
questions will help to shape the course of American Our research continues to gain grant support and
Arctic social sciences research and funding. public attention. Bob Preucels Pueblo Revolt
research was featured in Archaeology Magazine
On October 21, Chancellor Samuel Mencoff (March/April issue). Kevin Smiths research at
opened our 60th anniversary exhibition, during Surtshellir Cave in Iceland was then featured in
Browns Family Weekend! The exhibition, curated the next issue (May/June issue). Michle Hayeur
by Kevin Smith, showcases the museums Smith received a supplement to her NSF-Arctic
longstanding commitment to Arctic scholarship. Social Science grant and is continuing her exciting
Entitled Northern Horizons, Global Visions: J. research on womens roles in the production and
Louis Giddings and the Invention of the Haffenreffer trade of cloth across the North Atlantic from the
Museum of Anthropology, it examines the life and Viking Age until the early 1800s.
legacy of J. Louis and Bets Giddings as well as
the contributions of Doug and Wanni Anderson We continue to host our popular public lecture
and their students. One of the highlights of the series and programs. Dr. Chip Colwell (Denver
exhibition is a remarkable birch-bark kayak that Museum of Nature and Science) gave this years
merges Athabascan and Inuit technologies, from Barbara A. and Edward G. Hail Lecture entitled
Alaskas Kobuk River, where Brown has conducted The Diorama Dilemma: Is There a Future for
archaeological and ethnographic research for Anthropology in Museums? and this was just one of
60 years. six major events this term!

Our Mellon Foundation-funded Assemblages
Project with the RISD Museum has expanded
to include a joint exhibition. When an opening
emerged in the RISD Museums exhibition
schedule, we decided to use it to feature the
exhibition Whirling Return of the Ancestors: Egngn
Masquerade Ensembles of the Yorb. The exhibition
was co-curated by Bolaji Campbell (History of
Art and Visual Culture, RISD), Henry Drewal (Art
History and Afro-American Studies, University
of Wisconsin-Madison), and Kate Irvin (Costume
and Textiles, RISD Museum) and opened on July
15. It brings to life the rich and varied artistry of
the ensembles worn in Egngn performances of
the Yorb peoples of West Africa. The curators
and the artist Alagba Adesegun Oyewole gave a
wonderful panel presentation on October 16.
Our public outreach program serves nearly 2,700
Pre-K to High School students in Rhode Island
and Southeastern Massachusetts every year, with
eight Culture CaraVan programs and six educational
packages that include lesson plans available
online. In collaboration with Browns Joukowsky
Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World
and the RISD Museum we also take our nationally
recognized program Think Like an Archaeologist to
Middle Schools around Providence and elsewhere
in Rhode Island.
Thank you for your continued commitment and
support of the Haffenreffer Museum.
Robert W. Preucel
3
 New Faculty Fellows selected
Faculty, Student, and Staff News
We appointed six Faculty Fellows for the 2016-
2017 term. These are Sheila Bonde (Professor
and Chair of History of Art and Architecture,
Professor of Archaeology and the Ancient
World), Jessaca Leinaweaver (Associate
Professor of Anthropology, Director of Latin
American and Caribbean Studies), Linford
Fisher (Associate Professor of History),
Courtney Martin (Professor of History of Art
and Architecture), Andrew Scherer (Associate
Professor of Anthropology, Associate
Professor of Archaeology and the Ancient
World), and Parker VanValkenburgh (Assistant
Professor of Anthropology).
Museum Studies Postdoc
reappointed
Kaitlin McCormick has been reappointed as a
Postdoctoral Research Associate in Anthropology
and Museum Studies. Kaitlin is a specialist
in Northwest Coast cultures and teaches our
introductory museum studies class, Anthropology
in/of the Museum [ANTH 1901]
Grad Student awarded 6th Year
Interdisciplinary Fellowship
Mikhail Skoptsov (Modern Culture and Media)
has been award a 6th year Interdisciplinary
Fellowship with the Museum. He will be
examining the circulation of digital images of
museum objects to understand some of the ways
in which they are used by different publics.
Department of Anthropology
Proctor appointed
Alexandra Peck, an Anthropology graduate
student specializing in Museum Studies, was
appointed proctor for the Fall 2016 semester. She
helped edit text and locate photographs for the
Giddings exhibition and assisted Director Robert
Preucel in his assessment of the RISD Museums
ethnographic North American collections.
HMA receives an IMLS Museum
Assessment Program award
The HMA was selected to participate in the
Museum Assessment ProgramCollections
Stewardship Program funded by the Institute of
Museum and Library Services and administered
by the American Alliance of Museums. We
welcomed our external reviewer Kyle Bryner
(Museum of the Shenandoah Valley) in February.
4
Registrar attends AAM Annual
meeting
Dawn Kimbrel represented the Haffenreffer
Museum at the Annual Conference of the
American Alliance of Museums in St. Louis, MO,
May 6-11. The theme of the conference was
Gateways for Understanding: Diversity, Equity,
Accessibility, and Inclusion in Museums. It is
particularly relevant to the HMAs participation in
MAP-CS and our interest in accreditation.
Museum Operations
and Communications
Coordinator hired
The Museum has hired Emily Jackson as
our new Operations and Communications
Coordinator. Emily holds a Master of Arts degree
in Anthropology from the University of Edinburgh
and is a specialist in social media and its uses in
online communities.
Research Affiliate appointed
Robert Weiner has been appointed as a Research
Affiliate. Rob received his BA/MA from Browns
Joukowsky Institute of Archaeology and the
Ancient World last year and is specializing in the
role of gambling in understanding social practices
within Chacoan society. He is an Associate with
Anna Sofaers Solstice Project.
Curator for Programs and
Education joins the Rhode Island
Historical Society
After nearly nine years with the Haffenreffer
Museum, Geralyn Ducady has taken a new
position as Director of the Rhode Island Historical
Societys Newell D. Goff Center for Education and
Public Programs. Arianna Riva has been hired
as the Acting Curator of Program and Education,
while a national search is undertaken for a new
Manager of Museum Programs and Education.
Mellon Photographic Assistant
takes a job at the University
of Pittsburgh
Sophia Sobers accepted a position as Visiting
Assistant Professor in Studio Arts at the
University of Pittsburgh, after working with
the Museum on our Assemblages project
for nearly two years. She exhibited her
work nationally, and received grants and
commissions from The Puffin Foundation and
other organizations to create works centered
around the theme of the environment.
 New Mellon Photographic
Faculty, Student, and Staff News
Assistant hired
Caleb Churchill has been hired as our new Mellon
Photographic Assistant. Caleb is a practicing
artist, whose work has been exhibited in festivals
including the Brighton Photo Fringe (Brighton,
England) and Flash Forward Festival (Boston).
He has participated in multiple group exhibitions
nationally and internationally. His solo exhibition
Terra Incognita was presented at Settlement
Goods (Houston, Texas).
Greeter joins Tomaquag Museum
Anthony Belz, the face of Manning Hall for nearly
seven years, accepted a new position as Archivist
for the Tomaquag Museum. He will continue
working with the HMA as a Consulting Archivist.
Students take on increasing roles
Morayo Akande, Pinar Durgun, Aram Martin, and
Jessica Nelson, graduate and undergraduate
students at Brown, are serving as Visitor Service
Coordinators in Manning Hall, as we assess
new opportunities for staffing our gallery and
providing students with experiences in museum
interpretation, while Lena Bohman, Brandon
Dale, Pinar Durgun, Vala Fatah, Zoe Gilbard,
Felix Guo, Jena (Jung Ah) Lee, Arrya (Fuyuan)
Luo, Flannery McIntyre, Jessica Nelson, Ayomide
Omobo, Sydney Roach, Candy (Xiao) Rui, and Liza
Ruzicka have joined us as CultureLab Assistants.
Director co-organizes a
session at the SAA meetings
Robert Preucel co-organized a session with Sam
Duwe (University of Oklahoma) on Pueblo Mobility
and the Archaeology of Becoming at the Society for
American Archaeologys 82nd annual meeting in
Vancouver, Canada. He also coauthored a paper
with Joseph Aguilar (Penn) entitled Seeking
Strength and Protection: Tewa Mobility during the
Pueblo Revolt Period.
Director moderates panel on
Indigenous Archaeology
Robert Preucel moderated a panel entitled
Trailblazing an Indigenous Archaeology: New
Methodologies at the School for Advanced
Research in Santa Fe. The panelists were Joseph
Aguilar (Penn), Lindsay Montgomery (Arizona)
and Tim Wilcox (Stanford).
Deputy Director presents at
the SAA meetings
Kevin Smith presented a paper entitled
Dependent Independence? Identity,
Interconnection, and Isolation in Viking
Age Iceland in the symposium Identity and
Change: Archaeological Interaction across
Archipelagos and Inland Seas at the Society for
American Archaeologys annual meetings in
Vancouver, Canada.
Research Associate presents at
the SAA meetings
Michele Hayeur Smith gave a paper entitled
Globalization, Trade and Magic: Weaving the
Threads of Icelands Viking Age Textiles in a
session organized by the Fiber and Perishables
Interest Group at the Society for American
Archaeologys meetings in Vancouver, Canada.
Research Affiliate presents at
the SAA meetings
Rob Weiner gave a paper entitled Playing with
Fate: A Relational and Sensory Approach to
Pilgrimage at Chaco Canyon and coauthored
a paper with Lindsay Shepard, Christopher
Schwartz, and Ben Nelson entitled Blue-
Green Stone Mosaics in the US Southwest and
Northwestern Mexico: Origins, Spatiotemporal
Distribution, and Potential Meanings, which
was also presented at the Society for American
Archaeologys meetings in Vancouver, Canada.
Researcher studies
Southwestern collections
Vincent Drucker (Independent scholar) visited the
museum last fall to examine our Southwestern
pottery collection. He and Edward Wade are
working on a book project on the celebrated late-
19th century potter, Nampeyo.
Researcher studies Algonquin
collection
Curtis Collins (Director and Program Chair,
Yukon School of Visual Arts) visited the museum
to examine Algonquin octopus bags and pouches.
He is interested in their wide distribution across
different Native American and First Nation
cultures.
5
 Sociologist using HMA for survey
Faculty, Student, and Staff News
and marketing course
Carrie Spearin (Sociology, Brown) is using the
Haffenreffer Museum as a case study for her
course on survey and marketing. Class members
will survey students, faculty, and members
of the general public to gain a sense of their
understanding of the Museum and its resources,
learning through the process questionnaire
design and formatting; sample design and
selection; interviewing techniques; data base
design and data entry; and elementary data
analysis and report production.
Graduate student teaches a
course on Cultural Heritage
Ian Randall (Joukowsky Institute of Archaeology
and the Ancient World), last years recipient of a
6th Year Interdisciplinary Fellowship, taught
a course entitled ISIS, NAGPRA, and the
Academy: Archaeology and Global Issues in
Cultural Heritage.
Haffenreffer and Smithsonian
Institutions Arctic Studies Center
begin collaborative project
Igor Krupnik (Senior Curator of Northern and
Arctic Ethnography, Smithsonian Institution,
Department of Anthropology and Arctic Studies
Center) met some unexpected old friends during
the opening reception for the Haffenreffers
Arctic Horizons workshop on May 31, 2016.
Walking through our exhibition Northern Visions:
The Arctic Photography of J. Louis Giddings (1901-
1964), he was surprised to see black-and-white
portraits taken by Giddings in 1939 of men and
women from Alaskas Saint Lawrence Island
whose faces were familiar. Some years ago, he
had developed a collaborative project to digitally
repatriate images in the Smithsonians collections
of St. Lawrence Island community members that
were taken on St. Lawrence Island in the mid-
20th century. Working with todays elders, he
brought images of their family members back
to the community and added their memories
of those people to the SIs records. In May, he
recognized some of the same people in Giddingss
photographs, as well as others that were new
to him. Unfortunately, although Giddings surely
knew the names of the men, women, and
children he photographed, they are not recorded
with his images. We are now working with the
Smithsonians Arctic Studies Center to bring
copies of his images back to St. Lawrence Island
and to add the elders knowledge of these people
to our records.
6
Faculty, students, and staff take
the temperature of the past
In 2015, Yongsong Huang (Professor of Earth,
Environmental and Planetary Science), Peter
Van Dommelen (Professor of Archaeology and
Anthropology and Director of the Joukowsky
Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient
World), Andrew Scherer (Assistant Professor
of Anthropology) and Deputy Director Kevin
Smith received a collaborative Brown University
Research Seed Grant for their project Climatic
and environmental reconstruction using lipid
biomarkers in ancient bones: applications in
archaeology, anthropology, paleoclimatology
and paleontology. This project is using climate-
sensitive bacterial lipid compounds (branched
glycerol dialkyl glycerol tetraethers or b-GDGTs)
to extract data on past temperatures, soil pH, and
precipitation directly from animal or human bone
samples. The project was awarded additional
funding to provide collaborative research and
training opportunities for five undergraduate
students through Browns Karen T. Romer
Undergraduate Teaching and Research Awards
program. Three worked on material from the
Museums Circumpolar Lab and our NSF-funded
projects. Julia Deng worked on bones from
Giddings and Douglas Andersons excavations
on Cape Krusenstern, Alok Beeharry processed
and analyzed bones from Surtshellir cave (see p.
22), and Jacob Douglas worked on faunal remains
from earlier excavations at Gilsbakki, Iceland.
Results from this years work are encouraging and
emerging now.
Museum Research Associate
creates the North Women Arts
Collaborative (NWAC)
Michele Hayeur Smith initiated The Northern
Women Arts Collaborative (NWAC) as an outgrowth
of her NSF-funded projects. NWAC seeks to link
academic social science research on traditional
womens work especially (but not limited
to) the production of textiles, skin clothing, or
cloth in the North with contemporary artists
and artisans. Through this project, Dr. Hayeur
Smith is encouraging artists and researchers
to collaborate on projects exploring themes of
shared interest and of concern to contemporary
women in the circumpolar North.
NWAC is not restricted to one nation or
community. Its goals are to integrate ideas,
creativity, research, and artistry across the
circumpolar zone in order to explore how women
were respected and their work valued in the past;
to revalorize womens roles through the arts; and
to bring greater awareness to the rapid cultural,
social, economic, and environmental changes
that are under way across the Arctic and the ways
they affect womens roles and values within their
communities. Visit https://northernwomen.org.
 Mellon Teaching Fellows
Assemblages
The Assemblages Project promotes dialogue and critical discussion at the intersections of art,
anthropology, and materiality across the Brown and RISD campuses. One of the most important ways we
are accomplishing this goal is to share faculty through our Mellon Teaching Fellows program. Each year
of the four-year project, the Mellon Advisory Committee appoints one Brown faculty member to work with
the RISD Museum and one RISD faculty member to work with the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology.

The Teaching Fellows develop new curricula, create new exhibitions (either online or in museum
galleries), and lead teaching workshops. The new Teaching Fellows for 2017-2018 are Steven Lubar
(Brown University), who will be working with the RISD Museum and Duane Slick and Martin Smick
(RISD), who will be developing a joint project with the Haffenreffer Museum.

Steven Lubar is Professor in the Departments of

American Studies, History, and the History of Art
and Architecture at Brown University. He
teaches and advises in Browns public
humanities program, which he directed from
2004-2014, and served as Director of the
Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology from
2010-2012. Before coming to Brown, Dr. Lubar
was chair of the Division of the History of
Technology at the Smithsonian Institutions
National Museum of American History. He co-
curated numerous exhibits, including Engines
of Change, Information Age, and America on
the Move. He has authored or co authored
InfoCulture, History from Things, The Philosophy
of Manufactures, Engines of Change, and
Legacies: Collecting Americas History at the
Smithsonian, as well as many articles on the
history of technology and public history.
Recently, at Brown, he led the Jenks Societys
Lost Museums project and exhibition (see below
and p. 30). A recent recipient of a Guggenheim
Fellowship, he is working on a book on
museums and museum history.

7
Assemblages
Duane Slick is Professor of Painting at RISD. His
studio practice includes painting, printmaking,
artist books, and storytelling. He is of Native
American descent, an enrolled member of the
Meskwaki Nation of Iowa; his mother is from the
Ho-Chunk Nation of Nebraska. His visual work
blends oral and visual Native American traditions,
focusing on trickster strategies and Woodland
Nations patterning. Born in Waterloo, IA, Slick
earned his BFA in painting from the University of
Northern Iowa and his MFA in painting from the
University of California, Davis. He began teaching
painting and printmaking at RISD in 1995. He has
also lectured at colleges and universities across
the US and taught at the Institute of American
Indian Arts in Santa Fe, NM. His work has been
exhibited widely most recently at the Albert
Merola Gallery in Provincetown, MA, and at RK
Projects in New York City and is included in
the collections of the National Museum of the
American Indian in New York City, the Eiteljorg
Museum in Indianapolis, and the De Cordova
Museum in Lincoln, MA, among many others. Slick
is currently represented by the Albert Merola
Gallery in Provincetown.

Martin Smickis an Adjunct Lecturer in Painting

at RISD.He received his BFA in 2000 from
Washington University in St Louis and his MFA
in 2009 from RISD. He was a 2009-2010 Fellow
at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown,
MA. Beginning in 2001, he earned his living as a
muralist and decorative painter in Los Angeles and
New York, working for the architectural restoration
firm Evergreene Painting Studios. Notable
projects include a Richard Haas mural in Brooklyn
completed in 2006 and murals for the Atlantis
Hotel in Dubai.Hehas had several gallery and
museum exhibitions, most recently atYellow Peril
Galleryin Providence and a joint exhibition with
Duane Slick atFruitlands Museumin Harvard, MA.

8
Assemblages

The Return of the Ancestors: Assemblages

Exhibition at RISD Museum
Bolaji Campbell, Professor and Department Head, History of Art and Visual
Culture (RISD)
Whirling Return of the Ancestors: Egngn engaged in dialogue with an artist-priest, Alagbaa
Masquerade Ensembles of the Yorb, which opened Adesegun Oyewole, from Oyotunji African Village
to the public at the RISD Museum on July 15, 2016, in Sheldon, South Carolina, and with a panel that
as part of Brown and RISDs Mellon Foundation- included Thierry Gentis, the Museums Curator
funded Assemblages project, showcased a dynamic and NAGPRA Coordinator, Kate Irvin, Curator of
exhibition of 20th century Yorb masquerade Costume and Textiles at the RISD Museum.
ensembles and related elements selected from the
collection of the Haffenreffer Museum, juxtaposed
with a newly made piece from the Republic of
Benin, commissioned by the RISD Museum of Art.
The exhibitions co-curators were Henry John
Drewal, Professor of Afro-American Studies and
Art History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison,
and Bolaji Campbell, Professor and Department
Head in the Department of History of Art and Visual
Culture at RISD. Whirling Return of the Ancestors
ran through January 8, 2017.

This exhibition created a platform for realizing the

stated mission of collaboration between the two
institutions that lies at the heart of Assemblages,
and at the same time mirrors the salient tenets
lying at the core of Egngn masquerade
performances and celebrations. Every aspect of its
making, consecration, and presentation reflected
the spirit of this dynamic artistic process uniting
men and women, young and old, artists and
priests, as well as passionate devotees and casual
admirers in unending acts of dialogic reflection,
social interactivity, spectacle, and wonders.
Several programs were organized in relation with
the exhibition. These included Critical Encounters,
on October 16, 2016 at the Chace Center
Auditorium, where the exhibitions co-curators
In a bid at fostering further dialogue with faculty,
students and the general public about the
exhibition there was an informal gathering in the
Gallery entitled Double Take, on November 11, 2016.
The event featured a series of conversations
between two of Browns Africanist scholars,
Anani Dzidzienyo, Associate Professor of Africana,
Portuguese, and Brazilian Studies and Olakunle
George, Associate Professor of Africana Studies
and English. The forum provided an opportunity
for the literary scholars, culture historians, and
critics to comment on the objects on display
while revealing their unique perspectives on first
encounters with Egngn pageantry both in Nigeria
and in Brazil.
9
 To Study, To Draw
Assemblages
Masha Ryskin, Mellon Teaching Fellow
It has been a privilege to work at the Haffenreffer My goal for this fellowship is multi-faceted
Museum as the Mellon Teaching Fellow. I am and open-ended. At this point, I am making
studying pre-Columbian Peruvian textiles from progress towards putting together the teaching
the collection to gain a deeper understanding of collection of the textiles, in collaboration with
their designs and to build a teaching collection the Mellon Photography Fellow, Caleb Churchill.
that is documented and available to art and Discoveries are made every day and I am gaining
design faculty at RISD. a new understanding of the iconography and
diversity of design in Peruvian textiles. There
Much has been written about Peruvian design are also surprises. The fabrics have become an
and techniques. I began by reading about the unexpected influence in my own work, with their
textiles and the iconography in their historical motifs making their way into my paintings, while
contexts, then proceeded to study the works the gauzes are becoming a spring-board to a new
from the three collections at the Haffenreffer series of drawings. As I study the textiles, new
Museum. The subtlety and complexity of design ideas for prompts and assignments are forming,
was overwhelming. The more I looked, the more both for drawing and design classes.
I noticed. Eventually, it occurred to me that in
order to truly understand the design and the I would like to thank Dawn Kimbrel and Thierry
structure of these works, I needed to spend time Gentis for their generosity; Kevin Smith, Robert
with them more intimately. Drawing seemed to be Preucel, the staff at Haffenreffer, and the Brown-
the best possible way to achieve this. RISD Mellon Fellowship Committee for making
this project possible.
Drawing is a direct process, and is much more
intimate than photography. The process forced
me to understand the structure of the gauze
fabrics and to make sense of the design of the
woven and painted ones. Through drawing, I
began to see the patterns of abstraction used
in the designs and subtle variations in the color
patterns. To read and look at the examples was
enlightening; to read and understand it through
drawing the textiles took my understanding to
a new level. Drawing slowed me down and did
not allow for a mere glance. To spend hours
with a single piece of textile observing and
recording is a privilege one is rarely afforded.

10
Arctic Horizons

Charting New Directions for

Arctic Social Science
Kevin P. Smith, Deputy Director and Chief Curator
Arctic Horizons, a collaborative project funded
by the National Science Foundation, brought
together members of the Arctic research, policy,
and indigenous communities to reassess the
goals of Arctic social science and the needs of
diverse stakeholder communities within the
context of a rapidly changing circumpolar North.
As one of its principal investigators I am working
with colleagues at Portland State University,
Northern Iowa University, the University of
Alaska (Fairbanks and Juneau campuses), and
the Jefferson Institute to coordinate this massive
undertaking. Five major topical workshops and
a series of smaller town hall meetings and
roundtables, held across the country during
the 2016 and 2017 academic years, brought
more than 200 western and indigenous scholars
together in a re-envisioning process intended to
help shape future Arctic social science research,
set funding priorities, and inform Arctic economic,
environmental, and political policy development. States Arctic Executive Steering Committee.
The next two days of intense discussion, with a
Brown hosted the fifth of Arctic Horizons second keynote address by Lene Kielsen Holm,
workshops from May 31-June 2, 2016. We brought Research Scientist and Project Leader at the
together 37 researchers and policy makers from Greenland Climate Research Centre, were held in
19 universities, 5 museums, and 11 agencies in the Watson Institute for International and Public
seven of the eight Arctic nations to discuss two Affairs. The keynote speeches and many of the
core issues. The first was to explore ways that workshops discussions can be watched online at
natural science, social science, and indigenous http://www.arctichorizons.org/proceedings/2. A
scientific perspectives could be combined to full list of the projects participants can also be
generate transformative, multi-disciplinary found there.
research addressing issues of contemporary
and long-term change across the North. The Arctic Horizons is now in its final, integrative
second was to consider how such research could phase. The principal investigators met in
contribute to policy development for sustainable September 2016 in Charlottesville, Virginia,
community futures across the circumpolar at Monticellos Jefferson Library, to bring
zone, the roles of stakeholder communities in together key ideas from all of the workshops
setting priorities or co-producing knowledge, and to lay the foundations for our final reports
and the degrees to which policy development and and products. While the presidential election of
forecasting should guide research funding or be November 2017 ushered in a new administration
independent from it. whose goals for the North and for scientific
research remain unclear, the National Science
The program began with a reception in the Foundation has identified Navigating the New
Museums Manning Hall gallery, followed by Arctic as one of the six great challenges for
greetings from Deputy Provost Joseph Meisel, US scientific research over the coming decade,
Narragansett tribal elder Dawn Dove, and making Arctic Horizons findings potentially even
Amanda Lynch director of the Institute at more important.
Brown for Environment and Society (IBES), who
introduced the first keynote address, by Mark
Brzezinski, Executive Director of the United

11
 Growing Global Connections through
Social Media
Social Media
Emily Jackson, Museum Operations and Communications Coordinator
The Haffenreffers mission to inspire creative
and critical thinking about global cultures,
past and present, through interdisciplinary
understandings of the material world, extends
beyond our physical exhibits and education
programs into our virtual presence. Online,
as in our gallery and CultureLab, our aim is
to encourage excitement about cross-cultural
learning and to inspire people to participate in
larger conversationsengaged with what the
museum has to offer.
One teacher in Mexico, for example, sent us
questions from his classroom, using the open
forum to teach his students about museums like
ours. While most dialogue happened between
the public and Museum staff, these events also
opened up discussions between institutions.
Asking other archivists and curators about
their most challenging projects, caffeine habits,
and passion for history cultivates a world-wide
network of cultural institutions who share
information and ideas.

When I began working on the Museums social

media presence in August, the Haffenreffer
Museum already had active Facebook and Twitter
profiles, utilized primarily for promoting the
Museums events and reposting links to online
information of interest to our followers. Our
online following was moderate, and since then,
we have sought out new ways to engage with
people through social media. We have expanded
our content to include blog posts, photos of
objects, and live Q&A opportunities. We set up an
Instagram account, showcasing objects, behind-
the-scenes photos, and other imagery with a
steadily growing group of followers that doubled
over the past three months.

We also participated in the American

Anthropological Associations World Anthropology
Day (or #AnthroDay2017). In Manning Hall Gallery,
we offered activities like a table of artifacts for
visitors to handle, while online, people could
share selfies, ask questions, and learn about
unfamiliar objects. We enlisted the members
of MUSE [see p. 37], and Browns Anthropology
Department Undergraduate Group, building
our relationship with other Brown University
departments.

For a museum dedicated to the study of material

culture, the virtual world of social media might
seem an alien landscape, but online engagement
breaks down the walls of our limited physical
space and opens the door to a global community
of curious and engaged anthropology enthusiasts.
We look forward to participating in more
dialogues with students, the public, and other
On Twitter, we participated in two world-wide institutions around the world.
discussion events: #AskACurator (September
14th) and #AskAnArchivist (October 5th). Both
events encouraged the public to ask museum
staff around the world questions about their
daily work, opinions, collections, personal
favorites, or behind-the-scenes stories.

12
 The Anthropology of Food at the
Teaching
Haffenreffer Museum
Andrew K. Scherer, Associate Professor of Anthropology and
Jessaca B. Leinaweaver, Associate Professor of Anthropology
The Anthropology of Food, a four-field
anthropology (cultural, linguistic, biological,
and archaeological) course, explores the human
experience of food, past and present. Through
the Spring 2017 semester, students studied how
the human experience with food is shaped by the
interplay of language, culture, biology, ecology,
history, politics, and technology in cross-cultural
and globalized settings.

An important element of this course is to look

beyond basic nutrition to explore how foodways
are central to the fabric of human society. The
material culture of food acquisition, preparation,
and eating offers an insightful way to access the
significance of food in other societies. Students in
this years class completed two assignments with
the Museum, utilizing exhibits related to food at
Manning Hall and objects brought to CultureLab
expressly for the course.

In the first exercise, students toured the exhibit

Northern Horizons, Global Visions [see p. 16].
After viewing the exhibit, students wrote essays
that considered how human-animal relations
were, and are, materialized by Arctic people,
using objects from the Haffenreffers collections
including an atlatl (spear-thrower), an ulu
(semilunar knife), and a fishing net.
For the second exercise, students visited Manning
Hall to examine objects related to feasting
and the consumption of alcoholic beverages in
societies around the world. They viewed Brewed
for Thought, a Student Group exhibit examining
the preparation and consumption of alcohol in
Bolivian, Kenyan, and Tibetan communities [see
p. 19]. Students wrote essays on the significance
of alcohol in a specific society, as materialized
through one of the objects in Manning Hall.
Among the issues they explored were interplays
between material culture and the sociality of
drinking, the contexts of alcohol consumption,
and gender and status differences in imbibing.

For both assignments, students looked at

additional objects in CultureLab. We especially
benefited from our collaboration with the
Museums postdoc, Kaitlin McCormick, who drew
on her familiarity with collections in Bristol to
select objects fitting our assignments, and from
Kevin Smith, who shared his expertise in Arctic
society with us and our teaching assistants to
prepare for our students visit to CultureLab.
Having access to the Museums collections
was an exciting way for students to engage in
hands-on learning, applying the anthropological
theories and concepts they were learning to
unfamiliar objects of material culture.

13
 Engaging the Complexities of
Teaching
Cultural Heritage
Ian Randall, Haffenreffer Sixth-Year Teaching Fellow
As its title suggests, my class ISIS, NAGPRA, and
the Academy: Archaeology and Global Issues in
Cultural Heritage [ANTH 1580] taught through
the Haffenreffer Museum with generous support
from my 2016-2017 Haffenreffer Teaching
Fellowship deals with the roles of academics in
the contentious, contemporary world of Cultural
Heritage issues. In this course, the class has made
extensive use of the Museums collection. Students
have approached various pieces through the lens
of different stakeholders perspectives to examine
current topics within the legal framework of
repatriation, museum ethics, the movement of and
trade in antiquities, looting, nationalism, indigenous
rights, and the dangers of academic colonialism.
The Museums extensive collection transformed
these discussions from largely abstract and
theoretical ones to exercises grounded in
wonderful material: sculptures from Gabon,
de-sacralized Katsina dolls, Maya ceramics,
decorated Chukchi walrus tusks from Siberia, as
well as local archaeological materials. Without
the incredible resource that is the Haffenreffer
Museum, this class, and others like it, Im sure,
would be much the poorer.
14
How has the Haffenreffer navigated the landscape
of cultural heritage? How have the Museums
decisions differed from those of other institutions?
What questions do the objects themselves beg,
and how would they function in different contexts?
Each week the themes we covered found purchase
in the concrete, real-world examples provided by
the Museums collections, an advantage not lost
on the students.
Using CultureLab, visiting the Bristol facility,
and viewing satellite exhibits in the Joukowsky
Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World
allowed the students to engage physically with the
objects, adding a further phenomenological angle
to their research. The students ability to discuss
these issues as they relate to actual objects
from the Museums collection does so within the
framework of a need for post-colonial praxis,
providing in its very workings the beginnings of an
answer to the question posed by the entire course:
what is the role of the academy in engaging with
global issues in cultural heritage?
 Visualizing Vertical Economies in the Andes
Teaching
Parker VanValkenburgh, Assistant Professor of Anthropology
My faculty fellowship with the Haffenreffer Museum
this year supported the development of my course
Vertical Civilization: Andean Archaeology from Monte
Verde to the Inkas (Anthropology 1505), which I taught
during Fall 2017. This class offered students a broad
survey of indigenous Andean civilization, from the
earliest peopling of the continent to the Spanish
invasion of the 16th century, providing a rich
understanding of the often unique solutions that
Andean peoples developed to deal with risk and to
make sense of the world around them.

In addition to lectures and discussion sections,

we held a series of hands-on artifact sessions
in CultureLab, drawing on the Haffenreffer
Museums extensive holdings of ancient
Andean artifacts particularly textiles,
ceramics, and metals. Our first session
highlighted the earliest Andean artistic
traditions, dating to the Formative period,
and included viewings of the Museums
spectacular collection of textiles from the
site of Karwa (ca. 400-200 BC) on the southern
Peruvian coast. A second session, on the arts of
the Paracas (800 BC100 BC), Nazca (ca. 100 BC
800 AD), Moche (ca. 100 AD 800 AD), Wari (c.
500 AD 1000 AD), and Tiwanaku cultures (ca.
400 AD 1000 AD), focused primarily on ceramic
and metal implements from coastal Peruvian
contexts. A final session examined the arts of
the Inka (ca. 1400-1533 AD).

 he capstone project of each students work in the

T
Museum involved the creation of three-dimensional
models of artifacts using a program called Agisoft
Photoscan Structure from Motion software that
enables users to create three-dimensional models
from overlapping digital photographs. Students
worked with the Haffenreffers curators to carefully
select artifacts for modeling, captured photographs
in CultureLab, and then assembled and edited their
models in the Brown Digital Archaeology Laboratory,
in the department of anthropology. After building their
models, students wrote short reports on their work.
We hope to make their models accessible through the
Haffenreffers website.

Lower left and upper right: two-dimensional

renderings of three-dimensional models created
by students in ANTH 1505 of a Moche culture
ceramic trumpet and figurine, both from the
Haffenreffer Museums collections.

15
 Global Visions:
Exhibitions
The Haffenreffer Museum Turns 60
Kevin P. Smith, Deputy Director and Chief Curator
In December 1955, Rudolf Haffenreffer Jr.s
family donated his King Philip Museum, in
Bristol, RI, to Brown University. In accepting the
gift, President Barnaby Keeney remarked that it
would provide a sound basis for the development
of research and teaching in anthropology, yet
there was neither an anthropology department
at Brown then, nor faculty qualified to steer it. In
1956, President Keeney hired J. Louis Giddingsa
pioneering Arctic archaeologist, anthropologist,
and natural scientistto evaluate the museums
holdings, develop a plan for its integration
into Browns teaching mission, and establish
a program in anthropology within Browns
department of sociology.
This year marked the 60th anniversary of
Giddingss arrival at Brown. To celebrate, we
installed two exhibits looking at Giddingss
contributions to Arctic research and his role
in transforming Rudolf Haffenreffers private
collection into a university teaching museum
with a worldwide scope and global vision. We
organized a symposium at the annual meeting of
the Society for American Archaeology, bringing
together specialists from across the circumpolar
North to re-evaluate his legacy in Arctic
archaeology and consider new ways to approach
the collections he and his students generated
through Alaskan fieldwork. We reorganized
Giddingss photographs and archives to make
them easier for use by researchers. And, finally,
we set up a blog, called Sixty at Sixty to bring
together thoughts, memories, and visions for
the Museums future from sixty peoplestaff,
students, curators, administrators, and members
of the publicwhose lives or careers were
changed by their involvement with the Museum
during its six decades with Brown.
16
Northern Visions: The Arctic Photography of J. Louis
Giddings (1909-1964) exhibited select images
from Giddingss vast photographic archive,
highlighting the skill and aesthetic sensibilities
he brought to his work, whether capturing the
experience of living and working in the North or
documenting the discoveries he and his crews
made. In the days when Arctic archaeologists
had to travel light and when the quality of images
taken in the field would not be known until
after returning home, Giddings was a master of
lighting, composition, and visual story-telling.
His photographs provide glimpses into evolving
practices of fieldwork from the 1930s-1960s
in Alaska, documenting collaborations with
indigenous communities, capturing friendships
with co-workers, showing his love of family,
and revealing his fascination with the natural
world and his archaeological work. Northern
Visions opened in March 2016, and ran through
September 2016. It provided a fitting background
for the opening reception of Brown Universitys
Arctic Horizons workshop in May (see p. 11)
and generated a collaborative project with the
Smithsonian Institutions Arctic Studies Center
to document Giddingss images from his 1939
fieldwork on Saint Lawrence Island (Alaska)
and to digitally repatriate images of the islands
community members to their families today.
Northern Horizons, Global Visions: J. Louis Giddings
and the Invention of the Haffenreffer Museum
opened in Manning Hall on October 21, 2016.
Organized in three sections, Northern Horizons
examined the ways that Giddingss approaches to
fulfilling President Barnaby Keeneys challenges
influenced the Museums development and shaped
the practices that distinguish it today. In the fall of
1956, Giddings had no staff. He saw opportunities
in the collections but also antiquarian limitations
collections of prehistoric stone tools from New
England but none from controlled excavations,
ethnographic objects of great beauty without
information on their use or contexts. His solution
 was to engage students in all aspects of the
Exhibitions
Museums operationtraining them in collections
management, exhibition development, and object
acquisitionand to initiate programs of collections
research and archaeological fieldwork in which
students were the principal investigators.

The first of Northern Horizons sections focused

on his archaeological fieldwork at Alaskas Cape
Krusenstern, where Giddings and his crews
of Brown students documented a 4,500-year
sequence of Arctic cultural development on this
Northern Horizons final section looked at
coastal capes ancient beach ridges. Through his
Giddingss efforts to expand the scope of the
own words, photographs, and objects recovered
Museums collections beyond its origins as a
from those excavations, this section shows how
museum of Native American material culture. In
Giddings entrusted his students with planning
eight years, Giddings assembled forgotten items
and executing excavations and credited them
from the universitys lost Jenks Museum of
for the transformative discoveries they made.
Natural History and Anthropology (a process that
Highlights include objects from the enigmatic,
continues, see p. 30) to extend the Museums
3,500-year-old Old Whaling complex discovered
reach to Europe and the spread of hominins
by William Simmons, then an undergraduate and
out of Africa in the Lower Paleolithic. He
today professor of anthropology at Brown, and a
provided grants to students and faculty to make
set of ivory snow goggles from the 1,500-year-old
ethnographic collections from contemporary
settlements of the Ipiutak culture that Douglas
communities in Africa, Southeast Asia, Central
Anderson, director of the Museums Circumpolar
America, and Andean South America. He made
Lab, excavated and used as the subject of his
strategic purchases of ethnographic objects
Masters thesis, Browns first in anthropology.
from other parts of the world and expanded
upon Haffenreffers Native American collections
by adding significant circumpolar collections.
He also made alliances with museums and
colleagues around the world that allowed him to
acquire collections and loans of objects beyond
those Brown had.

In just eight short years between his arrival

at Brown and his tragic death, Giddings
established approaches that remain central to
the Haffenreffer Museum today. We still engage
students at all levels of collections management,
exhibition curation, and education; we involve
students in fieldwork; we maintain commitments
The exhibits second section focused on
to the North, to Native American issues, and
Giddingss fieldwork among the Iupiat Eskimo
to global issues; we provide collections grants
communities along Alaskas Kobuk River. From
to faculty and students; and our researchers
his first season on the river in 1940 until his death
continue to build alliances through collaborations
in 1964, Giddings, his students, and his colleagues
with indigenous communities and museums
worked with Iupiat community members as
around the world. You can read about our current
friends, colleagues, and informants to produce
efforts in the pages of this newsletter and explore
a remarkably early corpus of inter-disciplinary
the evolution of these approaches over the last six
archaeological, ethnographic, folkloric, and
decades at our blog, Sixty at Sixty (blogs.brown.
natural scientific research. Giddings and his wife,
edu/Haffenreffer60at60).
Bets, as well as Douglas Anderson and his wife
Wanni, assembled ethnographic collections while
on the Kobuk that document a period of transition
in which traditional objects made from gathered
materials were giving way to ones obtained
through trade within an increasingly globalized
world. Highlights of this section included the
only existing full-scale Kobuk River bark kayak, a
womans willow root fishing net, and an heirloom
feast ladle given to the Museum by the family of
one of Giddingss Kobuk Iupiat friends to honor
Louis after his death.

17
 Face to Face: African Views of Europeans in
Exhibitions
the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries
Kaitlin McCormick, Post-doctoral Fellow in Museum Anthropology
During the Fall 2016 semester, my class,
Anthropology in/of the Museum [ANTH 1901]
curated a satellite exhibit for display at Browns
Steven Robert 62 Campus Centre. This was
an opportunity for undergraduate student
curators Maria Averkiou, Theo Koda, Sean
OKeefe, Alexander Strzelecki, and Anna Stacy
to research and write label texts for a number
of African art works, drawing from the HMAs
collections. Our display explored African artists
representations of Europeans in different
colonial contact zones, within what are now
Cameroon, Nigeria, the Democratic Republic
of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo,
and Mozambique. The idea to reverse the
colonial gaze emerged from class discussions
regarding the politics of cross-cultural
representation, colonialism, and museums.
This project was timely for Brown students and
for the HMA. In September, 2016, the Museum
acquired a boat scene made by well-known
Yoruba artist Thomas Ona (ca. 1950-1952),
whose work is featured in museum collections
in London, New York, and Berkeley. Our display
was also influenced by recent scholarship on the
topic of African artists representing Europeans,
including the Detroit Institute of Arts Through
African Eyes exhibit and catalogue (Quarcoopome,
2010), and the new volume Humor and Violence:
Seeing Europeans in Central African Art (Strother,
2017). Face to Face: African Views of Europeans in
the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries
questioned how individual artists
chose to represent Europeans and
their material culture, beliefs,
and behaviours. Student curator
Sean OKeefe describes the
students curatorial approach:
18
The other students and I were keenly
aware of the difficulties of assigning
outsider narratives to these objects.
We decided to let the objects speak
for themselves and to focus on asking
questions about what their makers
artistic intentions may have been. We
worked to foreground the agency of the
artists by outlining the objects basic
historical and cultural contexts, in
order to invite viewers to reflect on their
possible meanings, without assigning
any single, essentialized interpretation.
Throughout the exhibit process, it
was great to learn about the amount
of thought that goes into curating the
displays design, in relation to its space,
its objects, and its intended audience.
I would like to thank the student curators, whose
research and vision shaped this exhibit, and the
Museums staff for their support throughout
the research, writing, design, and installation
process. We hope that our work prompts
reflection on how historical
African art and visual
culture illustrates diverse
perspectives on the
relationships between
Africans and Europeans
in the nineteenth and
twentieth centuries.
 Our Experience Curating Brewed for Thought:
Exhibitions
A Cross-Cultural Exploration of Beer and
Brewing
Candy Rui 17, Luiza Silva 17, Isabelle Williams 18,
Haffenreffer Student Group
Brewed for Thought explores brewed beverages
and their social significance in various cultures.
We brought together a selection of objects
from Bolivia, Peru, Kenya, Nepal, Tibet, and the
United States to display the diversity of traditions
surrounding the brewing and consumption of
alcoholic beverages.

Curating an exhibit with the Student Group was an

exciting and memorable experience for us. We got
the opportunity to work alongside knowledgeable
Museum staff and other students who were
similarly enthusiastic about seeing the project
take shape over the past two years. As students
considering potential careers in museums,
this was an invaluable learning experience that
exposed us to every step of the curation process
from proposing the exhibit and selecting the
objects to writing labels and helping with the
installation. Since the exhibits opening, we have
received positive feedback from students and
faculty alike, and are glad to see classes engaging
Last year marked the 60th anniversary of the with the objects and our discussion of their use
donation of the Haffenreffer Museum to Brown and cultural significance.
University, and the Haffenreffer Museum Student
Group wanted to curate an exhibit that would put
some of that rich history on display. The Museum
is closely tied to the history of the Haffenreffer
family, who donated Rudolf Haffenreffers King
Philip Museum to Brown in 1955, and who
remain engaged with the Museum to this day! The
Haffenreffers were brewers, and the Museum
owns many objects related to brewing, not only
in Rhode Island but also around the world. These
objects served as our inspiration for this exhibit.

Curating this exhibit was definitely challenging

at times; none of us had any prior experience,
and we often had doubts about how to display
the objects or how to frame specific parts of the
text. However, we are pleased with the result and
glad that both Brown students and the general
public have the chance to enjoy and learn from
our work. We are proud to honor the legacy of the
Haffenreffer family in the Museum, to reinterpret
parts of its collection, and to continue the work of
the Haffenreffer Museum Student Group.

19
 Satellite Displays across Campus
Exhibitions
Thierry Gentis, Curator and Dawn Kimbrel, Registrar
The Museum continued its program of intra-
campus loans for satellite displays to support
faculty and student engagement with the
collections and to raise its public profile.

During the 2016-17 academic year, the

Museums staff transported more than 200
objects from the Collection Research Center in
Bristol, RI, onto campus to support 23 courses
taught by Brown and RISD faculty. With limited
space in the Manning Hall Gallery, satellite
displays arranged in collaboration with other
centers and institutes on campus offered a
solution to meet this high demand.

Three Akan royal stools displayed at the entrance

to the Reading Room of the John Hay Library,
for example, supported Bolaji Campbells RISD
course, Art and History of Early West African
Kingdoms. The stools, essential elements of Akan
chiefs regalia are carved with leopards and other
symbols of power to communicate strength,
courage, wisdom, and beauty.

Installations at the Joukowsky Institute for

Archaeology and the Ancient World focused
on material related to faculty research and
teaching, including two Mexican jade masks
used to address questions of authenticity and
cultural patrimony law. The Museums loan of
replica colonial tobacco pipes to The Center for
the Study of Slavery and Justice contributed to its
Transatlantic Slave Trade exhibition.

For the Brown University Librarys symposium

and exhibition Bamboula! Black Music Before
the Blues, the library staff expressed interest
in borrowing a bolon. A traditional West African
stringed instrument with a gourd resonator, the
bolon is a precursor to the banjo. By coincidence,
this year the Museum acquired a bolon as a gift
to the permanent collection from Dwight B. and
Anna M. Cooper Heath. The instrument was
installed at the Rockefeller Library in October.

New acquisitions featured in the satellite displays

also represent the Museums ongoing collecting
interests. A wooden carving of a river boat crew
by Nigerian artist Thomas Ona, presented for
the first time in Face to Face: African Views of
Europeans from the Nineteenth and Twentieth
Centuries, at the Steven Robert 62 Student
Center, opens opportunities for comparative
studies of technique, satire, and portrayals of
ordinary life in Colonial Africa.

20
 After the Fire: Assessing Cochiti Pueblo
Research
Traditional Cultural Properties
Robert W. Preucel, Director
On June 26, 2011 the mountains west of Santa
Fe were aflame. The Valle Grande, an extinct
volcano, looked like it had just erupted. In fact,
a massive fire, known as the Las Conchas Fire,
had broken out on private land in the Jemez
Mountains of northern New Mexico. It grew
rapidly because of extreme drought conditions
and eventually extended to portions of the
Santa Fe National Forest, Bandelier National
Monument, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los
Alamos County, Valles Caldera National Preserve,
Jemez Pueblo, Santo Domingo Pueblo, Santa
Clara Pueblo, and numerous private inholdings. It
even led to the evacuation of Los Alamos!
Of special concern to many of the local Pueblos
especially Cochiti, Jemez, and Santa Clarawas
the impact of the fire on their ancestral village
sites and traditional use areas. When Cochiti
Pueblo asked me to do a preliminary assessment,
I made arrangements with archaeologists from
the Burn Area Emergency Response (BAER)
team and the Santa Fe National Forest to inspect
Hanat Kotyiti, the village where I have conducted
research since 1996. We met at the Cochiti
Elementary School and dressed ourselves in
Romex clothing and carried backpacks containing
emergency bags that you could slide into to wait
out a fire. As we walked up the trail, it was as
if we were in a war zone. The ground was still
smoking. The ponderosa trees were knocked
down and blackened due to the force of the fire
storm. The tuff boulders were reddened and
cracked from the heat. When we reached the top
we could see that the fire had burned over the
edge of the mesa and across half of the village.
All of the vegetationthe pinyon and juniperwas
totally burnt with the fire carbonizing the very
tree roots.
With representatives from Cochiti Pueblo and
the BAER team, I then conducted a helicopter
survey of the major village sites and shrines in the
Santa Fe National Forest and Bandelier National
Monument. We flew over Tyuonyi, Haatse, Pueblo
of the Stone Lions, the Stone Lions shrine, Kuapa,
and Hanat Kotyiti. We discovered that the fire had
spared Tyuonyi, Kuapa, and the Stone Lions shrine.
However, it had burned over Haatse, the Pueblo of
the Stone Lions, and Hanat Kotyiti, putting these
ancestral villages at extreme risk from erosion.
Last July, I returned to Hanat Kotyiti to examine
the condition of the village and to see how
the vegetation was recovering. There were
encouraging signs of new growth and the grasses
and forbs were in bloom. I could also see new
features that had been obscured by the pine
duff. For example, I could see a line of stones
that closed off the northwest corner of the
pueblo. This is likely the foundation for a wall
that had been thrown up to defend the village
against Diego de Vargas attack on April 17, 1694.
Similarly, the fire had cleared some heavy brush
and I could now see a large concentration of
stone in the west plaza near the kiva that may be
evidence for a plaza shrine.
In 2013, Cochiti Pueblo, along with Jemez Pueblo
and more than 300 plaintiffs brought a lawsuit
against the Jemez Mountains Electric Cooperative
and Tri-State Generation and Transmission
Association. They argued that the energy
companies failed to take reasonable precautions
to prevent and suppress forest fires. The plaintiffs
were successful and the lawsuit is currently in
the compensation stage. What is not adequately
figured into this equation, however, is the harm
done to Cochiti people due to the inability to use
their traditional lands for hunting, wild plant
gathering, and religious practices.
21
 Fires in the Land, Fires in the Dark
Research
Kevin P. Smith, Deputy Director and Chief Curator
Around AD 900, less than a generation after Viking
Age Norse colonists began to settle Iceland, the
earth began to quake beneath Langjkull, the
islands second largest glacier. Within weeks,
a volcanic fissure opened beneath the glaciers
western edge. As fire and lava melted the glacier
from beneath, massive floods coursed down
the rivers leading into western Icelands newly
settled valleys. When the eruption burst through
the glaciers surface, melt-water mixing with lava
would have sent clouds of volcanic ash high into
the air, darkening the skies above, with thunder
and lightning crackling through the clouds of ash
and the glow of the eruptions fire lighting them
from beneath.
Icelands settlers arrived from geologically stable
lands in Scandinavia and the British Isles to find an
unoccupied land of pristine forests and seemingly
unlimited grazing land for their cattle, horses,
sheep, and goats. They had no way of knowing
they were colonizing one of the most volcanically
active islands in the world. The eruption beneath
Langjkull, almost certainly northern Europeans
first direct experience of a volcanic eruption in
11,000 years, was a massive one.
The Norse believed that natures elemental
forces, as well as the social nature of humankind,
were manifestations of tensions between the gods
and giants, who represented the most powerful
aspects of the sea, the earth, the cold, and fire.
The most powerful of the giants was Surtur (the
darkener), who was present at the worlds
creation. At the worlds end, Ragnark, he would
lead forces that would kill the gods. Then, he
would scourge the world with flames and lava.
The thunder, lightning, and crashing sounds
at this eruptions start may well have been
interpreted as manifestations of the god Thor,
22
who protected the worlds of men and gods from
the giants. Yet, when the glaciers melted enough
to prevent water from mixing with magma,
the eruption cycle would have shifted. The ash
clouds would have disappeared, along with the
thunder and lightning. But rather than these
being evidence of the gods victory, the eruption
continued, spilling lava across the land for 15-25
years. By the time it was over, black, smoking
rock covered nearly 90 square miles (240 square
kilometers) of verdant pastureland, two rivers
had shifted course, and perhaps half-a-dozen
farms disappeared beneath the lava. Within the
lava field were caves as large as subway tunnels,
including Surtshellir Surts Cave...his home.
We dont know what the Norse settlers did while
the lava was flowing, but analyses we have done
over the past three years suggest that as soon
as the lava cooled enough to enter Surtshellir,
they did so to make offerings. Perhaps these
were done to placate Surtur or to strengthen and
summon the gods to prevent him from emerging
again. Cattle, sheep, horses, and pigs in their
prime of life were driven to the lava field, killed
and defleshed. Their bones were deposited nearly
800 feet into the cave or burned inside a boat-
shaped stone structure built deep in the dark.
Beads found inside this structure came from
workshops as far away as Iraq, Turkey, Central
Europe, and southern Scandinavia. Orpiment,
a glittering arsenic ore from Irans Zagros
Mountains, used in medieval Europe to produce
the brightest yellow pigments, was found with
the beads, suggesting they were once parts of a
decorated object. The trace element chemistries
of jasper fire-starter fragments, scattered across
the floor as fires were lit in the structure, link
them to sources in Iceland requiring days or
weeks of travel to reach Surtshellir. These distant
connections resonate with the 12th-century story
of a Viking Age chieftains son who traveled nearly
100 miles across Icelands interior to chant a
poem of praise to the giant in the cave. Finally, a
set of lead scale weights calibrated for measuring
the value of human lives in Icelands legal system
was left on top of the structures fireplace when
the site was abandoned, around AD 1000.
The scale of the sacrifices, the distances that
animals had to be driven to reach the cave,
the effort required to build structures inside
Surtshellir, the globalized origins of the
objects left inside it, all imply that the activities
undertaken within Surtshellir were controlled
by Icelands Viking Age chieftains. Our NSF-
funded work on material from Surtshellir is
not complete, but as we move forward with it
we expect to learn more about Icelands early
chieftains and their role in Viking Age rituals.
 Textiles from the Canadian Arctic: Indigenous
Research
Fiber Technologies or Evidence of Norse/Inuit
Contacts?
Michle Hayeur Smith, Museum Research Associate
Over the last 50 years, a small number of A review of this Arctic material is a logical
textile artifacts have been identified on Dorset next step in my NSF-funded research on
(500 BC1300 AD) and Thule (12001500 AD) North Atlantic textile production, and with
culture sites from Canadas Arctic islands and supplemental funding will be undertaken in
northern Labrador. Woven woolen cloth, found 2017 at the Canadian Museum of History in
in an Early Thule (ca. 1200-1300 AD) site on the Ottawa while I complete work on Greenlands
far northeastern shore of Ellesmere Island, Norse cloth. Comparisons with the 8,500+
documents some type of contact between the textiles I have documented across the Norse
Norse and an ancestral Inuit community there; North Atlantic, and the application of new dating
yet the nature of their interaction remains and DNA analyses, will allow us to address
unclear. In addition to these textiles, other items basic questions: Are these items the result of
of indisputable Norse material cultureincluding Norse/Inuit contact? Did the Dorset develop an
boat rivets, oak fragments, a carpenters plane, indigenous fiber-spinning tradition? How were
chain mail, woolen cloth, a traders scales, and these spun threads made and used? Do they
smelted metal objectsare scattered across include fibers from European domesticated
the Canadian Arctic from Ellesmere Island to animals, or only wild Arctic species?
the shores of Hudsons Bay, across the central
Canadian Arctic archipelago and into northern
Greenland. The majority of these objects are
found in sites dating to the 13th or 14th centuries,
which is not surprising given the presence of
contemporary Norse settlements in Greenland.

Farther south, pieces of spun yarn have been

recovered from a number of Dorset culture sites
on Baffin Island and northern Labrador. Dr.
Patricia Sutherland (formerly of the Canadian
Museum of Civilization) has argued that these
may be evidence the Dorset learned to spin
through sustained contact with Norse traders.
If so, these are important pieces of evidence for
understanding medieval European contacts with
North American indigenous cultures. However,
unlike the textiles found in Thule contexts, the
threads from Dorset sites appear not to have
been woven into cloth. What were they for?

Analyses at the University of York, UK (before

the availability of aDNA studies) suggest some
incorporate Arctic Hare fur and domesticated
goat hair, a mix similar to yarn found at a well-
preserved, frozen Norse site in Greenland (GUS
the Farm beneath the Sand). However, the
Canadian yarn was radiocarbon dated to the 7th
and 8th centuries, long before Greenlands Norse
colonies were founded. Several explanations are
possible: the yarn may have been contaminated
with seal or whale oil, producing erroneous
dates; the yarn may have been already old when
traded to the Dorset; or it may represent an
indigenous and unknown pre-European Dorset
fiber technology, coming to light due to climate
change and melting sites.

23
 Gambling at Chaco Canyon: Material Culture
Research
and Oral Traditions
Robert Weiner, Research Affiliate, Haffenreffer Museum and Research
Associate, Solstice Project
Northwestern New Mexicos Chaco Canyon
fascinates and bewilders those who encounter
its rich archaeological history. Between 850-
1185 AD, Ancient Puebloan people constructed
more than 150 monumental, multi-storied
Great Houses, some with more than 700 rooms,
connected by roads crossing 75,000 square miles
of the American Southwest, from Pagosa Springs,
Colorado to Flagstaff, Arizona. At its greatest
extent, the Chacoan system covered an area twice
that of Ireland.
Books and articles have attempted to answer the
questions: What was Chaco, and why was it so
important? My masters thesis takes seriously
Native oral traditions that describe extensive
gambling in the canyon. Scholars have known
these stories for years, but few have considered
the possibility that they reflect historical
practices.
Analyzing the gambling myths of Chacos Pueblo
and Navajo descendants was illuminating I
found shared themes and episodes in different
versions that suggest derivation from a common
source that I provisionally reconstructed. I
also demonstrated that six of the eight Navajo
individuals who shared these stories with
anthropologists belonged to clans claiming
Pueblo origin, suggesting significant sharing of
knowledge between Navajo and Pueblo peoples.
communities gather. And, many people around
the world draw connections between the chance-
based, unknown outcomes of gambling matches
and unpredictable aspects of the world around
them, such as rainfall or the outcome of wars.
Gambling games were often, therefore, divinatory.
These insights provide new ways to conceptualize
hotly debated issues in Chacoan archaeology.
Gamblingfun, chance-based, and addictive
may have been a social technology facilitating
interactions among members of the far-flung
Chacoan world, who may not have spoken the
same languages. Divinatory gambling may
also have been one of the compelling ritual
practices that took place within the canyon.
Prestige gambling, known throughout Native
North America, may have been one way that
some individuals accumulated material wealth
and status. Finally, gambling may explain Pax
Chacothe low levels of violence throughout
the Chaco worldas people may have fought
with property instead of weapons, similar to the
potlatches of the Northwest Coast.

At the American Museum of Natural History in

New York and at the Smithsonian Institution, I
analyzed 271 gambling artifactskick sticks,
dice, and shinny sticksfrom Chacoan sites. This
corpus of previously unstudied artifacts shows
that gambling was indeed present at Chaco
Canyon. Many were cached in the most sacred
rooms of Pueblo Bonito, where ritual goods
such as macaws and cacao from the jungles
of Mesoamerica were stashed, along with the
burials of high status individuals from a single
matrilineal dynasty.

With this evidence, I began to consider what

role gambling might have played in Chacoan
society. Ethnographic accounts of Native
American societies show that gambling was
not a recreational activity, but held important
ceremonial, economic, social, and political
functions. Globally, gambling facilitates economic
exchange, creates settings for playing out
rivalries without bloodshed, and provides ways
to break the ice when members of different

24
 Emma Shaw Colcleugh on the
Research
Northwest Coast
Kaitlin McCormick, Post-Doctoral Fellow in Museum Anthropology
Between 1884 and 1889, Rhode Island In her articles and lectures, Colceugh often
schoolteacher and journalist Emma Shaw described the carved works she collected
Colcleugh (1847-1940) made three trips to the from Northwest Coast people with enthusiasm
Pacific Northwest. There, she collected over 40 and admiration. The different attitudes she
carved and woven items made for the tourist expressed towards carving and weaving
trade or for use in Haida, Tlingit, Tsimshian, suggests that, like her peers, she sought items
Makah, and Nuxalk communities. The social, made for use in Northwest Coast societies,
cultural, and personal circumstances that which, in the 1880s, were highly valued
shaped her later Subarctic collections are well as ingenious and authentic remnants of a
documented, but Colcleughs travels to the perceived vanishing Aboriginal culture.
Northwest Coast and her collections from this
region are less understood. I am now exploring I am interested in discourses of authenticity
the circumstances that influenced Colcleughs and the idea of Northwest Coast art. How
collecting at villages in Alaska and British did the emergence of these ideas, visible in
Columbia in the 1880s. early ethnographies of the Haida, influence
Colcleughs collecting? Though her collection is
On her visits to the Northwest personal (and not systematic), the objects she
Coast, Colcleugh had access selected, and the ways she represented them,
to, and collected, items carved reflect her efforts to collect knowledgeably
by men, including horn spoons by making distinctions between categories of
and dishes, gambling gear, authentic and inauthentic. Did Colcleugh make
halibut hooks, and canoe special efforts to collect things like horn spoons
and totem pole models. out of a personal preference for carving, or
In her newspaper because northern Northwest Coast carving,
dispatches, Colcleugh through which Indigenous social ranking
described in vivid detail was expressed, was then beginning to be
the visits she and fellow constructed by male settler ethnographers as
tourists made into the the artistic canon of this region?
multi-family lineage
houses in Haida and
Tlingit villages, and
their desire to secure
items such as the
beautifully carved horn
clan spoons, which she
described as among the
most desirable curios
on the Northwest Coast.
Basketry, she reported,
was experiencing a decline
in quality, which Colcleugh attributed to the
influx of tourists: Each year the cedar root
baskets are more coarsely woven and the
traders dyes have replaced [the Tlingits] own
soft and harmonious colourings. Still, she
collected more than two-dozen woven items,
including mats and covered bottles, made for
sale by Makah and Tlingit women.

25
 Investigating Heritage and Identity in
Research
Contemporary Belize
Geralyn Ducady, Curator for Programs and Education/
Education Program Affiliate
In June 2016, the Haffenreffer Museum sponsored
my research on educations heritage, and identity
in Belize. Under the guidance of Patricia McAnany
(Professor of Anthropology, University of North
Carolina, Chapel Hill Executive Director) of
InHerit: Indigenous Heritage Passed to Present, an
organization that conducts educational and outreach
heritage programs to Maya communities in Central
America, my project expanded on work I did as an
undergraduate student at Boston University in 1999.
In Belize, I visited all six districts of the country
and conducted 210 in-person surveys along with a
number of informal interviews with Belizean citizens
to gauge their knowledge, opinions, and thoughts
toward archaeology, archaeological stewardship,
heritage, and identity with the goals of improving
heritage outreach in the country and to guide
involvement between archeologists and community
stakeholders.
26
Despite its small size, Belize is comprised of many
ethnic groups; its populations composition varies
district by district. Mestizos are descendants of both
Mexicans and Maya who fled into Belize during the
Mexican Caste War in the 1800s. Creoles are of
mixed African and white ancestry whose ancestors
were brought to Belize during the transatlantic slave
trade. There are two distinct Maya groups, the Ketchi
(or Qeqchi / Kiche) and the Mopan. The ancestors of
the Garifuna (or Garinagu) were runaway slaves from
St. Vincent who created a distinct Garifuna culture
and language and are of African and American Indian
descent. German Mennonites began coming to Belize
from Canada and Mexico in the 1950s. East Indians,
Caucasians, and Chinese add to an already complex
ethnic community.
The results of my surveys and interviews
demonstrated that people have differing
relationships with archaeological heritage since
most archaeological work in Belize is focused
on ancient Maya ruins despite the diverse post-
Conquest histories of the regions communities. Yet,
there is universal pride in the countrys hundreds of
archaeological sites and ecological parks, since they
attract tourists who boost the economy.
You can learn more about this project on the
Haffenreffer blog, Expeditions in Public Archaeology. A
chapter in the book Public Engagement and Education:
Developing and Fostering Heritage Stewardship for
an Archaeological Future, edited by Katherine M.
Erdman, Ph.D, will explore the project further.
Entitled Gathering Public Opinions about Archaeology
and Heritage in Belize: a drive toward better local
access and programming, it is slated for publication
in 2017. Because of this and other work, I am thrilled
to have been invited to serve on the editorial board of
the new Journal of Archaeology and Education.
 Commitments to Excellence
Collections
Dawn Kimbrel, Registrar
The Museum Assessment Program (MAP) is
a national, voluntary program which helps
museums strengthen their operations, plan for
the future, and meet professional standards
through self-study and a consultative site visit
from an expert peer reviewer. MAP is supported
through a cooperative agreement between the
Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS)
and the American Alliance of Museums (AAM).
All types of museums apply to be selected into
MAP; since 1981 more than 5,000 museums have
participated in over 6,500 assessments.
Last fall the Museum applied for and
participated in the MAP-Collections Stewardship
Program (MAP-CS). This program focuses
on collections policies, planning, access,
and documentation within the context of the
Museums total operations. The scope of the
MAP-CS assessment includes collections care
and use, acquisitions and deaccessioning, legal,
ethical, and safety issues, documentation,
inventory, and emergency planning.
In December, the Museum completed a lengthy
self-study, which was sent to the AAM Program
Officer, Ms. Danyelle Rickard, and the Museums
assigned peer reviewer, Ms. Kyle Bryner. In
February, Ms. Bryner, Registrar and Collection
Manager at the Museum of the Shenandoah
Valley, came to Providence and Bristol for a two-
day site visit. In the summary of her visit, Ms.
Bryner remarked, I was afforded the opportunity
to meet staff, governing authority, partners,
stakeholders, Brown students, and friends of the
HMA. It is rare to gather such a diverse range of
viewpoints during a site visit and I gained a unique
understanding of the HMAs role in the campus
and the wider community.
The 2017 MAP-CS report will help the Museum
prioritize long-term collections stewardship
issues, improve its ability to raise funds to support
the care and development of the collection, and
prepare for AAM accreditation. Ms. Bryners
preview of the final report recommends strategic
and collections planning, expanding collections
staff, and moving the collection closer to campus
as top priorities to align the Museums teaching
and research activities with best practices for
collections care.
In conjunction with MAP-CS, the Museum agreed
to the AAMs Pledge of Excellence, thereby
making a public commitment to operating in
accordance with national standards and best
practices. The next step toward AAM accreditation
will be revising and producing five core
documents: Mission Statement, Institutional Code
of Ethics, Strategic Institutional Plan, Disaster
Preparedness/Emergency Response Plan, and
Collections Management Policy.
27
 a.
New Acquisitions
Collections
Thierry Gentis, Curator
The Museums collections grew, over the course
of the 2016-17 academic year, through the
addition of approximately 1,000 objects, both
ethnographic and archaeological, from Africa,
North, South, and Central America, Asia, Oceania,
and Europe.
A gift of 618 artifacts from the collection of Dwight
B. Heath and Anna M. Cooper Heath represents a
major addition to the Museums African holdings.
African metal work makes up a significant part
of this gift and reflects the collectors interest
in the arts of casting and forging technologies in
Africa. The items include jewelry and cast brass
manillas, traditional currencies used in the slave
trade. These have been important objects for
teaching in several classes this year, including
Sheila Bondes class, Global History of Art and
Architecture. Another object included in the gift
is a West African musical instrument called a
bolon, which has been on view in the Rockefeller
Library in conjunction with the John Hay Librarys
exhibition, Bamboula! Black Music Before the
Blues. The collection as a whole has significant
teaching and exhibition potential.
28
b. c.
g.
Apart from the ethnographic material, the
Heaths also donated a photographic archive that
documents their fieldwork in Bolivia in the late
1960s. This visual documentation enhances one
of their previous collections and documents daily
life in rural and urban Bolivia during a time of
tremendous changes.
These images provide a small glimpse of the
beauty and diversity of this years ethnographic
acquisitions:
a. Balinese mask, Bequest of Robert and
Mary Lou Sutter
b. Baule mouse oracle vessel. Gift of Dwight B.
Heath and Anna Cooper Heath
c. Greek bread stamp. Gift of Dwight B. Heath
and Anna Cooper Heath
d. Dan chair with cast brass ritual bracelets.
Gift of Dwight B. Heath and Anna Cooper Heath
e. Brass manila, West Africa. Gift of Dwight B.
Heath and Anna Cooper Heath
f. Hand Katsina (Matia), detail, by Manfred
Susunkewa Hopi. Gift of Joyce Smith
g. Ceremonial huipil, Comalapa, Guatemala.
Gift of Diana J. Baker
h. Ceremonial huipil, San Martin Jilotepeque,
Guatemala. Gift of Diana J. Baker
i. Palm leaf rice goddess figure, Bali. Gift of
Sidney and Alice Goldstein
d. e. f.

h.

29
i.
 Ghosts of the Lost Museum
Collections
Steven D. Lubar, Professor of American Studies, History of Art and
Architecture, and History
Ghosts appeared in Rhode Island Hall a few years
ago. In the late nineteenth century the building
had been the home of the Jenks Museum of
Anthropology and Natural History. Suddenly,
the old museum was back. John Whipple Potter
Jenkss workshop, full of taxidermy work in
progress. Some of the original artifacts that had
Coming Home: Returning the John
Lineweaver Collection
Kevin P. Smith, Deputy Director and Chief Curator
The Jenks Museum had a more material afterlife,
too. An article in the New York Times about the
Lost Museum installation caught the attention
of John Lineweaver, who had been a National
Science Foundation scholar working on science
education at Brown in 1961-62. One summers
day, Mr. Lineweaver saw workers carrying boxes
past his office in Van Wickle Hall to a dump
truck outside. Curious, he looked into the boxes
and was surprised to see Neolithic and Bronze
Age artifacts. Recognizing opportunities for
science education, he bought the boxes with no
information about their history at Brown. Later
that summer, he moved on to start a teaching
career and Van Wickle Hall was razed to make
way for the Rockefeller Library.
For half a century, Mr. Lineweaver and his family
used these archaeological collections in their
teaching. But when the Times article made it
clear these were objects from Browns lost
Jenks Museum, they contacted Brown, hoping
the objects could return. In September, 2016,
I visited the Lineweavers in Virginia, and on a
blustery day in November we met again on Long
Island to transfer the collection. As we unpack it,
new treasures emerge: Bronze Age and Neolithic
pottery, jewelry from Swiss lake villages,
30
survived to become part of the collections of the
Haffenreffer Museum. Some of the lost objects,
reimagined in papier-mch. The Lost Museum
was the work of the Jenks Society, a group of
Brown and RISD faculty and students and visiting
artist Mark Dion.
The installation graced Rhode Island Hall for
two years, and had a remarkable afterlife. A
symposium on lost museums attracted dozens of
participants for scholarly talks and performances.
A special issue of the Museum History Journal on
lost museums included several papers from the
symposium, among them a history of the Jenks
Museum by Brown American Studies graduate
student Kathrinne Duffy. The exhibit is included
in the Institute of Contemporary Art/Bostons
upcoming Mark Dion retrospective. My book Inside
the Lost Museum: Curating, Past and Present,
inspired by the project, will be published this
summer by Harvard University Press.
Neanderthals stone tools, bone pendants worn
by Upper Paleolithic humans on the
Mediterranean coast.
As much a treasure are the original labels,
still attached to their objects. Jenks catalogs
disappeared with his museum and most of the
objects that remained at Brown were separated
from their labels long ago. John Lineweavers
actions to save these boxes and his care in
preserving their labels provide new opportunities
for research on 19th century anthropology, for
teaching about European prehistory, and for re-
contextualizing Browns Lost Museum.
 All in the Family
Collections
Robert W. Preucel, Director
Last summer, I was fortunate to acquire two
remarkable pieces of Hopi pottery for the
Haffenreffer Museum. The first of these was a
bowl made by Nampeyo, the famous Hopi-Tewa
potter. It is a beautiful example of the Sikyatki
revival style, named after the pottery from the
Hopi village of Sikyatki, occupied from AD 1375-
1625.
Around 1890, Nampeyo started painting designs
that were inspired by the motifs used by Sikyatki
potters. They are not direct copies, but rather
interpretations characterized by bold, flowing
images that harmoniously join together birds
and insects in innovative ways. Bowls and jars
with these designs became very popular among
tourists and Nampeyo became something of
a celebrity. In 1905, and again in 1907, the
Fred Harvey Company invited Nampeyo to give
demonstrations of her work in Hopi House at the
Grand Canyon. In 1910, she and her husband,
Lesso, were invited to make pottery at the United
States Land and Irrigation Exposition in Chicago.
This bowl probably dates to the period 1910-
1920. It has two black framing lines surrounding
abstract bird designs in the center. Both of the
framing lines are left open.
There are two opposing spirit bird designs made
up of eagle tail feathers and swirls. The larger
bird design encircles three rods tied together by a
binding marked with eight dots, possibly gaming
pieces? The smaller design has a butterflys
proboscis emerging from the bird.
The second piece is a small jar made by Rachel
Sahmie, a well-known potter from Polacca,
Arizona. Rachel comes from a distinguished
family: she is Nampeyos great-great-grand-
daughter. Her great-grandmother was Annie
Healing Nampeyo and her aunt was Dextra
Quotskuyva. Rachel learned pottery making
from her mother Priscilla Nampeyo. She
specializes in the Sikyatki revival style as
well as other ancestral Pueblo styles.
This jar was likely inspired by an
old Sikyatki seed jar (29-77-
703) in the collections of the
University of Pennsylvania
Museum. Rachel may have
seen it in J. J. Brodys
catalogue, Beauty from
the Earth. Her version
incorporates the devils
claw, squash blossom,
and dragonfly motifs, but
it omits the geometric
band running around its
mid section.
These Hopi pottery
vessels are testimony
to material linkages over
timegenerations in clay.
31
 Lectures and Public Programs
Public Programs
Arianna Riva, Acting Manager of Museum Programs and Education
This year, we hosted a dazzling range of talks Kevin P. Smith, exhibition curator. Russell
with topics that ranged from the cinnabar trade in Giddings, James Giddings, and Annie Giddings
pre-Columbian Andean South America to the 19th Lightner, children of J.L. and Bets Giddings who
and 20th century acquisition of Native American accompanied them to the field and grew up with
jewelry by museums in the United Kingdom, the Haffenreffer, were also able to attend with
and we held celebrations to open three new
exhibitions.

On May 27th, our student group celebrated the

opening of their exhibit Brewed for Thought: A
Cross-Cultural Exploration of Beer and Brewing
with a reception in the Manning Hall gallery.
Student co-curators and current student group
co-presidents Luiza Silva, Candy Rui, and Isabelle
Williams discuss the exhibit in another article in
this issue (p. 19).

For our first lecture of the Fall semesterthe

2016 Jane Powell Dwyer Memorial Lecturewe
welcomed Richard Burger who spoke about The
Dazzle of Vermilion: Tracing the Early Cinnabar
Trade in the Ancient Andes on September 29th. Dr.
Burger is Yale Universitys Charles J. MacCurdy
Professor of Anthropology and Curator in the
Division of Anthropology at the Yale Peabody
Museum of Natural History. An archaeologist
specializing in the emergence of civilization in the
Central Andes, Burger has carried out research
in Peru for more than two decades. The talk was
also sponsored by the Friends of the Haffenreffer
Museum of Anthropology.

Two of our spectacular Egngn masquerade

ensembles and associated masks were exhibited
at the RISD Museum during the fall in the
Costume and Textile departments show Whirling
Return of the Ancestors: Egngn Masquerade
Ensembles of the Yorb, and our curator and
NAGPRA Coordinator Thierry Gentis spoke at
the RISD Museum on October 16th as part of their
Critical Encounters series. The ensemble was
also featured in RISDs Double Take event on
November 11th (see p. 9).
On October 18th, we hosted Larry Coben, founder
of the Sustainable Preservation Initiative and
archaeologist at the University of Pennsylvania
Museum, for his talk Building Futures, Saving
Pasts How Thriving Communities Can Preserve
their Heritage, sponsored by the Friends of the
Haffenreffer Museum.
On October 21st, we held an opening reception for
our exhibit Northern Horizons, Global Visions: J.
Louis Giddings and the Invention of the Haffenreffer
Museum of Anthropology, celebrating our 60-year
anniversary through a retrospective consideration
of one of its most influential directors. Speakers
included Brown Universitys Chancellor Samuel
M. Mencoff, Robert Preucel, director, and
members of their family (pp 16-17).
On November 2nd, we held the 2016 Barbara A.
and Edward G. Hail Lecture, an annual endowed
lecture honoring the work of Barbara Hail and
her late husband Ted. Chip Colwell, our speaker,
the Senior Curator of Anthropology at the Denver
Museum of Nature & Science, gave a fascinating
and provocative talk entitled The Diorama
Dilemma: Is There a Future for Anthropology in
Museums?
We co-sponsored a talk with Browns Visual Arts
Department on November 9th by Duane Slick
(Meskwaki painter and storyteller) and Martin
Smick (artist and teacher at RISD and Brown)
entitled Finding Metacom. The artists presented
work from their recent collaborative exhibition
Finding Metacom at Fruitlands Museum in
Harvard, MA.
On December 10th, we held a reception
and showcase in honor of our student
docent group, MUSE (Museum Union of
Student Educators). The reception included
programming planned by MUSE members,
and an evaluation by local museum educators
to serve as feedback for our students.

32
 We kicked off our spring semester with a talk
Public Programs
on February 7th by Syrian archaeologist Salam
Al Kuntar, a Research Fellow at the University
of Pennsylvanias Museum of Archaeology
and Anthropology, and co-director of the
Safeguarding the Heritage of Syria and Iraq
Project a project run collaboratively by the
Penn Cultural Heritage Center, the Smithsonian
Institution, and the American Association for the
Advancement of Science. Dr. Al Kuntars talk
was entitled The Destruction of Cultural Heritage
in Syria and Iraq: Current Debate and Protection
Efforts, and was sponsored by the Friends of the
Haffenreffer Museum.
February 16 was the American Anthropological
Associations second annual Anthropology Day,
and our MUSE student docent group planned
an interactive TouchTable of objects that was
available to visitors in our Manning Hall gallery
from the 16th through the 19th of the month. The
American Anthropological Association also hosted
an online #AnthroDay selfie contest, which we
encouraged our members to participate in, and
we awarded a prize to the best selfie-taker.
We invited Henrietta Lidchi (Honorary Professor
at the University of Edinburgh and Keeper of
the Department of World Cultures, National
Museums Scotland) to speak at the museum on
March 1st. Her talk, entitled Gifts and Trades: The
Building of Native American Jewellery Collections
in the United Kingdom, explored the complex
processes through which ethnographic and
colonial perceptions of the other, together with
individual curatorial preferences, structure the
growth of collections, the information acquired
with them, and their uses in museum displays
and research. Dr. Lidchi used some of her time at
Brown to visit the Museums Collections Research
Center, in Bristol, where she provided invaluable
insights into our collection of Southwestern items
of adornment.
On March 15, our newest satellite exhibit,
Face to Face: African Views of Europeans in the
Nineteenth and Twentieth Century opened at the
Stephen Robert 62 Campus Center. Curator
Kaitlin McCormick gave remarks and our student
curators took advantage of the reception to
celebrate their hard work together.
March 22, Pueblo artist Jason Garcia gave a talk
entitled Documenting the Ever Changing Cultural
Landscape of KhaPo Owingeh, as our 2017 Barbara
Greenwald Memorial Arts Program speaker.
Garcia uses his artwork to document the ever-
changing cultural landscape of his home of Santa
Clara Pueblo, New Mexico.
Simon Martin, specialist in Maya hieroglyphic
writing and Associate Curator at the University
of Pennsylvanias Museum of Archaeology and
Anthropology, spoke on April 20th. His talk, Kings
and Overkings: The Political Culture of the Classic
Maya 250-900 CE, was sponsored by the Friends of
the Haffenreffer Museum.
Finally, on April 26, George Nicholas visited
campus as to present the 2017 Shepard Krech III
Lecture. Dr. Nicholas is Professor of Archaeology
at Simon Fraser University, British Columbia,
Canada. His research focuses on intellectual
property rights and archaeology, Indigenous
archaeology, the archaeology and human ecology
of wetlands, hunter-gatherers past and present,
and archaeological theory. He gave a talk
entitled Activism, Education, and the Protection of
Indigenous Heritage.
33
 Think Like An Archaeologist
Education Outreach
Leah Burgin, Education and Outreach Assistant Intern
This year, our Think Like An Archaeologist
programa collaborative, experiential learning
project for sixth graders coordinated by the
Museum, the Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology
and the Ancient World, and the RISD Museum
attracted widespread attention through an
article published in a special edition of the
Society for American Archaeologys journal
Advances in Archaeological Practices dedicated
to professionalizing archaeology education. The
article, Archaeology and the Common Core:
Using Objects and Methodology to Teach Twenty-
First-Century Skills in Middle School, was co-
authored by team members Geralyn Ducady,
Mariani Lefas-Tetenes, Sarah Sharpe, and
graduate student Miriam A. W. Rothenberg. Using
surveys completed by students who participated
in Think Like An Archaeologist programs, the
article demonstrated that learning archaeological
methodology guides students in the development
of critical thinking skills and in learning how to Nearly 200 of these students visited the
make evidence-based arguments. Haffenreffer Museum for the field trip portion
of Think Like an Archaeologist. Members of the
Along with educators from the Museums Museums student docent group, MUSE (see p.
partners, Education and Outreach Interns Luiza 37), designed and led the field trip experiences.
Silva, Emily Frost, and Grace Monk worked Their program, Life in the Arctic, utilized the
diligently with me this year to reach hundreds of museums Arctic teaching collection and current
sixth graders through Think Like an Archaeologist, exhibition, Northern Horizons, Global Visions: J.
sharing their knowledge of archaeological Louis Giddings and the Invention of the Haffenreffer
practices and ethics through four in-classroom Museum (pp. 16-17) to provide hands-on, object-
sessions. These sessions align with Common centered explorations of Arctic hunting, clothing,
Core standards for the sixth grade and focus on and inuksuk building. MUSE members enjoyed
developing the interdisciplinary, critical thinking developing museum education skills through the
skills that archaeologists use when conducting programs and Think Like An Archaeologist student
field research and material culture analyses. participants enjoyed their experiences in the
From getting their hands dirty during the mock museum. As one student commented in a thank
excavation to meeting real archaeologists, you note:
students enthusiastically participated in the
sessions and, as evidenced by Archaeology and I love the museum, I really like putting on the
the Common Core, learned a lot in the process. smelli creepy looking mask. It was really fun.
My favorite part is when I touch the mask. I
understand how people in the Arctic lives.
You guys are very nice.

34
 My Time at the Haffenreffer Museum
Students and Interns
Daniel Denci (Drew University, 17), Education
Program Summer Intern, 2016
I have always been fascinated by how people
deal with problems, how they solve them, what
they decide is important and what is not, what is
considered normal and what is considered taboo.
This is why I got into studying anthropology and
archaeology, and when I was given the opportunity
to work at the Haffenreffer, last summer, I jumped
at it. Working with the Education Programs
collections, I was able to handle objects from
the forests of Mesoamerica, the Alaskan tundra,
and the savannahs of Africa. Working with these
different pieces gave me new perspectives on
how humans create and overcome the challenges
they face. Specifically, I think of the Iupiat snow
goggles in our collection: wooden, tight-fitting
eyewear with small slits for the eyes so that one
can see to hunt in the blindingly snowy landscape
of the ice off the North Alaskan coast. Being able
to hold objects like these allowed me to imagine
these peoples lives: how their lives are lived,
what is important to them, what things they see
that I dont, and how they perceive the world.
While I worked at the Haffenreffer, my most
memorable and exciting moments came when I
helped Geralyn Ducady with the research she did
in Belize (see p. 26). When she had returned, with
survey data to compile, some in Spanish, I was able
to use my university training in anthropology and
Spanish to translate the surveys for her, and to give
her a better idea of her informants intent in their
responses to her questions. This honestly made
me feel like a professional anthropologist and
translator. If I had never worked at Haffenreffer,
I would never have had this opportunity, which
deepened my love for anthropology.
Pnar Durgun, Doctoral Candidate, Joukowsky
Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World
This year I have had the opportunity to work at the
Haffenreffer Museum as a CultureLab Assistant
and as a member of the Museums Union of
Student Educators Program (MUSE). Being a
CultureLab Assistant has provided me with a
better understanding of museum curation and
skills in object handling. Working with MUSE, on
the other hand, has exposed me to theories and
methods of museum education and educational
programming. The combination of these different
experiences enabled me to put this knowledge
into practice by designing gallery tours and by
giving tours to different audiences.
This semester I am also one of the Museums
Visitor Service Coordinators, and my
responsibilities include answering Museum
visitors questions about the Museum, its exhibits,
and its collections. My training and experiences
in MUSE have informed the way I interact with
visitors and how I provide information. In return,
I have gained insights about public interest and
expectations for the Haffenreffer Museum from
the visitors I serve.
As an archaeologist, I believe that museums
are very influential in the re-construction of the
past, as well as in the publics involvement with
archaeology. Volunteering for MUSE events such
as Anthropology Day or with our Think Like an
Archaeologist outreach program has made me
more aware of Haffenreffer Museums important
role as a bridge between the past and the present;
objects and information; archaeology, museum
education, and the public.
35
Students and Interns
Emily Frost, American Studies, MA 17
So, I have a confession to make: as of August
2016, when I started my time as a graduate
student at Brown, I had never worked with sixth
graders. I hadnt worked in an anthropology
museum before, either! Fast forward a semester
and a half and most weeks youll find me in the
Haffenreffer Museums gallery at Manning Hall,
with the rest of my colleagues in the Museums
Union of Student Educators, or in a local middle
school teaching sixth graders through the Think
Like an Archaeologist program.
The Haffenreffer has taught me so much more
than I thought I would get with an American
Studies degree ask me about stratigraphy
some time. Ive got great stories to go with my
definition! Any given week were thinking critically
about how to design programming for different
types of audiences, how best to navigate the
often complicated histories behind objects in a
collection, or how we can use our bodies to create
more meaningful experiences of engagement.
Through both MUSE-organized programs and
my TLA trips Ive been able to implement the
skills and techniques Ive spent the year learning.
Perhaps even more importantly, theyve allowed
me to pause and enjoy the thrill of discovery, both
for myself and for the audiences Ive gotten to
work with this year.
36
Morayo Akande, Public Health, MA 17
I have been a museum guard at the Haffenreffer
for almost five years. I am not an Anthropology
concentrator, so I like to joke that I was only
hired because I am strong and can help lift and
move heavy installation pieces. The Haffenreffer
Museum is a hidden gem at Brown University. I feel
overwhelmingly lucky to spend regular time here.
Its amazing how much a small room can
transform into different parts of the world. I
have always been impressed with the amount
of research and care that the staff put into the
exhibits. Regardless of what is on display, the
atmosphere of our tiny one-room gallery is always
cool and relaxed. Our displays invite outsiders to
embrace a new culture, a new mindset, and a new
world. Working here is not work, it is peace.
I will miss the Museum after I leave Brown. The
Haffenreffer will always hold a place in my heart
as my quiet comfort, my relief from the stressors
of classes and extra-curriculars, my museum.
 Musing on MUSE: Reflections on the
Students and Interns
Museums Pilot Student Docent Program
Leah Burgin, Education and Outreach Assistant Intern
In September 2016, the
Haffenreffer Museum of
Anthropology launched a
new student docent program,
MUSE (the Museums Union of
Student Educators). Currently
in its pilot stage, MUSE is a
group of 11 undergraduate and
graduate students who support
the Museums educational
mission as museum educators.
Members attend regular
training meetings to learn the
theory and practice behind
museum education and use this
training to plan and implement
school tour programming at
the HMA.

So far, MUSE members have

logged more than 150 volunteer
hours on behalf of the Museum,
and have more than tripled the
staffing available for education
programming. They designed
and led hands-on programming
using the Museums Arctic
teaching collection for 70
sixth graders who visited the
Museum as part of the Think
Like An Archaeologist outreach
program, planned and executed
an interdisciplinary program
for 25 of their peers during the
MUSE Appreciation Showcase & Reception, and Some student comments from the evaluation
interpreted a touch table for about 50 visitors include:
during the Museums World Anthropology Day
celebration. MUSE gave me hands-on exposure to
museum education, something I had worked
MUSE has also strengthened the Museums with in a more abstract way. I learned about
partnerships. Educators from the Haffenreffer how to develop a program using teaching
and the RISD Museum are coordinating objects and how to plan these programs with
collaborations between MUSE and the Guild, members of a group.
the RISD Museums student docent program.
Additionally, the Rhode Island Historical Society Ive really enjoyed the program so far and
has asked MUSE members to bring their feel like its been an ideal extracurricular in
hands-on programming development skills to the terms of getting really practical knowledge
John Brown House Museum and to brainstorm and experience out of it at a perfect time
creative ideas for the interpretation of that space. commitment amount each week, and Im
really hoping it continues!
In addition to benefitting the Museum, its
partners, and its constituents, MUSE members MUSE will conclude its pilot stage this May, due
have personally grown as museum educators. to the graduation of Education and Outreach
An evaluation of the program revealed that Assistant Leah Burgin (MA 17). The MUSE
MUSE members greatly expanded their museum program will hopefully grow and develop beyond
education skills and knowledge, and were eager its pilot stage, and continue to engage the
for the pilot program to become a permanent part community, at Brown and beyond.
of the Museum.

37
Acknowledgements
Grants and Awards
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
Rhode Island Foundation, Seaconnet Point Fund I
Rhode Island Foundation, Haffenreffer Family Fund
Brown University, Office of the Vice President for Research
National Science Foundation, Arctic Social Sciences
American Alliance of Museums

Institutional Partners
National Museum of Scotland
Danish National Museum/Nationalmuseet
The Cultural Heritage Agency of Iceland/Minjastofnun slands
Historical Museum of the Faroe Islands/Froya Fornminnissavn
Greenland National Museum/Nunatta Katersugaasivia/Grnlands Nationalmuseum
Icelandic Institute of Natural History/Nttrufristofnun slands
Icelandic Archaeological Institute/Fornleifastofnun slands
National Museum of Iceland/jminjasafn slands
Smithsonian Institution, Arctic Studies Center
University of Iceland/Hskli slands
School for Advanced Research
Canadian Museum of History
Cochiti Pueblo

Rhode Island Partners

Tomaquag Museum
Rhode Island Historical Society
Rhode Island School of Design Museum of Art
Brown/Fox Point Early Childhood Education Center
Providence Public Schools

Brown University Partners

John Carter Brown Library
Center for Middle East Studies
Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America
Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World
Native American and Indigenous Studies at Brown
Department of Anthropology
Haffenreffer Student Group
Native Americans at Brown
Brown Green Events

38
 Friends Board
Jeffrey Schreck, President
Elizabeth Johnson, Secretary
Peter Allen, Rhode Island College
Edith Andrews, Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head
(Aquinnah)
Gina Borromeo, RISD Museum
Kristine M. Bovy, University of Rhode Island
David Haffenreffer
Rudolf F. Haffenreffer
Barbara A. Hail, Curator Emerita
Richard Locke, Provost
Sylvia Moubayed, CAV Restaurant
Robert W. Preucel (Ex Officio)
Daniel Smith, Chair of Anthropology
Kevin Smith (Ex Officio)
Peter Van Dommelen, Joukowsky Institute of
Archaeology and the Ancient World
Administration
Robert W. Preucel, Director
Kevin P. Smith, Deputy Director/Chief Curator
Dawn Kimbrel, Registrar
Emily Jackson, Museum Operations and
Communications Coordinator
Thierry Gentis, Curator/NAGPRA Officer
Nathan Arndt, Curatorial Affiliate
Rip Gerry, Exhibit Preparator/Photo Archivist
Anthony M. Belz, Consulting Archivist (Tomaquag
Museum)
Alexandra Allardt, Consulting Conservator (ArtCare
Resources)
Programs and Education
Geralyn Ducady, Curator of Programs and
Education (until October 2016)
Arianna Riva, Acting Manager of Museum Programs
and Education/Collections Information Assistant
Kathy Silvia, Outreach Coordinator
Leah Burgin, Education & Outreach Assistant Intern
Luiza Silva, Outreach Intern
Emily Frost, Outreach Intern
Grace Monk, Outreach Intern
Daniel Denci, Education Program Summer Intern
Research
Douglas Anderson, Director of the Circumpolar
Laboratory
Barbara A. Hail, Curator Emerita
Michele Hayeur Smith, Research Associate
Christopher Wolff, Research Associate
Wanni Anderson, Research Affiliate
Edward (Ned) Dwyer, Research Affiliate
Robert Weiner, Research Affiliate
Faculty Fellows
Sheila Bonde, Professor and Chair of History of Art
and Architecture
Linford Fisher, Associate Professor of History
39
Jessaca Leinaweaver, Associate Professor of
Anthropology
Courtney Martin, Professor of History of Art and
Architecture
Andrew Scherer, Associate Professor of
Anthropology
Parker VanValkenburgh, Assistant Professor of
Anthropology
Faculty Associates
Elizabeth Hoover, Assistant Professor of American
Studies and Ethnic Studies
Steven D. Lubar, Professor of American Studies,
History of Art and Architecture, and History
William S. Simmons, Professor of Anthropology
Postdoctoral Fellow
Kaitlin McCormick, Postdoctoral Fellow
in Museum Anthropology
Predoctoral Fellow (6th Year
Interdisciplinary Opportunity)
Ian Randall, Joukowsky Institute of Archaeology and
the Ancient World
Mellon Teaching Fellows
Jeffrey Moser, Assistant Professor of History of Art
and Architecture, Brown University
Masha Ryskin, Artist, Printmaker, Experimental
and Foundation Studies, RISD
Mellon Photography Assistant
Caleb Churchill
Student Assistants
Alexandra Peck, Anthropology Proctor
MUSE
Ludwell Chase, Patricia Duenas , Pinar Durgun,
Emily Frost, Thaddeus Gibson, Theodore Koda,
Jane Merrick, Bryn Pernot, Luiza Silva, Zainab
Soetan, Eliana Weiner
Visitor Service Coordinators
Morayo Akande, Pinar Durgun, Aram Martin,
Jessica Nelson
Student CultureLab Assistants
Lena Bohman, Brandon Dale, Pinar Durgun,
Vala Fatah, Zoe Gilbard, Felix Guo, Jena (Jung
Ah) Lee, Arrya (Fuyuan) Luo, Flannery McIntyre,
Jessica Nelson, Ayomide Omobo, Sydney Roach,
Candy (Xiao) Rui, Liza Ruzicka
39
Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology Non-Profit
Brown University Organization
Box 1965 US Postage
Providence, RI 02912 PAID
brown.edu/Haffenreffer Permit No. 202
Providence, RI