{"id":105335,"date":"2015-10-21T09:24:34","date_gmt":"2015-10-21T13:24:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=105335"},"modified":"2015-10-28T08:45:37","modified_gmt":"2015-10-28T12:45:37","slug":"a-bare-bones-approach-to-understanding-human-behavior","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2015\/10\/a-bare-bones-approach-to-understanding-human-behavior\/","title":{"rendered":"A Bare Bones Approach to Understanding Human Behavior"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Natalie<\/a>
Natalie Munro, professor of anthropology, holds up a specimen from the bone collection at her lab in Beach Hall. (Peter Morenus\/UConn Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The laboratory of UConn anthropologist Natalie Munro is a treasure trove of animal\u00a0bones. She has assembled\u00a0the collection for teaching students how to identify\u00a0everything\u00a0from the\u00a0species\u00a0and age of the animal to how it died.<\/p>\n

\"Bones<\/a>
Bone fragments in Natalie Munro’s lab, used to train students how to piece together archaeological clues to human behavior. (Peter Morenus\/UConn Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Diversity of specimens is critical for that education, and Munro has been creative about amassing a rich collection.<\/p>\n

Interspersed between the\u00a0bleached remains of\u00a0animals tens of thousands of years old from distant digs are\u00a0newer specimens from closer to home \u2013 roadkill\u00a0both\u00a0collected and donated.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have processed roadkill specimens, especially when we were first getting the lab up and running,” says Munro. “My collection is more for teaching, than for research\u00a0\u2013 it\u2019s mostly about having a large enough variety of specimens so that I can teach my zooarchaeological method and theory class about how to identify bones and understand what they can tell us about human behavior.\u201d<\/p>\n

Students in Munro\u2019s lab train their eyes in taphonomy, or the study of surface markings that yield information about what happened to the bone. They learn to recognize details such as whether the animal was consumed by humans or other predatory animals or scavengers, and also about characteristics of the landscape where that bone ended up. For instance, if it was tumbled in water, collected from animal scats, or buried in sandy soil.<\/p>\n

Studying human behavior at a time of historic climate change may provide lessons for mankind in the long term, but in the short term it’s teaching UConn students how to recreate human behavior.
\nBased on a collection of bone remnants from meals consumed about 20,000 years ago in Jordan, students of anthropology professor Natalie Munro are piecing together details about one society’s impact on the ecosystem.
\n\u201cWhen thousands of bones are amassed, they can tell you a surprising amount,” says Munro, whose students have scrutinized bone fragments as small as a centimeter.
\nA bone fragment can indicate the species and relative age of the animal that was a meal. The shape is analyzed to give details about how and when the bone was fragmented. Finding complete skeletons implies that hunting was happening close by and an entire animal could be easily transported back to camp.
\nThe bones and ancient detritus were deposited in the archaeological record at a time that coincided with the Last Glacial Maximum or last major ice age \u2013 a time of great change.
\nAfter years of digging and brushing away the layers of time at dig sites in the Jordanian western highlands, the history of this important passageway linking Africa and Europe is still being written.
\nTo aid in that process, Munro was able to export some of the material from Jordan to her lab in Storrs so that her students have the opportunity to be involved \u201cfrom analysis to publication.\u201d<\/div>\n

Gaining the knowledge to piece together the clues left in the archaeological record requires a lot of hands-on learning.\u00a0Preparation of the new additions\u00a0is part of the process.<\/p>\n

On one side of Munro’s lab is a fume hood, but not for the ordinary purpose of removing vapors from noxious chemicals. Here, its purpose is to remove the smell of decomposition emanating from animal remains soaking in buckets of water.<\/p>\n

The soaking method works by submerging the remains in water for a period of time, usually month or so, after which the water, flotsam, and jetsam is poured off. By then, the bones are fairly clean and the job is largely done. The soaking, or macerating, is extremely effective, albeit stinky and unpleasant.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0process has\u00a0yielded some unlikely bedfellows. The bones of badgers and raccoons from North America\u00a0are cataloged with\u00a0gazelles and monkeys from another continent.\u00a0\u201cWe have appropriate specimens to ask a student if a bone is the distal femur of a wildcat or a fox,\u201d says Munro.<\/p>\n

Currently, the contents of the buckets are remnants of the annual roast the archaeology faculty host for students, which is in itself a learning experience. Students recreate an ancient roast, making tools to prepare a previously purchased and humanely killed goat or lamb carcass. The bones are then added to Munro’s collection\u00a0for future\u00a0analysis.<\/p>\n

Munro’s enthusiasm about\u00a0the research and teaching using the collection\u00a0shines.<\/p>\n

\u201cI find it motivating,” she says. “You are constantly being rewarded and surprised.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Anthropologist Natalie Munro has assembled a collection of animal bones from archaeological digs and recent roadkill for teaching students about long ago societies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":58,"featured_media":105347,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2226,2076,2227],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[117],"class_list":["post-105335","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-clas","category-research","category-uconn-edu-homepage"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-10 13:32:27","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105335","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/58"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105335"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105335\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":105350,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105335\/revisions\/105350"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/105347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105335"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=105335"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=105335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}