This volume explores 15,000 years of indigenous human history on the North American continent, drawing on the latest archaeological theories, time-honored methodologies, and rich datasets. From the Arctic south to the Mexican border and east to the Atlantic Ocean, all of the major cultural developments are covered in 53 chapters, with certain periods, places, and historical problems receiving special focus by the volume's authors. Questions like who first peopled the continent, what did it mean to have been a hunter-gatherer in the Great Basin versus the California coast, how significant were cultural exchanges between Native North Americans and Mesoamericans, and why do major historical changes seem to correspond to shifts in religion, politics, demography, and economy are brought into focus. The practice of archaeology itself is discussed as contributors wrestle with modern-day concerns with the implications of doing archaeology and its relevance for understanding ourselves today. In the end, the chapters in this book show us that the principal questions answered about human history through the archaeology of North America are central to any larger understanding of the relationships between people, cultural identities, landscapes, and the living of everyday life.

Section 1. Histories, Perspectives, and Definitions 1. Questioning the Past in North America, Timothy R. Pauketat 2. Hunter-Gatherer Theory in North American Archaeology, Kenneth E. Sassaman and Asa R. Randall 3. Bone Lickers, Grave Diggers, and Other Unsavory Characters: Archaeologists, Archaeological Cultures, and the Disconnect from Native Peoples, Joe Watkins Section 2. Pan-American Connections, Migrations, and Encounters 4. Historical Archaeology and Native Agency across the Spanish Borderlands, David Hurst Thomas 5. Some Commonalities Linking North America And Mesoamerica, Robert L. Hall 6. The North American Oikoumene, Peter N. Peregrine and Stephen H. Lekson 7. People, Plants, And Culinary Traditions, Deborah M. Pearsall 8. Early Paleoindians from Colonization to Folsom, Nicole Waguespack 9. Pleistocene Settlement in the East, David G. Anderson Section 3. Archaeological Histories and Cultural Processes I. Arctic and Subarctic 10. Adapting to a Frozen Coastal Environment, Robert W. Park 11. Rethinking Eastern Subarctic History, Donald H. Holly, Jr. and Moira Mccaffrey 12. Archaeology of the North Pacific, Herbert D. G. Maschner II. The West 13. Foundations for the Far West: Paleoindian Cultures on the Western Fringe of North America, Jon Erlandson and Todd J. Braje 14. Archaeology of the Northwest Coast, Herbert D. G. Maschner 15. The Winter Village Pattern on the Plateau of Northwestern North America, Anna Marie Prentiss 16. Great Basin Foraging Strategies, Christopher Morgan and Robert L. Bettinger 17. The Evolution of Social Organization, Settlement Patterns, and Population Densities in Prehistoric Owens Valley, Jelmer Eerkins 18. Mound Building by California Hunter-Gatherers, Kent G. Lightfoot and Edward M. Luby 19. Diversity, Exchange, and Complexity in the California Bight, Jennifer E. Perry 20. Archaeologies of Colonial Reduction and Cultural Production in Native Northern California, Stephen W. Silliman III. Northeast and Mid-Atlantic Seaboard 21. Overview of the St. Lawrence Archaic through Woodland, Claude Chapdelaine 22. New England Algonquians: Navigating "Backwaters" and Typological Boundaries, Elizabeth S. Chilton 23. What Will Be Has Always Been: The Past and Present of Northern Iroquoians, Ronald F. Williamson 24. Regional Ritual Organization in the Northern Great Lakes, AD 1200-1600, Meghan C. L. Howey 25. Villagers and Farmers of the Middle and Upper Ohio River Valley, 11th to 17th Centuries AD: The Fort Ancient and Monongahela Traditions, Bernard K. Means 26. Native History in the Chesapeake: The Powhatan Chiefdom and Beyond, Martin Gallivan IV. Plains and Upper Midwest 27. Lifeways through Time in the Upper Mississippi River Valley and Northeastern Plains, Guy Gibbon 28. The Archaeological Imprint of Oral Traditions on the Landscape of Northern Plains Hunter-Gatherers, Gerald A. Oetelaar 29. Situating (Proto)History on the Northwestern Plains and Rocky Mountains, Laura L. Scheiber and Judson Byrd Finley 30. The Origins and Development of Farming Villages in the Northern Great Plains, Mark D. Mitchell 31. Planting the Plains: The Development and Extent of Plains Village Agriculturalists in the Southern and Central Plains, Richard R. Drass 32. Women on the Edge: Looking at Protohistoric Plains-Pueblo Interaction from a Feminist Perspective, Judith A. Habicht-Mauche 33. Cahokia Interaction and Ethnogenesis in the Northern Midcontinent, Thomas E. Emerson 34. The Effigy Mound to Oneota Revolution in the Upper Mississippi River Valley, Robert F. Boszhardt 35. Post-Contact Cultural Dynamics in the Upper Great Lakes Region, Vergil E. Noble V. Mid-South and Southeast 36. Mound Building Societies of the Midsouth and Southeast, George R. Milner 37. Re-envisioning Eastern Woodlands Archaic Origins, Dale L. McElrath and Thomas E. Emerson 38. Poverty Point, Tristram R. Kidder 39. Origins of the Hopewell Phenomenon, Douglas K. Charles 40. Monumental Landscape and Community in the Southern Lower Mississippi Valley during the Late Woodland and Mississippi Periods, Mark A. Rees 41. Making Mississippian at Cahokia, Susan M. Alt 42. Mississippian in the Deep South: Common Themes in Varied Histories, Adam King 43. Living With War: The Impact Of Chronic Violence In The Mississippian Period Central Illinois Valley, Gregory D. Wilson 44. Moundville in the Mississippian World, John H. Blitz Section 4. Greater Southwest and Northern Mexico 45. The Archaeology of the Greater Southwest: Migration, Inequality, and Religious Transformations, Barbara J. Mills 46. Diversity in First Century AD Southwestern Farming Communities, Lisa Young 47. Hohokam Society and Management, Suzanne K. Fish and Paul R. Fish 48. Terraced Lives: Cerros De Trincheras Sites In The Northwest/ Southwest, Bridget M. Zavala 49. Chaco's Hinterlands, Stephen H. Lekson 50. The Mesa Verde Region, Mark D. Varien, Timothy A. Kohler, and Scott G. Ortman 51. Warfare and Conflict in the Late Pre-Columbian Pueblo World, James E. Snead 52. The Pueblo Village in an Age of Reformation (AD 1300-1600), Severin Fowles 53. Casas Grandes Phenomenon, Christine S. VanPool and Todd L. VanPool

Timothy Pauketat , Professor of Anthropology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, United States

Timothy R. Pauketat is an Archaeologist and Professor of Anthropology and Medieval Studies at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign.

"If any editor is to be given special praise for his work, vision and services to the cause of clarity, then it is Timothy Pauketat. His handbook, marshalling the contributions of 62 authors, is a model of organization." --Madeleine Hummler, Antiquity