B J Mills
Biographic Data
| ID | 3400 |
|---|---|
| NAME | B J Mills |
| GIVEN NAMES | B J |
| FAMILY NAME | Mills |
| SIGNATURE | MILLS B J |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Arizona |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2130-2185 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 60 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 766 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 60 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1987 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 16 |
From Exclusive to Inclusive
The plaza is one of the most important elements of the built environment for bringing people together in the Pueblo World of the US Southwest. Yet, the myriad ways in which plazas were designed and used vary greatly through time. Although plazas have been significant components of Ancestral Pueblo site layouts for hundreds of years, nearly every research study has been based on the enclosed plazas of the Pueblo IV period. In this article, we eval…
Sampling variability and centrality score comparisons in archaeological network analysis
From Frontier to Centre Place
Chaco Canyon’s concentration of monumental architecture and the replication of its great house/small house architectural distinction throughout a broad region has often been regarded as unique and one of the world’s archaeological ‘Anomalous Giants’. Rather than seeing Chaco as unique, this contribution argues that Chaco should be seen in light of (1) its early position as a frontier zone of households with diverse backgrounds that periodically u…
Reading between the Lines
Archaeologists have pointed to certain architectural or decorative designs as representing 'elite styles' that mark status distinctions. We look at one such style-Dogoszhi-that was applied to several pottery wares across the Chaco World of the northern Southwest. Using a large database of ceramics, we test whether this style comprised an elite style or whether it signaled participation in a broader Chaco social network. We compare the distributio…
Assessing the performance of the bootstrap in simulated assemblage networks
Finding Archaeological Relevance during a Pandemic and What Comes After
This article emerged as the human species collectively have been experiencing the worst global pandemic in a century. With a long view of the ecological, economic, social, and political factors that promote the emergence and spread of infectious disease, archaeologists are well positioned to examine the antecedents of the present crisis. In this article, we bring together a variety of perspectives on the issues surrounding the emergence, spread, …
Hope in Dirt
A 2018 workshop on the White Mountain Apache Tribe lands in Arizona examined ways to enhance investigations into cultural property crime (CPC) through applications of rapidly evolving methods from archaeological science. CPC (also looting, graverobbing) refers to unauthorized damage, removal, or trafficking in materials possessing blends of communal, aesthetic, and scientific values. The Fort Apache workshop integrated four generally partitioned …
Intermarriage, Technological Diffusion, and Boundary Objects in the U.S. Southwest
Frontiers of Marginality and Mediation in the North American Southwest
Social networks and similarity of site assemblages
Resolving the migrant paradox
Fostering Collaborative Synthetic Research in Archaeology
While our fascination with understanding the past is sufficient to warrant an increased focus on synthesis, solutions to important problems facing modern society require understandings based on data that only archaeology can provide. Yet, even as we use public monies to collect ever-greater amounts of data, modes of research that can stimulate emergent understandings of human behavior have lagged behind. Consequently, a substantial amount of arch…
Evaluating Chaco migration scenarios using dynamic social network analysis
Migration was a key social process contributing to the creation of the 'Chaco World' between AD 800 and 1200. Dynamic social network analysis allows for evaluation of several migration scenarios, and demonstrates that Chaco's earliest ninth-century networks show interaction with areas to the west and south, rather than migration to the Canyon from the Northern San Juan. By the late eleventh century, Chaco Canyon was tied strongly to the Middle an…
What's new in Chaco research
This special section of Antiquity reports on new research on Chaco Canyon and its surrounding region in the northern U.S. Southwest. Two of the contributions are based on new excavations within Chaco Canyon-one at the largest great house of Pueblo Bonito by Patricia Crown and W.H. Wills (2018), and the other on Chaco's water management by Vernon Scarborough et
A total viewshed approach to local visibility in the Chaco World
The Chacoan great houses and great kivas of the U.S. Southwest are monumental, both in their scale and in conveying meaning. Visibility is key to understanding how and by whom that meaning was experienced. Although often discussed in Chaco studies, visibility has been infrequently tested. Here, the authors consider 430 great house and great kiva locations, and evaluate their visibility within their local landscapes. Using a total viewshed approac…
Why Do Fewer Women Than Men Apply for Grants After Their Phds
In spring 2013, the Society for American Archaeology created the Task Force on Gender Disparities in Archaeological Grant Submissions because of an apparent disparity in the rates of senior (post-PhD) proposal submissions by men and women to archaeology programs at the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research. Although NSF success rates for men and women between 2009 and 2013 were roughly equal…
On History in Southwest Archaeology
As an introduction to the Handbook, this chapter examines the question of history in Southwest archaeology in two senses. First, it traces the intellectual history of research in the region: from the nineteenth-century inauguration of Southwest archaeology as an extension of American military conquest, to the museum-oriented expeditions of the turn of the century, to the scientific advances and the growth of culture resource management during the…
Social Network Analysis in Archaeology
Social network analysis (SNA) in archaeology has become important for a range of theoretical and methodological approaches that can more generally be characterized as relational. They are relational in that it is the ties between actors (or nodes) that define social connections. Archaeologists are currently employing a diversity of theoretical approaches to networks, and the perspective taken in this review is that SNA can provide insights into a…
Migration, skill, and the transformation of social networks in the pre-Hispanic Southwest
Migration restructures interaction at different social and spatial scales and has the potential to create deep and lasting inequalities between migrants and hosts. But migrants may also create relationships that mediate inequalities and assume positions of power. We examine how migration restructured social relationships in the late pre-Hispanic U.S. Southwest and argue that skilled migrant potters were responsible for both technological innovati…
Networks in Archaeology
Are Social Networks Survival Networks? An Example from the Late Pre-Hispanic US Southwest
Diabase Temper as a Marker for Laguna Ceramics
The Western Keresan area consists of the present-day Pueblos of Laguna and Acoma. In the 1950s, Florence Hawley Ellis proposed that a high proportion of Laguna ceramics could be distinguished from the ceramics produced by Acoma and other population centers by the frequent use of diabase temper. We conducted a petrographic analysis of 51 ceramic sherds designed to test the veracity of this association. Historic period sherds from culinary and deco…
Multiscalar Perspectives on Social Networks in the Late Prehispanic Southwest
Analyzing historical trajectories of social interactions at varying scales can lead to complementary interpretations of relationships among archaeological settlements. We use social network analysis combined with geographic information systems at three spatial scales over time in the western U.S. Southwest to show how the same social processes affected network dynamics at each scale. The period we address, A.D. 1200-1450, was characterized by mig…
Relational Networks and Religious Sodalities at Çatalhöyük
Çatalhöyük is often compared to the Pueblos of the North American Southwest. As someone whose work largely focuses on Ancestral Pueblo archaeology, I was intrigued by the possibility of comparing these two areas. My initial reaction upon walking around the site of Çatalhöyük was that it was nothing like the pueblos or the Pueblos of the Southwest. One of the most obvious differences is that the buildings do not share walls, leaving a gap between …
The Dynamics of Social Networks in the Late Prehispanic US Southwest
This chapter conducts social network analysis on two case studies from the late prehispanic US Southwest. It takes a diachronic perspective in order to look at network dynamics over a 200-year period (ad 1200 to 1400). The case studies chosen are areas where, through independent data, extensive migration has been demonstrated and is widely accepted. The analyses pertain to three specific topics of archaeological interest: (1) first-comer advantag…
The Establishment and Defeat of Hierarchy
The role of social valuables in establishing and defeating hierarchies in prestate societies is explored through the use of Annette Weiner's concept of "inalienable possessions." Inalienable possessions are objects made to be kept (not exchanged), have symbolic and economic power that cannot be transferred, and are often used to authenticate the ritual authority of corporate groups. Ethnographic examples from Zuni are used to understand the range…
Social Network Analysis in Archaeology
Social network analysis (SNA) in archaeology has become important for a range of theoretical and methodological approaches that can more generally be characterized as relational. They are relational in that it is the ties between actors (or nodes) that define social connections. Archaeologists are currently employing a diversity of theoretical approaches to networks, and the perspective taken in this review is that SNA can provide insights into a…
Networks in Archaeology
Performing the Feast
Ceramic bowls from the Greater Southwest are used to show how changes in the exterior decoration of serving vessels are associated with the proxemics of ritual performances. Across the northern Southwest the first use of exterior designs and polychrome ceramics is during the Pueblo III period, which corresponds to a shift in settlement aggregation and the use of open plaza spaces. With the transition to the more enclosed plazas of the Early Puebl…
Accumulations research
Integrating functional analyses of vessels and sherds through models of ceramic assemblage formation
Current research on archaeological ceramics that use functional approaches are characterized as having two broad analytical goals: (1) the identification of the role of ceramics in subsistence systems, and (2) the identification of differences in settlement types. Much research has been conducted to meet each goal, but integration of the two approaches has been difficult because models of ceramic assemblage formation have been ill‐defined. As a s…
Recent Research on Chaco
Are Social Networks Survival Networks? An Example from the Late Pre-Hispanic US Southwest
Why Do Fewer Women Than Men Apply for Grants After Their Phds
In spring 2013, the Society for American Archaeology created the Task Force on Gender Disparities in Archaeological Grant Submissions because of an apparent disparity in the rates of senior (post-PhD) proposal submissions by men and women to archaeology programs at the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research. Although NSF success rates for men and women between 2009 and 2013 were roughly equal…
Animate Objects
Resolving the migrant paradox
Multiscalar Perspectives on Social Networks in the Late Prehispanic Southwest
Analyzing historical trajectories of social interactions at varying scales can lead to complementary interpretations of relationships among archaeological settlements. We use social network analysis combined with geographic information systems at three spatial scales over time in the western U.S. Southwest to show how the same social processes affected network dynamics at each scale. The period we address, A.D. 1200-1450, was characterized by mig…
A method for chronological apportioning of ceramic assemblages
Ceramic Production in the American Southwest
Gender and the Reorganization of Historic Zuni Craft Production
Over the past century, there has been a dramatic reorganization of craft production at Zuni Pueblo, including a change from a gender-specific economic system to one in which gender is less of an organizational principle. Concurrently changes in learning contexts, resource acquisition, labor scheduling, production scale, product demand, and, ultimately, the finished products have occurred. The interrelationships among these variables are discussed…
The Social and Historical Context of Short-Term Stylistic Replacement
Social networks and similarity of site assemblages
Fostering Collaborative Synthetic Research in Archaeology
While our fascination with understanding the past is sufficient to warrant an increased focus on synthesis, solutions to important problems facing modern society require understandings based on data that only archaeology can provide. Yet, even as we use public monies to collect ever-greater amounts of data, modes of research that can stimulate emergent understandings of human behavior have lagged behind. Consequently, a substantial amount of arch…
Evaluating Chaco migration scenarios using dynamic social network analysis
Migration was a key social process contributing to the creation of the 'Chaco World' between AD 800 and 1200. Dynamic social network analysis allows for evaluation of several migration scenarios, and demonstrates that Chaco's earliest ninth-century networks show interaction with areas to the west and south, rather than migration to the Canyon from the Northern San Juan. By the late eleventh century, Chaco Canyon was tied strongly to the Middle an…
Calendar Age of Lisakovsky Timbers Attributed to Andronovo Community of Bronze Age in Eurasia
We measured radiocarbon ages of 22 decadal replications and 1 bulk group from 5 tree-ring specimens using acid-base-acid pretreatment and accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS). The study has the goal of refining the precision and resolution of a segment of the conventional Bronze Age chronology in the Eurasian steppe attributed to the multicultural community known as Andronovo. The archaeological timbers were gathered from 3 cemeteries at the Lisak…
A total viewshed approach to local visibility in the Chaco World
The Chacoan great houses and great kivas of the U.S. Southwest are monumental, both in their scale and in conveying meaning. Visibility is key to understanding how and by whom that meaning was experienced. Although often discussed in Chaco studies, visibility has been infrequently tested. Here, the authors consider 430 great house and great kiva locations, and evaluate their visibility within their local landscapes. Using a total viewshed approac…
Finding Archaeological Relevance during a Pandemic and What Comes After
This article emerged as the human species collectively have been experiencing the worst global pandemic in a century. With a long view of the ecological, economic, social, and political factors that promote the emergence and spread of infectious disease, archaeologists are well positioned to examine the antecedents of the present crisis. In this article, we bring together a variety of perspectives on the issues surrounding the emergence, spread, …
Archaeological Collaboration with American Indians
From Frontier to Centre Place
Chaco Canyon’s concentration of monumental architecture and the replication of its great house/small house architectural distinction throughout a broad region has often been regarded as unique and one of the world’s archaeological ‘Anomalous Giants’. Rather than seeing Chaco as unique, this contribution argues that Chaco should be seen in light of (1) its early position as a frontier zone of households with diverse backgrounds that periodically u…
Migration, skill, and the transformation of social networks in the pre-Hispanic Southwest
Migration restructures interaction at different social and spatial scales and has the potential to create deep and lasting inequalities between migrants and hosts. But migrants may also create relationships that mediate inequalities and assume positions of power. We examine how migration restructured social relationships in the late pre-Hispanic U.S. Southwest and argue that skilled migrant potters were responsible for both technological innovati…
Settlement and Growth of Zuni Pueblo
The architectural history of Zuni Pueblo is reviewed. Inferences about the settlement and growth of the pueblo are drawn from archaeological data, plans, and photographs of the village. Key principles and features of nineteenth century Zuni architecture are elucidated. The dramatic architectural transformation of Zuni Pueblo during the last century is described, and the changing and enduring aspects of Zuni architecture are discussed
Integrating functional analyses of vessels and sherds through models of ceramic assemblage formation
Current research on archaeological ceramics that use functional approaches are characterized as having two broad analytical goals: (1) the identification of the role of ceramics in subsistence systems, and (2) the identification of differences in settlement types. Much research has been conducted to meet each goal, but integration of the two approaches has been difficult because models of ceramic assemblage formation have been ill‐defined. As a s…
An Assessment of the Research Potential of Museum Collections
Methods for assessing the research potential of anthropological museum collections are an important first step in using these collections for scientific research. Preliminary assessments are especially needed for casual collections, which often do not have the same amount of documentation as more systematic collections. Here, we present a method for evaluating the representativeness of collections of whole ceramic vessels using the Babbitt Collec…
Archeology
Acoma and Laguna Pottery
Gender and the Reorganization of Historic Zuni Craft Production
Over the past century, there has been a dramatic reorganization of craft production at Zuni Pueblo, including a change from a gender-specific economic system to one in which gender is less of an organizational principle. Concurrently changes in learning contexts, resource acquisition, labor scheduling, production scale, product demand, and, ultimately, the finished products have occurred. The interrelationships among these variables are discussed…
Assessing Organizational Scale In Zuni Ceramic Production
The organization of prehistoric southwestern communities
Ericson, Jonathon E. and Timothy G. Baugh, eds. The American Southwest and Mesoamerica: Systems of Prehistoric Exchange. New York: Plenum Press, Interdisciplinary Contributions to Archaeology, 1993. xviii + 302 pp. including chapter references and index. $45.00 cloth. McGuire, Randall H. Death, Society, and Ideology in a Hohokam Community. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, Investigations in American Archaeology, 1992. xii + 209 pp. including appendix,…
First Coswa Roundtable Luncheon for Graduate Students
Ceramic Production in the American Southwest
Accumulations research
Sourcing Chuskan Ceramic Production
Chuskan ceramics are often used as a classic example of the usefulness of temper analyses to identify the large-scale distribution of vessels from their locus of production. Although the general production location of Chuskan ceramics in the Chuska Mountains has been known since Shepard's pioneering work, specific sources of the igneous rock within this broad area have not been systematically investigated. We suggest that the paucity of clear-cut…
Forum on Women's Equity and Anthropological Praxis
Ceramic Production in the American Southwest
Preservation and Research of Sacred Sites by the Zuni Indian Tribe of New Mexico
Sacred sites are important in the ceremonial life of the Zuni Indians of the American Southwest. To protect these sites, both on and off the Zuni Indian Reservation, the Zuni Tribe has used two research and management strategies: (1) historic preservation, and (2) legislation and litigation. In this article, the Zuni Tribe's use of historic preservation to manage sacred sites is analyzed using the report series of the Zuni Archaeology Program. Wh…
Job Satisfaction and Parity for Women
The Social and Historical Context of Short-Term Stylistic Replacement
Recent Research on Chaco
Indigenous Archaeology
Indigenous Archaeology: American Indian Values and Scientific Practice. Joe Watkins. Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press, 2001. 234 pp
Migration, Factionalism, and the Trajectories of Pueblo IV Period Clusters in the Mogollon Rim Region
The Establishment and Defeat of Hierarchy
The role of social valuables in establishing and defeating hierarchies in prestate societies is explored through the use of Annette Weiner's concept of "inalienable possessions." Inalienable possessions are objects made to be kept (not exchanged), have symbolic and economic power that cannot be transferred, and are often used to authenticate the ritual authority of corporate groups. Ethnographic examples from Zuni are used to understand the range…
How Does the Past Become Present
Mimbres Painted Pottery
Performing the Feast
Ceramic bowls from the Greater Southwest are used to show how changes in the exterior decoration of serving vessels are associated with the proxemics of ritual performances. Across the northern Southwest the first use of exterior designs and polychrome ceramics is during the Pueblo III period, which corresponds to a shift in settlement aggregation and the use of open plaza spaces. With the transition to the more enclosed plazas of the Early Puebl…
How the Pueblos Became Global
Archaeology (43 works) · Geography (40 works) · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies (37 works) · History (35 works) · Sociology (32 works) · Computer Science (23 works) · History (21 works) · Political science (18 works) · Anthropology (16 works) · Historical and Cultural Archaeology Studies (16 works)