Head Shaping and other Cultural Modifications of the Body

These subjects are an overarching focus of my research and an active area for my investigations. My dissertation and master's paper focused exclusively on the use of cranial vault modification to convey group membership and allegiances throughout the Andes. My MA research examined a cemetery from the San Pedro de Atacama oases to determine if cranial vault modification and artifact analysis yielded evidence as to whether this could have been a colony of the highland Bolivian state of Tiwanaku. My PhD dissertation (Anthropology, University of California, Santa Barbara, 2003) was a survey of cranial modification practices in the pre-Columbian Andes. I analyzed over 2,700 crania from complex and small-scale societies throughout the Andes to see if there was a correlation between head shaping practices and social complexity and showed that increasing complexity led to increasing homogeneity in cranial vault modification styles. 

I have conducted in-depth examinations of cranial modification practices in San Pedro de Atacama, Chile. These projects have revealed that the population used head shape to ally with foreign powers as well as to create a unified local identity when needed. A more detailed manuscript I wrote based on this research is in press for 2007 at a Chilean journal, Estudios Atacameños. My work has also used a similar framework, focused on ethnicity and the creation of social identity, to examine head shaping practices outside of the southern Andes. My recent work, in collaboration with Leonid Yablonsky of the Russian Academy of Sciences, comparing cranial modification in Andean populations and Eurasian Steppe populations was published in Homo: Journal of Comparative Human Biology.

Also tied into my interests in the deliberate modification of the body in the past, was research I conducted on the effects of labret use (lip plugs) on dental health. A short paper I wrote about this was published in the International Journal of Osteoarchaeology. It focuses on one individual buried with two labrets, and the effects visible on his skeleton after prolonged wear.

Skeletal Trauma

I just completed an investigation of interpersonal violence in San Pedro de Atacama, Chile. I presented some of the results at the 2005 AAPA. Costa and I previously explored this topic in a sample from the Late Intermediate Period. The LIP research was published in the Chilean journal Chungará, and we have since expanded the sample to cover the entire occupation of the San Pedro oases. This reveals that increased rates of injury accompanied the increase in population and hierarchy during the Middle Horizon. Compounded by resource stress during the Late Intermediate, this resulted in highly elevated levels of violent injury. Our manuscript on this topic is in the May 2006 issue of the American Journal of Physical Anthropology.

Ceremonial Centers

Aside from the main thrust of my research on the populations of north Chile, I have been fortunate to analyze a number of smaller collections. At the AAPA in 2004 I presented a poster summarizing my bioarchaeological research on health and cultural identity in a small collection from the Island of the Sun in Lake Titicaca, Bolivia. The Island of the Sun was of great ritual significance to a number of Andean peoples and as such is a unique sample for analysis. I hope to publish the results of this interesting study soon. This research ties into my dissertation research on human remains from the great Andean oracle and pilgrimage center of Pachacamac.