Zooarchaeology

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

Read more about Melanie Cootsona

Morphometric Analysis of Littleneck clams (Leukoma Staminea) from Tomales Bay

I harvested modern littleneck clams from Tomales Bay and developed several predictive formulae in order to assess harvesting profiles and changes in population size from fragmented clam remains represented in the archaeological record from Tomales Bay.