Speakers & Programs 2020-21

Situated along the banks of St. Joseph’s Bay in northwest Florida, the antebellum city of St. Joseph played a foundational role in Florida’s early political and economic history.

In 2013, structural assessments associated with ongoing renovations of the Red House, Trinidad and Tobago’s Parliament building, revealed human remains buried beneath the foundation. Excavations and radiocarbon dating indicate the remains are pre-Columbian with 14C dates ranging between approximately AD 125 and AD 1395. *Due to the sensitive nature of the information provided during this lecture, this talk will not be recorded for future viewing.

Thursday, February 18th at 7 pm Two winners of the 2019 Alliance for Weedon Island Archaeological Research and Education (AWIARE) and Levett Foundation Grant, Kendal Jackson and Heather Draskovich, will discuss their winning research in the Tampa Bay area. Read their lecture abstracts and biographies. Searching for Ancient Seascapes: Preliminary Results of Ongoing Geoarchaeological Investigations…

An Indigenous Analysis of the Grotesques of the Southeast S. Margaret Spivey-Faulkner, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of Alberta A new reanalysis of the large assemblage of zoomorphic carvings excavated at the Fort Center archaeological site in south Florida has revealed what appears to be a nearly 1,000-year rooftop sculptural tradition in the…

Forgotten Ecologies: Recent Vegetation Transformations Reveal Past Human Influence Christopher A. Kiahtipes, Ph.D., Postdoctoral Scholar, Institute for the Advanced Study of Culture and the Environment, University of South Florida Humans leave lasting environmental legacies on the landscapes they occupy. From the fire-stick to the farm, human interventions in ecological process have important ramifications for future…

Gulf Coast Archaeology: Examining Society and Climate through Material Culture Trevor Duke, Ph.D. Candidate, University of Florida Lindsey Parsons, M.A. Student, Geology Department, University of Georgia Two winners of the 2019 and 2020 Alliance for Weedon Island Archaeological Research and Education (AWIARE) and Levett Foundation Grant discuss their winning research along the Gulf Coast of…

Once There Was A Mound . . . Robert Austin, Ph.D., Alliance for Weedon Island Archaeological Research and Education, Inc. During the third week of July 1950, bulldozers began chewing away at the sides of a large shell mound in downtown St. Petersburg, bringing to an end a once iconic landmark. During the city’s early…