Recognizing Post-Columbian Indigenous Sites in California’s Colonial Hinterlands

Land-use patterns of seasonally mobile hunter-gatherers present a particular set of challenges to archaeological recognition of post-1492 Indigenous residential sites in the colonial hinterlands of California. The relatively short duration of site use, frequent re-use of sites episodically occupied in the more distant past, and fine temporal scale often required for archaeological study of cultural practices in the wake of colonialism necessitate a multifaceted approach. This research strategy entails creative and exhaustive use of diverse data sources, including documents, images, and material evidence; innovative approaches to inferring site formation, chronology, and organization; and an iterative method that feeds data back into the identification process and builds on often subtle differences between components dating before and after 1492. This chapter illustrates this research strategy via examples from studies in Yosemite National Park that also have relevance to archaeological identification of post-1492 Indigenous sites elsewhere in North America.

Archaeology · Colonialism · Geography · Identification (biology) · Indigenous · National park · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies · Archaeology and Natural History · Ecology · Historical and Cultural Archaeology Studies · History