LSU Maya Archaeology Night 2003
Tuesday October 28, 2003

Once again, members of the public and the LSU community are cordially invited to attend LSU Maya Archaeology Night, a free event in which current and former LSU students give talks about their original research on the ancient Maya.  Heather McKillop, William G. Haag Professor of Archaeology, and Bretton Somers, an M.A. student in geography, are organizing the event.  McKillop noted that "when I began the event several years ago, I thought that by inviting the public to LSU, I could help satisfy the general interest in the ancient Maya and give something back to the public, who ultimately fund archaeology." Past LSU Maya Archaeology Nights have been incredibly successful, with hundreds of visitors to the talks and reception. Maya Night is scheduled for Tuesday October 28, 2003 beginning at 6pm, in the Howe-Russell 130 auditorium, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge. Parking will be available nearby.

The winning format for LSU Maya Archaeology Night has been to invite an outside speaker, followed by short student presentations (well-practiced and oriented to the public), each followed by questions from the audience. We have a reception following the talks so that members of the public can mingle and talk with the researchers. This year we have Dr. Jaime Awe, the new Director of the Belize government Institute of Archaeology as our outside speaker. He will show slides of big Maya ruins excavated and restored in the course of a multi-million dollar tourism development project in Belize.  Visits to the ruins have increased dramatically, as has tourism revenue in Belize for the government and private sector.

By showcasing undergraduate and graduate students, the public can see not only is there exciting research being carried out at LSU in Maya archaeology, but there is a future in the past! Past presenters have gained archaeological employment with state and federal governments and in the private sector with consulting archaeology companies. Others have entered M.A. and Ph.D. programs at LSU and other universities. One of this year’s presenters, Terance Winemiller, a Ph.D. candidate in geography at LSU, was hired as a tenure-track Assistant Professor this fall at Auburn University. LSU Maya Archaeology Night has provided a nice opportunity for our students to present their research, often for the first time.

The speakers will be introduced by Heather McKillop, who also will field questions after each talk from the audience. Dr. Awe’s talk "Archaeology and Tourism Development in Belize" will kick off the event. Terry Winemiller will talk about his Ph.D. dissertation research in "Water Resource Exploitation by the Ancient Maya of Yucatan, Mexico." Rachel Watson, who graduated from LSU with an M.A. in Anthropology and is an Archaeologist at the Division of Archaeology, State of Louisiana, will present her Master’s research "Coral Architecture at Frenchman’s Cay, Belize." Marsha Hernandez, a current M.A. student in Anthropology at LSU, and student employee at the LA Division of Archaeology, will talk about her Master’s research in Belize in " Excavations at Arvin’s Landing, Punta Gorda, Belize." Kevin Pemberton, a current Master’s student in Anthropology at LSU, will present his Master’s fieldwork in "What’s going on at Pork and Doughboy Point, Belize?" Terry McClosky will talk about "5000 Years of Hurricane Strikes in Belize," research he will be continuing in the Ph.D. program in Geography at LSU. Hampton Peele, who earned an MNS in Geography at LSU and is currently employed in the LSU Energy Center, will show how sophisticated GIS (geographic information systems) computer mapping can help in organizing and studying Maya sites in "Altun Ha: Let’s Map the Ancient Maya." Bretton Somers will show us how he found sites with no visible evidence during his Master’s fieldwork last summer in "Hidden Landscapes of the Ancient Maya."

The public will have the opportunity to mingle and chat with the presenters and others at the reception following the presentations. They can also talk with students who took the 2003 LSU summer course "Field Methods in Archaeology" in Belize.

LSU Maya Archaeology Night 2003 is made possible by the financial support of the Department of Geography and Anthropology and the Office of the Vice-Chancellor for Research and Graduate Studies at LSU, and by Lambda Alpha, the Honors Anthropology Society, who organized the reception.

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