Melanie Cootsona

Graduate Student
Research Website: 
Teaching Website: 

My research concerns the role of animal-human relationships in human societies. I work with Picuris Pueblo in northern New Mexico, and my dissertation work centers on a legacy collection of primarily avian remains from the ancestral pueblo dating to 1200-1800 CE excavated in the 1960's. I am interested in decolonial theory and methodologies and community-based work and have been incorporating oral histories and modern-day community perspectives into my interpretations of this archaeological record. 

Region(s): 
American Southwest
Research Theme(s): 
Zooarchaeology, Oral History, animal-human relationships, Indigenous Archaeology, community-based archaeology, legacy collections, collections-based research, American Southwest

A Revolution in Ruins: Historical Archaeology of Land Reform in Southwestern Queretaro, Mexico

A Revolution in Ruins: Historical Archaeology of Land Reform in Southwestern Queretaro, Mexico

In 2019, Stahl Foundation funding supported my dissertation fieldwork in southwestern Queretaro, Mexico. In Queretaro, research efforts largely focused on amassing a body of research materials associated with land reform. In particular, Stahl Foundation funding supported trips to manuscript depositories which resulted in the recovery of a significant amount of digital surrogates of archival material from local and state depositories.