College of Behavioral & Social Sciences
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The collections in this community comprise faculty research works, as well as graduate theses and dissertations..
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Item MINDING YOUR FEET: AN EXAMINATION OF CEMETERY RECORDATION AND ANALYSIS THROUGH GEOSPATIAL DOCUMENTATION IN FAIRFAX COUNTY, VIRGINIA(2024) Boyle, Colleen; Palus, Matthew; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Cemeteries are a wealth of information and are a vital cultural resource for the communities in which they reside. These spaces reflect the cultural and community practices, the evolution of public space, economic conditions, and religious traditions of those interred. This thesis seeks to answer the research question: can cemetery landscapes be understood using a phenomenological approach to interpreting cultural patterns and trends in a digital landscape? Understanding cemetery landscapes is vital to the understanding and preservation of the cultural landscapes of these communities, so clear and accurate documentation of these sites is possible and necessary when using modern geospatial technology. This thesis examines the results of the Fairfax County Park Authority’s Archaeology and Collections Branch cemetery survey using geospatial mapping methodologies to record cemetery boundaries and inventory grave and grave marker locations. Through the examination of each of the three cemeteries highlighted throughout this thesis, it was determined that a hybrid approach to cemetery analysis utilizing the theoretical framework of phenomenology in conjunction with the broader perspective offered through digital data and mapping allows for a greater understanding of a space and its use over time.Item PERSISTENCE OF FORM: A MATERIAL ETHNOGRAPHY THROUGH THE ARCHITECTURE OF ANAHEIM’S 20TH CENTURY LANDSCAPE(2022) Reed, Dean Joseph; Palus, Matthew M.; Samuels, Kathryn L.; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)During the mid-20th century, Anaheim was one of many small unincorporated communities within southern California that would undergo a transition from a rural agricultural community into an industrial and commercial suburban sprawl. Previous works in cultural heritage resource management and local historical research within the City have been primarily centered around their local historic districts or larger commercial areas. However, the areas within proximity to these culturally defining areas have been largely undocumented. Those that have been documented have been studied under the regulatory lens of the National Historic Preservation Act or the California Environmental Quality Act. As a result, they are interpreted as just a product general growth of the City in the post-World War II era and determined ineligible for treatment or protection as historic resources. However, properties of this type are often examined as material culture that is independent of its surroundings. They have not been thoroughly examined for their data potential outside of the regulatory lens, nor has their connection to each other and the greater Anaheim landscape been considered fully. The analysis of architecture is useful in helping us understand production and use of space within the built environment. A further analysis, with the application of theory based in social production, space and place, and landscape may elaborate further on the broader social structures, allow a fuller understanding of the past, and help unpack the notion of material culture as a product. An approximately one-mile segment of East Lincoln Avenue, located near the center of Anaheim, exhibits a variety of the City’s vernacular architecture. In what ways did the City’s development allow these buildings to persist, and what processes were at play in their reconfiguration? Material culture, as a social product, requires a broader theoretical lens, a need to understand cultural resources as a part of a landscape, and a more in depth look into the individual. As the mid-20th century landscape emerges in the historical record, the importance of understanding the social factors that were at play are relevant to their preservation, especially as each phase of construction becomes overshadowed by the next, even to this day.Item LANDSCAPES OF TENSION: EXPLORING NERVOUSNESS AND ANXIETY ON A MARYLAND PLANTATION(2018) BAILEY, MEGAN; Shackel, Paul A; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This dissertation examines a late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century plantation site, L’Hermitage, which is located in Frederick, Maryland, on what is now Monocacy National Battlefield. It considers how the interactions among and between the plantation owners, the Vincendière family, and their enslaved workers, in order to investigate how negotiations of power and supremacy can be read through spatial organization, material culture, and interpersonal relations. I refer to Denis Byrne’s (2003) use of the phrase “nervous landscape” to explore how a landscape and its occupants can be literally and figuratively nervous when absolute power fails and a heterogeneity and multiplicity of power and identities are introduced. That is, the disruption of homogeneity and hegemony breeds nervousness. Byrne uses this concept to explore racial tension; however, this project recognizes that anxiety can emerge from uneasiness around other structural factors. This research relies on multiple sources, including historical documents, artifacts, and archaeological features in order to explore how race, gender, class, religion, and nationality interacted on the plantation landscape. This work applies particular attention to how the power dynamics around these hierarchies played out within the nervous frame, mitigating or contributing to a nervous landscape. The dissertation also uses this framework to explore nervousness in the literal sense; how anxiety was a fundamental element of the colonial experience, and more broadly how emotion is an important aspect of the human experience that should be considered in archaeological interpretations of the past. This research is intended to contribute to the National Park Service’s goal of enhancing its interpretation of the larger context of the Civil War. Monocacy National Battlefield (MNB) is primarily valued for the battle that took place in 1864, and this is reflected in much of its current interpretation. However, MNB is committed to expanding this interpretation to situate the Civil War battle in its historical, social, political, economic, and geographical context. Research on plantation life, including topics such as agriculture, slavery, and racism, will contribute toward this goal. Furthermore, the results of my study can be useful in framing the way Monocacy discusses power dynamics and identity in the context of L’Hermitage.