| Abstract: |
Read again and focus on her methods. This chapter is a summary of results from the Koster archaeological site in Illinois. She attempt to regionally study the importance of the spatial dimension of mortuary behavior and its effect upon the study of prehistoric human biology. pg 125 Why study bones? Adaptation to the natural environment, genetic and social realationships and social organization all have an impact on the composition and structure skeletal series. Skeletal maturation, bony response to chronic and acute developmental upset, and the form and distribution of pathology are important measures of the ability of the human gorup to deal with universal problems of nutrition and disease. Demographic information, especially that defining longevity, also measures adaptive efficiency, and is therefore a useful supplement to data derived a skeletal sample. pg 126 biases in the structure and composition of burial series can result from both prehistoric disposal modes and archaeological sampling error.
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