Dr. William Andrefsky, Jr.
Ph.D., Binghamton University
Professor and Chair
Archaeology
Interests
Prehistoric hunter-gatherer organization, lithic technology, rise of sedentism
Courses
General Anthropology (ANTH 101); Introduction to Archaeology (ANTH 230); Archaeological Field School (ANTH 399/599); Lithic Technological Organization (ANTH 513); Plateau Prehistory (ANTH 543)
For the past 16 years I have worked in the interior northwestern region of North America. I have also conducted field research in Alaska, Japan, and over a dozen states in the continental U.S. I am interested in the manner in which hunter-gatherers organize themselves across the landscape and how their organizational strategies are mirrored in their lithic technology.
Representative Publications
2005 Lithics: Macroscopic Approaches to Analysis, Second Edition,
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, U.K.
2004 Partitioning the Aggregate: Mass Analysis and Debitage Assemblages. In Aggregate Analysis in Chipped Stone Studies, edited by Mary Lou Larson and Christopher Hall, pp 172-193, University of Utah Press.
2004 Materials and Contexts for a Culture History of the Columbia Plateau. In Complex Hunter-Gatherers: Evolution and Organization of Prehistoric Communities on the Plateau of Northwestern North America. Edited by Wm. C. Prentiss and Ian Kuijt, pp. 35-62, University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City.
2001 Lithic Debitage Analysis: Context Form Meaning. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City.
2000 The Calispell Archaeological Project: Final Report, Volumes 1-V. Center for Northwest Anthropology, Project Report Number 16, Washington State University, Pullman, Washington. (first editor with Gregg Burtchard, Kira Presler, Steven R. Samuels, Paul H. Sanders, and Alston Thoms).
1997 Thoughts on Stone Tool Shape and Inferred Function. Journal of Middle Atlantic Archaeology 13:125-143.1994 Raw Material Availability and the Organization of Technology. American Antiquity 59:21 35.
1990 An Introduction to the Archaeology of Pinon Canyon, Southeastern Colorado Vols. I VI. National Park Service, Rocky Mountain Region, Denver, Colorado.
1987 Diffusion and Innovation from the Perspective of Wedge Shaped Cores in Alaska and Japan. In The Organization of Core Technology. eds. Johnson, J.K. and C.A. Morrow. Westview Press, Boulder, Colorado.
1982 Reduction Sequences and the Exchange of Obsidian in Neolithic Calabria. In Contexts for Prehistoric Exchange. eds. Ericson, J. and T. Earle, pp. 149-172. Academic Press, New York. (second author with Albert Ammerman).
Current Research
My
research centers upon the contexts and situations that
allow hunting and gathering populations to shift from simple
foraging to a sedentary lifestyle. Over the past seven
years I have focused this effort on the Owyhee River Canyon
in southeastern Oregon. This research effort has put us
into the field for six of the past seven years with both
undergraduate field schools and with smaller more concentrated
teams of graduate students and researchers. This summer
(2006) we will again conduct investigations with an undergraduate
field school program on the Owyhee River Canyon (field
school link).
I consider myself an archaeological methodologist. My interests in methodological approaches to archaeology primarily deal with stone tools and lithic debitage analysis. This may seem trivial to some, however, a case can be made that a great majority of the materials found on prehistoric sites from all parts of the world are composed of stone, yet we know so little about how to interpret such materials. The archaeological record is a collection of the material remains of past human activities and behaviors. Because of organic decomposition, natural erosion, and modern landscape development only a very small fraction of that material culture is preserved on prehistoric site locations. Stone tools, however, are among the few kinds of material culture withstanding the inroads of natural and cultural perturbations. I think it is fascinating and essential to develop techniques and methods that will help us determine how to interpret behavioral and cultural information from this body of data.
Current Graduate Students
Sloan Craven, Ph.D., Paleoarchaic Mobility in the Great Basin
Nathan Goodale, Ph.D., Rise of Village Life in Jordan
College
Hall 150
509.335.1127
and@wsu.edu
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