- University of Miami
Anthropology Department
P.O. Box 248106
Coral Gables, FL 33124-2005 - 305 284 5091
Pamela L. Geller
University of Miami, Anthropology, Faculty Member
- University of Pennsylvania, Anthropology, Alumnusadd
- Bioarchaeology, Feminist and Queer Studies, Sociopolitics of the Past, Maya Archaeology, Archaeology of death and burial, Mortuary archaeology, and 19 moreGender Studies, Sex and Gender, Ethics, Queer Theory, Anthropology, Precolumbian archaelogy, Identity (Culture), Death and Burial (Archaeology), Feminist Theory, Funerary Archaeology, Anthropology of the Body, Ritual, History of Archaeology, Archaeology, History of Anthropology, Racialization, Haiti, Haitian Revolution, and Cultural Heritageedit
This book considers the vast collection of skulls amassed by Samuel Morton in the first half of the nineteenth century. Craniometric studies undertaken by this Philadelphia physician and natural historian, as previous writers have noted,... more
This book considers the vast collection of skulls amassed by Samuel Morton in the first half of the nineteenth century. Craniometric studies undertaken by this Philadelphia physician and natural historian, as previous writers have noted, advanced scientific racism. In Becoming Object, Pamela Geller shows that while the characterization is accurate, it is also oversimplified. Geller uses a biohistoric approach, which examines skeletal remains and archival sources, to take a close look at the times in which Morton lived, his work, and its complicated legacy.
During a pivotal moment in US history-an interlude between the nation's cohesion and its civil unraveling-Morton and colleagues encouraged and developed biomedical interventions, public health initiatives, and scientific standards. Yet they also represented certain populations as biologically inferior; diseases were tied to non-white races, suffering was gendered female, and poverty was presumed inherited. Efforts by Morton and colleagues made it easier to rationalize the deaths of disenfranchised individuals, collect their skulls from almshouse hospitals and battlefields, and transform them into objects. Ultimately, these men's studies of diseases and skulls contributed to an understanding of American citizenship that valued whiteness, Christianity, and heroic masculinity defined by violence.
Though medicine came to repudiate Morton's work, his thinking became foundational for anthropology. The Morton Collection, a tangible reminder of his legacy, has become a barometer of the discipline's relationship to white supremacy and colonialism. To advance today's decolonial efforts, Becoming Object turns to the Morton Collection to document the diverse lives excluded from the body politic. To recount their stories, as Geller does, is to counter official histories, while the silences that remain hint at the subtle machinations of necropolitics.
During a pivotal moment in US history-an interlude between the nation's cohesion and its civil unraveling-Morton and colleagues encouraged and developed biomedical interventions, public health initiatives, and scientific standards. Yet they also represented certain populations as biologically inferior; diseases were tied to non-white races, suffering was gendered female, and poverty was presumed inherited. Efforts by Morton and colleagues made it easier to rationalize the deaths of disenfranchised individuals, collect their skulls from almshouse hospitals and battlefields, and transform them into objects. Ultimately, these men's studies of diseases and skulls contributed to an understanding of American citizenship that valued whiteness, Christianity, and heroic masculinity defined by violence.
Though medicine came to repudiate Morton's work, his thinking became foundational for anthropology. The Morton Collection, a tangible reminder of his legacy, has become a barometer of the discipline's relationship to white supremacy and colonialism. To advance today's decolonial efforts, Becoming Object turns to the Morton Collection to document the diverse lives excluded from the body politic. To recount their stories, as Geller does, is to counter official histories, while the silences that remain hint at the subtle machinations of necropolitics.
Research Interests: American History, Anthropology, Biological Anthropology, Historical Archaeology, Museum Studies, and 15 moreBioarchaeology, History of Medicine, Hybridity, History of Anthropology, Necropolitics, History of Museums, Social History of Medicine, Decolonial Thought, Craniometry, Samuel George Morton, Nationbuilding and Statebuilding, Skulls, Biohistory, Hybridity and Cultural Identity, and Nationalism and Decolonization
Bioarchaeology has relied on Darwinian perspectives and biocultural models to communicate information about the lives of past peoples. This book demonstrates how further theoretical expansion—a thoughtful engagement with critical social... more
Bioarchaeology has relied on Darwinian perspectives and biocultural models to communicate information about the lives of past peoples. This book demonstrates how further theoretical expansion—a thoughtful engagement with critical social theorizing—can contribute insightful and more ethical outcomes. To do so, it focuses on social theoretical concepts of pertinence to bioarchaeological studies: habitus, the normal, intersectionality, necropolitics, and bioethos. These concepts can deepen study of plasticity, disease, gender, violence, and race and ethnicity, as well as advance the field’s decolonization efforts.
This book also works to overcome the challenges presented by dense social theorizing, which has paid little attention to real bodies. It historicizes, explains, and adapts concepts, as well as discusses archaeological, historic, and contemporary case studies from around the world.
Theorizing Bioarchaeology is intended for individuals who may have initially dismissed social theorizing as postmodern but now acknowledge this characterization as oversimplified. It is for readers who foster curiosity about bioarchaeology’s contradictions and common sense. The ideas contained in these pages may also be of use to students who know that it is naive at best and myopic at worst to presume data derived from bodies speak for themselves.
This book also works to overcome the challenges presented by dense social theorizing, which has paid little attention to real bodies. It historicizes, explains, and adapts concepts, as well as discusses archaeological, historic, and contemporary case studies from around the world.
Theorizing Bioarchaeology is intended for individuals who may have initially dismissed social theorizing as postmodern but now acknowledge this characterization as oversimplified. It is for readers who foster curiosity about bioarchaeology’s contradictions and common sense. The ideas contained in these pages may also be of use to students who know that it is naive at best and myopic at worst to presume data derived from bodies speak for themselves.
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This volume uses bioarchaeological remains to examine the complexities and diversity of past socio-sexual lives. This book does not begin with the presumption that certain aspects of sex, gender, and sexuality are universal and... more
This volume uses bioarchaeological remains to examine the complexities and diversity of past socio-sexual lives. This book does not begin with the presumption that certain aspects of sex, gender, and sexuality are universal and longstanding. Rather, the case studies within—extend from Neolithic Europe to pre-Columbian Mesoamerica to the nineteenth-century United States—highlight the importance of culturally and historically contextualizing socio-sexual beliefs and practices.
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To situate the contributions in this special issue, I historicize the isotopic study of ancient bodies. I begin with radiocarbon (14C) dating as developed by the physical chemist Willard Libby. Libby and team’s successful efforts... more
To situate the contributions in this special issue, I historicize the isotopic study of ancient bodies. I begin with radiocarbon (14C) dating as developed by the physical chemist Willard Libby. Libby and team’s successful efforts reverberated throughout the sciences but were experienced most profoundly in archaeology. For Libby, this scientific advance engendered symbolic capital, and he was appointed to the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission’s (AEC) General Advisory Committee in 1950. As a member of the AEC, he analyzed radioactive strontium (90Sr) to determine the effects of radioactive fallout. Decades later, declassified records indicate that aspects of this work, while not illegal, were decidedly unethical. I see the full scope of Libby’s research, both its contribution and its opprobrium, as inceptive for bioarchaeologists’ radiogenic and stable isotopic studies. But less historic trivia, my consideration is offered as a cautionary tale for the subfield—about methodological innovation, ontological transformations, and the bioethics of analyzing human remains.
Research Interests: Archaeology, Biological Anthropology, Bioethics, Stable Isotope Analysis, Bioarchaeology, and 13 moreRadiogenic Isotope Geochemistry, Archeologia, History of Archaeology, Strontium Isotope Analysis, Radiocarbon Dating, Archéologie, Bioarcheology, Radiocarbon Dating (Archaeology), Bioarchaeology, human & faunal osteology, Bioarchaeology, Osteology, Paleopathology, Bioarqueologia, Archaeochemistry, and Archeology
Here I use a biohistorical approach to examine the connection between 19th-century nation building in the United States and physicians’ collection of crania, notably “specimens” amassed by Dr. Samuel Morton. Globally disparate places are... more
Here I use a biohistorical approach to examine the connection between 19th-century nation building in the United States and physicians’ collection of crania, notably “specimens” amassed by Dr. Samuel Morton. Globally disparate places are represented in the Morton Collection, though roughly 25% are Native Americans. Morton acquired these decedents as a result of colonial expansion and military conflicts that revised the national borders of the U.S. Events precipitating removal of natives from the Southeast, paying special attention to Florida, are demonstrative. During this process, “White” Americans’ retellings of interactions with “Indians” solidified into official history, while Morton’s craniometric studies reified racialized categories. This two-pronged “bio-political strategy” produced hegemonic notions of American citizenship that privileged Whiteness. In returning to the Morton Collection, however, I also identify traces—archival and skeletal—of past events and peoples that counterpoise official histories and, in so doing, point to the fragility of this nationalist project and racialization processes.
Research Interests: American History, Bioarchaeology, History of Anthropology, Nationalism, Necropolitics, and 15 moreNationalism And State Building, Biopolitics, Racialization, Citizenship, NAGPRA, US History, Whiteness, Samuel George Morton, Nation-building, Craniometrics, Black Seminole History, Human Osteology, Bioarchaeology, Biohistory, Seminole Indian History, and Nation building and State making
A growing number of heritage studies scholars critique top-down approaches to cultural sites of global significance. International and state organizations, they explain, eschew locals’ concerns. We consider the Parc National Historique, a... more
A growing number of heritage studies scholars critique top-down approaches to cultural sites of global significance. International and state organizations, they explain, eschew locals’ concerns. We consider the Parc National Historique, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Haiti, Milot. Writers have produced a history that is hierarchical and nationalistic in ideological tone, which policy makers circulate when promoting the Parc. In so doing, they elide the past roles and present-day concerns of Milot’s residents, who have lived in these structures’ shadows for generations. To access them, our ethnographic work documents a vernacular culture-history, which shares common ground with official interests and departs in important ways. Incongruities in practice and discourse stem from locals’ understanding of heritage (eritaj) and experiences of instability (enstabilite). The validation of vernacular concerns makes for a comprehensive understanding of the past. It may also create collaborative opportunities between the community and national (or international) organizations, which can safeguard Haitian patrimony and alleviate socio-economic instabilities.
Research Interests: Cultural Heritage, Ethnography, Heritage Studies, Heritage Tourism, Cultural Heritage Conservation, and 13 moreNationalism, Haiti, Heritage Conservation, Haitian Revolution, Cultures and heritage tourism, Cultural Heritage Management, World Cultural Heritage, Haitian History, Heritage Management, Cultural Patrimony, Heritage, Tourism in protected areas/World Heritage, and Haiti et la colonisation
Clyde Snow’s osteobiographic approach, with its focus on the individual and acknowledgment of speculation’s part in analyses, provides a starting point (a counterpoint, more appropriately) for developing a subdisciplinary bioethos. The... more
Clyde Snow’s osteobiographic approach, with its focus on the individual and acknowledgment of speculation’s part in analyses, provides a starting point (a counterpoint, more appropriately) for developing a subdisciplinary bioethos. The concept refers to consolidation of a habit that gives rise to moral, normative practices related to exhumation, documentation, analysis, and posthumous treatment of dead bodies. To this end, conversations in bioethics—about consent, anonymity, vulnerable populations, legislation of policy, and so forth—are germane but require expansion to be useful for the particulars of studying dead bodies. I cite the contemporary case of HeLa/Henrietta Lacks as instructive for building models of greater applicability to the remains of ancient (or historic) decedents. As an example of the latter, I discuss Kennewick Man/Ancient One. More than a cautionary or idiosyncratic tale, events surrounding the Kennewick case involved normative, disciplinary practices in need of deliberation. I focus on naming, facial reconstruction, and genetic testing. These techniques are useful for personalizing individuals, thereby making academic analyses more interesting to nonspecialists. Yet they also raise epistemological and ethical concerns related to stakeholders’ ontological security (or its disruption) and dissemination of narratives in mediascapes, among other issues. By way of conclusion, I suggest that osteobiographers begin research by posing certain key queries about the historic antecedents for their work, the current political context in which it takes place, and its possible repercussions.
Para desarrollar un “bioethos” subdisciplinario, comienzo con el enfoque osteobiográfico de Clyde Snow, con su foco en el individuo y su reconocimiento de la especulación en la investigación. El concepto “bioethos” se refiere a la consolidación de un hábito que da lugar a prácticas morales y normativas relacionadas con la exhumación, documentación, análisis y tratamiento póstumo de cuerpos muertos. Para tal fin, las conversaciones en bioética (sobre el consentimiento, el anonimato, las poblaciones vulnerables, la legislación de políticas, etcétera) son pertinentes, pero requieren expansión para aquellos que estudian cuerpos muertos. Discuto el caso contemporáneo de HeLa / Henrietta Lacks. Esto caso ayuda a construir modelos que son aplicables a los restos antiguos (o históricos). Como ejemplo del último, discuto Hombre de Kennewick / El Antiguo. Más que un cuento de precaución o ejemplo idiosincrásico, los eventos que rodean el caso de Kennewick involucraron prácticas normativas y disciplinarias que requieren deliberación. Me concentro en nombrar, la reconstrucción facial y la prueba genética. Estas técnicas son útiles para personalizar individuos, lo que hace que el análisis académico sea más interesante para los no especialistas. Sin embargo, plantean inquietudes éticas y epistemológicas relacionadas con la seguridad ontológica (o su interrupción) y la difusión de narrativas en “mediascapes,” entre otras cuestiones. Para concluir, yo sugiero que los osteobiógrafos comiencen sus estudios haciendo preguntas clave sobre los antecedentes históricos de su trabajo, su contexto político y sus posibles repercusiones.
Para desarrollar un “bioethos” subdisciplinario, comienzo con el enfoque osteobiográfico de Clyde Snow, con su foco en el individuo y su reconocimiento de la especulación en la investigación. El concepto “bioethos” se refiere a la consolidación de un hábito que da lugar a prácticas morales y normativas relacionadas con la exhumación, documentación, análisis y tratamiento póstumo de cuerpos muertos. Para tal fin, las conversaciones en bioética (sobre el consentimiento, el anonimato, las poblaciones vulnerables, la legislación de políticas, etcétera) son pertinentes, pero requieren expansión para aquellos que estudian cuerpos muertos. Discuto el caso contemporáneo de HeLa / Henrietta Lacks. Esto caso ayuda a construir modelos que son aplicables a los restos antiguos (o históricos). Como ejemplo del último, discuto Hombre de Kennewick / El Antiguo. Más que un cuento de precaución o ejemplo idiosincrásico, los eventos que rodean el caso de Kennewick involucraron prácticas normativas y disciplinarias que requieren deliberación. Me concentro en nombrar, la reconstrucción facial y la prueba genética. Estas técnicas son útiles para personalizar individuos, lo que hace que el análisis académico sea más interesante para los no especialistas. Sin embargo, plantean inquietudes éticas y epistemológicas relacionadas con la seguridad ontológica (o su interrupción) y la difusión de narrativas en “mediascapes,” entre otras cuestiones. Para concluir, yo sugiero que los osteobiógrafos comiencen sus estudios haciendo preguntas clave sobre los antecedentes históricos de su trabajo, su contexto político y sus posibles repercusiones.
Research Interests: Archaeology, Ethics, Bioethics, Bioarchaeology, Osteoarchaeology, and 12 moreBioethics, Death, Life extension, History of Bioethics, Mortuary archaeology, Human Osteology, Mortuary Practices, Bioarchaeology, human & faunal osteology, Osteobiography, Human Osteoarchaeology, Human Osteology, Bioarchaeology, Bioarchaeology, Osteology, Paleopathology, Ethics and the Relevance of Archaeology, and Ethics and Archaeology
Objectives: This article uses craniometric allocation as a platform for discussing the legacy of Samuel G. Morton's collection of crania, the process of racialization, and the value of contextualized biohistoric research perspectives in... more
Objectives: This article uses craniometric allocation as a platform for discussing the legacy of Samuel G. Morton's collection of crania, the process of racialization, and the value of contextualized biohistoric research perspectives in biological anthropology.
Materials and Methods: Standard craniometric measurements were recorded for seven Seminoles in the Samuel G. Morton Crania Collection and 10 European soldiers from the Fort St. Marks Military Cemetery; all individuals were men and died in Florida during the 19th century. Fordisc 3.1 was used to assess craniometric affinity with respect to three samples: the Forensic Data Bank, Howells data set, and an archival sample that best fits the target populations collected from 19th century Florida. Discriminant function analyses were used to evaluate how allocations change across the three comparative databases, which roughly reflect a temporal sequence.
Results: Most Seminoles allocated as Native American, while most soldiers allocated as Euro-American. Allocation of Seminole crania, however, was unstable across analysis runs with more individuals identifying as African Americans when compared to the Howells and Forensic Data Bank. To the contrary, most of the soldiers produced consistent allocations across analyses. Repeatability for the St. Marks sample was lower when using the archival sample database, contrary to expectations. For the Seminole crania, Cohen's κ indicates significantly lower repeatability. A possible Black Seminole individual was identified in the Morton Collection.
Discussion: Recent articles discussing the merits and weaknesses of comparative craniometry focus on methodological issues. In our biohistoric approach, we use the patterning of craniometric allocations across databases as a platform for discussing social race and its development during the 19th century, a process known as racialization. Here we propose that differences in repeatability for the Seminoles and Euro-American soldiers reflect this process and transformation of racialized identities during 19th century U.S. nation-building. In particular, notions of whiteness were and remain tightly controlled, while other racial categorizations were affected by legal, social, and political contexts that resulted in hybridity in lieu of boundedness.
Materials and Methods: Standard craniometric measurements were recorded for seven Seminoles in the Samuel G. Morton Crania Collection and 10 European soldiers from the Fort St. Marks Military Cemetery; all individuals were men and died in Florida during the 19th century. Fordisc 3.1 was used to assess craniometric affinity with respect to three samples: the Forensic Data Bank, Howells data set, and an archival sample that best fits the target populations collected from 19th century Florida. Discriminant function analyses were used to evaluate how allocations change across the three comparative databases, which roughly reflect a temporal sequence.
Results: Most Seminoles allocated as Native American, while most soldiers allocated as Euro-American. Allocation of Seminole crania, however, was unstable across analysis runs with more individuals identifying as African Americans when compared to the Howells and Forensic Data Bank. To the contrary, most of the soldiers produced consistent allocations across analyses. Repeatability for the St. Marks sample was lower when using the archival sample database, contrary to expectations. For the Seminole crania, Cohen's κ indicates significantly lower repeatability. A possible Black Seminole individual was identified in the Morton Collection.
Discussion: Recent articles discussing the merits and weaknesses of comparative craniometry focus on methodological issues. In our biohistoric approach, we use the patterning of craniometric allocations across databases as a platform for discussing social race and its development during the 19th century, a process known as racialization. Here we propose that differences in repeatability for the Seminoles and Euro-American soldiers reflect this process and transformation of racialized identities during 19th century U.S. nation-building. In particular, notions of whiteness were and remain tightly controlled, while other racial categorizations were affected by legal, social, and political contexts that resulted in hybridity in lieu of boundedness.
Research Interests: Biological Anthropology, Bioarchaeology, Critical Race Studies, Race and Racism, History of Science, and 19 moreHistory of Anthropology, Critical Race Theory, Race and Ethnicity, Physical Anthropology, Critical Race Theory and Whiteness theory, Race and ethnicity (Anthropology), Repatriation (Archaeology), Racialization, History of Race and Ethnicity, Critical Mixed Race Studies, Museum Collection history, NAGPRA, Race, Repatriation of Indigenous Human Remains, Repatriation, Craniometry, Samuel George Morton, Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), and Biohistory
The temporality of bodies has featured prominently in bioarchaeologists’ studies of embodiment, lifecycle, plasticity and ancestor veneration, amongst other topics. We focus here on the temporality of violence, as evidenced by peri-mortem... more
The temporality of bodies has featured prominently in bioarchaeologists’ studies of embodiment, lifecycle, plasticity and ancestor veneration, amongst other topics. We focus here on the temporality of violence, as evidenced by peri-mortem marks on and post-mortem treatments of bodies. Such evidence can signal violence that is either interpersonal or symbolic, though we realize the distinction may be a materially subtle one. To this end, we look to archaeologists’ recent theoretical forays into temporality. More specifically, we deliberate about relationality, which invites reflective comparison between past and present bodies. Relationality allows bioarchaeologists to examine bodies qua bodies, as well as demands that they contextualize their ancient (or historic) case studies and present-day research in time and place. To explore these ideas, we draw upon a variety of sources, not all of which are traditional (i.e. impersonal) academic discussions. The latter can obfuscate or overlook the more emotional or politicized dimensions of violated bodies.
Research Interests: Prehistoric Archaeology, Forensic Anthropology, Ethics, Violence, Bioarchaeology, and 17 morePolitical Violence and Terrorism, Necropolitics, Political Violence, Forensic Archaeology, Classic Maya (Archaeology), Death and Burial (Archaeology), Maya Archaeology, Archaeology of the Contemporary Past, Narco violence, Mortuary archaeology, Community Archaeology, Archaeology of burials, Structural Violence, Honduras, Precolumbian archaelogy, Narcotráfico, and Bioarchaeology, Osteology, Paleopathology
ABSTRACT: The term bodyscape encourages thinking about representation of bodies at multiple scales—from different bodies as they move through space to the microlandscape of individual bodily differences. A hegemonic bodyscape's... more
ABSTRACT: The term bodyscape encourages thinking about representation of bodies at multiple scales—from different bodies as they move through space to the microlandscape of individual bodily differences. A hegemonic bodyscape's representations tend to idealize and essentialize bodies’ differences to reinforce normative ideas about a society's socioeconomic organization. But, a dominant bodyscape is never absolute. Bodyscapes that depart from or subvert hegemonic representations may simultaneously exist. In Western society, the biomedical bodyscape predominates in scientific understandings of bodily difference. Its representation of sex differences conveys heteronormative notions about gender and sexuality. Because the biomedical bodyscape frames studies of ancient bodies, investigators need recognize how their considerations of labor divisions, familial organization, and reproduction may situate modern (hetero)sexist representations deep within antiquity. To innovate analyses of socioeconomic relations, queer theory allows scholars to interrogate human nature. Doing so produces alternative bodyscapes that represent the diversity of past peoples’ social and sexual lives. [Keywords: bodyscape, heteronormativity, queer theory, bioarchaeology, paleoanthropology]
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Abstract: Archaeologists–feminist or otherwise–use biologically sexed human remains to make inferences about cultures' conceptions of gender. Creating an easy link between 'sex' and 'gender', however, is not without problems. Recent... more
Abstract: Archaeologists–feminist or otherwise–use biologically sexed human remains to make inferences about cultures' conceptions of gender. Creating an easy link between 'sex' and 'gender', however, is not without problems. Recent debates within the social sciences have centered on the evolving, historical definition and cultural relevance of both of these terms. Interestingly, skeletal analysts' voices tend to remain silent in this debate.
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As a complement to life histories authored by many researchers of Maya bones, this study narrates death histories. The latter entails detection of perimortem and postmortem changes to decedents' bodies, followed by translation of these... more
As a complement to life histories authored by many researchers of Maya bones, this study narrates death histories. The latter entails detection of perimortem and postmortem changes to decedents' bodies, followed by translation of these changes' encoded meanings. Biographical analysis of body parts and the buildings in which they are situated facilitates such an endeavor. Past investigations of partibility have focused on protracted processing of noble and royal bodies as a means to reconstitute decedents' identities. Commoners' burials, however, have received far less attention. Consequently, it is difficult to determine if partible practices differ according to or transcend social class. To address this lacuna, a multiscalar frame is applied to a burial sample comprised of decedents from varied social settings in the Three Rivers region, northwestern Belize. Identification of widely shared practices related to the becoming and venerating of ancestors offers a springboard for examining particulars within patterns. Scaling down, commoner burials unearthed at the minor center RB-11 are summarized and special attention is paid to the death history of Individual 71. This decedent's intentionally fragmented body reflects general thinking about ancestors as partible and dividual persons. Yet, certain attributes of Individual 71's burial are unique to the sample as a whole, which demonstrates how social class, circumstance, and individual life history are also instrumental in the reformation of ancestorhood.
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In Bioarchaeologists Speak Out: Deep Time Perspectives on Contemporary Issues, ed. by J. Buikstra, pp. 231-242. Springer Press.
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In Exploring Sex and Gender in Bioarchaeology, edited by S. Agarwal and J. Wesp, pp. 70-98. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.
Research Interests: Archaeology, Sex and Gender, Feminist Theory, Bioarchaeology, Bioarcheology, and 6 moreBioarchaeology, Biological Anthropology, Archaeology, Bioarchaeology, Mortuary Archaeology, Human Osteology, Bioarchaeology, Social Bioarchaeology, Bioarchaeology, Osteology, Paleopathology, and Human Skeletal Analysis
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Research Interests: Bioarchaeology, Death and Burial (Archaeology), Maya Archaeology, Anthropology of Death, Burial Practices (Archaeology), and 6 moreMortuary archaeology, Precolumbian Cultures, Archaeology of death and burial, Burial Customs, Belize archaeology, and Religion; Mesoamerican Civilization; Precolumbian History
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Research Interests: Archaeology of Gender, Feminist Theory, History of Anthropology, Gender Archaeology, Feminist Archaeology, and 6 moreHistory of Archaeology, Archaeology and Gender, Springer Encyclopedia of Global Archaeology, The Encyclopedia of Global Archaeology, History of Archaeology and Anthropology, and Rockstar
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With the Plastics Collective, a collaborative and transdisciplinary effort between the following University of Miami faculty: Pamela Geller (Public Voices Fellow with The OpEd Project), Sanjeev Chatterjee, Victoria Coverstone, Neil... more
With the Plastics Collective, a collaborative and transdisciplinary effort between the following University of Miami faculty: Pamela Geller (Public Voices Fellow with The OpEd Project), Sanjeev Chatterjee, Victoria Coverstone, Neil Hammerschlag, Chris Parmeter, Jessica Rosenberg, James Sobczak and James Wilson.
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On March 25, 2022, bioarchaeologist Pamela Geller (University of Miami) met with a panel of CIAMS students (Amanda Domingues, Sophia Taborski, Grace Hermes, Anna Whittemore, and Emily Sharp) and faculty host Matthew Velasco to discuss the... more
On March 25, 2022, bioarchaeologist Pamela Geller (University of Miami) met with a panel of CIAMS students (Amanda Domingues, Sophia Taborski, Grace Hermes, Anna Whittemore, and Emily Sharp) and faculty host Matthew Velasco to discuss the politics of human remains, the objectification of bodies in anatomical collections, and the importance of studying the historical contexts that shaped these collections. The conversation centered on two works by Dr. Geller: a 2020 article in the journal "Historical Archaeology” titled “Building Nation, Becoming Object: The Biopolitics of the Samuel G. Morton Crania Collection,” and a chapter from her 2021 book “Theorizing Bioarchaeology,” titled, “What is Necropolitics?” published by Springer Press. This RadioCIAMS podcast was recorded in-person.
Please note that this episode contains some references to genocide and the Holocaust.
https://soundcloud.com/user-664136257/radiociams-with-pamela-geller
https://archaeology.cornell.edu/radiociams-archive
Please note that this episode contains some references to genocide and the Holocaust.
https://soundcloud.com/user-664136257/radiociams-with-pamela-geller
https://archaeology.cornell.edu/radiociams-archive
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2020 27(2):1-9.“Nothing is Sacred”: Abandonment and Neglect of Haiti’s Heritage.
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Authored by The Collective Change, a democratic collaboration between Jason De León, Chelsea Fisher, Pamela Geller, and Heather Thakar
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Abstract Through space and time bodies present alternative surfaces upon which to inscribe social norms and personal predilection. This dissertation establishes a humanistic bioarchaeological framework for investigating the body and its... more
Abstract Through space and time bodies present alternative surfaces upon which to inscribe social norms and personal predilection. This dissertation establishes a humanistic bioarchaeological framework for investigating the body and its intentional manipulation in life and after death. Past examinations have been fraught with misunderstanding or over-simplification of corporeal modifications. To move beyond past studies, I apply bioarchaeological frameworks and social theories.
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“Truly the schemes & wonders of nature are illimitable,” penned Charles Darwin to Charles Lyell in 1849. The prompt for so poetic a comment was the naturalist’s study of hermaphroditic barnacles. Yet, despite empirical evidence to the... more
“Truly the schemes & wonders of nature are illimitable,” penned Charles Darwin to Charles Lyell in 1849. The prompt for so poetic a comment was the naturalist’s study of hermaphroditic barnacles. Yet, despite empirical evidence to the contrary, their morphological and behavioral variations have long been discussed in terms of dimorphism. Barnacles, I suggest, invite researchers to rethink data, or at least the analytical categories for biophysical evidence of sexual differences. Darwin later wrote about humans’ dimorphism as foundational for drawing social inferences about labor’s sexual division, though he offered tenuous support. Today, the idea that the sexual division of labor is an inevitable, universal mode of socioeconomic organization—is human nature—is taken for granted. But, were we to examine Darwin’s socio-historical location and cultural cases involving complex, communal, and/or flexible labor relations, as I also do in this talk, this presumption would appear far less infallible.
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“Morton,” mused Ashley Montagu, “had thousands of skulls but apparently no brains at all.” He was responding to a query sent by J. Percy Moore, a professor of zoology at Penn. Montagu’s train of thought continues, “He was probably a very... more
“Morton,” mused Ashley Montagu, “had thousands of skulls but apparently no brains at all.” He was responding to a query sent by J. Percy Moore, a professor of zoology at Penn. Montagu’s train of thought continues, “He was probably a very nice man, but I should say not an outstanding scientist, and so far as I am aware his influence upon anthropological thought in this country was neither good nor bad nor very noticeable.” The letter, penned on 30 January 1946, indicates that almost a century after his 1851 death Morton had transitioned from beloved kin and medical colleague to historical footnote. Research on scientific racism would next transform him into anthropologists’ unhandsome intellectual ancestor. If anything, these shifting caricatures have oversimplified the complexities of his biography and the lessons we may draw from his scientific work. As I discuss in this talk, Morton and the crania he amassed invite us to think further about the historic machinations of bio-power.
Coined by Michel Foucault in the 1970s, bio-power initially referred to the processes that transform humans’ biological attributes into politically strategic objects. Much subsequent theorizing about the concept has focused on the discursive and abstract. That is, the technical study and materiality of human remains have seldom been brought to the fore. My study of the Morton Collection has been a biohistoric one in which I examining textual and skeletal materials. The approach yields evidence of bio-power’s key attributes—the formation of Western biomedicine, violent nation-building by European or Euro-American forces, and racialization processes. To illustrate this point, I spotlight Morton’s relationships with the military and medical officers who supplied him with the crania of subjugated Others.
Coined by Michel Foucault in the 1970s, bio-power initially referred to the processes that transform humans’ biological attributes into politically strategic objects. Much subsequent theorizing about the concept has focused on the discursive and abstract. That is, the technical study and materiality of human remains have seldom been brought to the fore. My study of the Morton Collection has been a biohistoric one in which I examining textual and skeletal materials. The approach yields evidence of bio-power’s key attributes—the formation of Western biomedicine, violent nation-building by European or Euro-American forces, and racialization processes. To illustrate this point, I spotlight Morton’s relationships with the military and medical officers who supplied him with the crania of subjugated Others.
Research Interests:
“Don’t you think a study of The Body is trendy?” I was once asked by another scholar. Though he may have meant no offense, his question had a whiff of the condescending. While an eloquent retort proved evasive at the time, his inquiry has... more
“Don’t you think a study of The Body is trendy?” I was once asked by another scholar. Though he may have meant no offense, his question had a whiff of the condescending. While an eloquent retort proved evasive at the time, his inquiry has since nagged me. As I lecture on bodily changes resultant from evolutionary adaptation or phenotypic plasticity, do I hear it as provocation from the impertinent audience member? As I excavate and analyze ancient bodies interred in burials for information about social identities or embodied experience, I think, will this work be unfashionable come next season? As I study human remains in historic museum collections, can I sense native peoples’ frustration with the sustained interest in their ancestors? These questions, I have come to realize (and for this I thank my skeptical colleague), require reflection about the pertinence of studying past human bodies in the contemporary intellectual and political landscape.
In thinking about the relevance of bio- (archaeological, anthropological, molecular) studies, I deliberate about bio-power. Coined by Michel Foucault in the 1970s, the concept initially referred to the processes that transform humans’ biological attributes into politically strategic objects. Hence, bio-power resides at the nexus of social identity, lived experience, and power relations. Much subsequent theorizing about bio-power has focused on the discursive and abstract. That is, the technical study and materiality of human remains have seldom been brought to the fore. To extend thinking about bio-power, I offer a biohistoric consideration of crania collected by the nineteenth-century natural historian Samuel G. Morton. The study of these remains, I argue, is intimately connected to the establishment and ongoing maintenance of the United States’ body politic.
In thinking about the relevance of bio- (archaeological, anthropological, molecular) studies, I deliberate about bio-power. Coined by Michel Foucault in the 1970s, the concept initially referred to the processes that transform humans’ biological attributes into politically strategic objects. Hence, bio-power resides at the nexus of social identity, lived experience, and power relations. Much subsequent theorizing about bio-power has focused on the discursive and abstract. That is, the technical study and materiality of human remains have seldom been brought to the fore. To extend thinking about bio-power, I offer a biohistoric consideration of crania collected by the nineteenth-century natural historian Samuel G. Morton. The study of these remains, I argue, is intimately connected to the establishment and ongoing maintenance of the United States’ body politic.
Violence is neither an innate aspect of the human condition, nor is it an aberration. Rather, violent conflicts are a consequence of complex socio-historical circumstances. For those who study the material traces of such encounters,... more
Violence is neither an innate aspect of the human condition, nor is it an aberration. Rather, violent conflicts are a consequence of complex socio-historical circumstances. For those who study the material traces of such encounters, contextualized human remains offer evidence of interpersonal traumas and long-term physiological stresses. Investigation of these marks can testify to the conjoining of state formation processes, systematic violence, and racialization of the Other. In this lecture, I spotlight conflicts that occurred in the United States during the nineteenth century, and I examine their connection to natural historic research on human remains. In the manifesting of the U.S. nation-state—in establishing and maintaining the body politic—Euro-Americans were validated as citizens and received proper burial when they died during violent conflicts. Such was not the case for rebellious Africans or ‘savage’ Native Americans with whom they clashed. These Others only acquired social worth after death and through a process of disinterment, fragmentation, and examination by Euro-American scientists. It is also significant that this research erased hybrid identities like Black Indians from the national consciousness. Conflict undergirded by colonial necropolitics then engendered scientific opportunism and a cohesive national identity. As illustrative example, I offer a biohistoric look at Samuel G. Morton and the crania he amassed prior to dying in 1851; many of the latter were gifted from U.S. Army surgeons. Rather than an archaism of the discipline, the collection communicates much about social identities, as well as the violence—real or symbolic—that scientific inquiry can produce.