courtesy photo
Dr. Todd Surovell researching in Mongolia.
Grand County Historical Association hosts Dr. Todd Surovell at a potluck on Friday, April 7, 6-9 pm, at the Granby Community Center
Dr. Surovell is an archaeologist and a professor at the University of Wyoming. He will present his program titled “From Middle Park to Mongolia: How Mongolian Reindeer Herders Can Inform Us About Folsom Archaeology.”
Dr. Surovell based his research on the Dukha Ethnoarchaeological Project (DEP). DEP was inspired by ten years of fieldwork at Barger Gulch, Locality B, a Folsom site near Kremmling, Colorado. At Barger Gulch, a large contiguous areas was excavated and tens of thousands of artifacts were recovered. The focus of the work was the spatial and social organization of a Folsom campsite. After countless hours of spatial analysis, Dr. Surovell found that spatial patterns were easy to identify at Barger Gulch, but understanding their significance for past human behavior was difficult.
This problem led to the development of the DEP, the focus of which is the study of how nomadic peoples use space within their campsites. Specifically, in the campsites of reindeer herders in northern Mongolia, Dr. Surovell studies how people decide where to do what they do, and how those decisions are manifested spatially in the archaeological record. For more information on Dr. Surovell’s Mongolia expeditions, please follow the Dukha Ethnoarchaeological Project at https://sites.google.com/site/dukhaethnoarch/
For more information call 970-725 3939 or visit www.grandcountyhistory.org
