Communication is an important basic need of culture. Communication allows individuals to interact with each other through customs, roles, rules, or rituals, thereby defining and establishing the characteristics of a particular culture. Culture is created through communication, and preserves and passes along cultural characteristics from one place and time to another.

Art is one form of communication. Artists create art to communicate ideas, thoughts, or feelings about their culture. Art at its simplest is a form of communication. Our knowledge of Roman painting comes almost entirely from the common practice of painting the interior walls of houses while the plaster was still damp. Romans decorated the interior walls of their houses and villas with paintings executed on wet plaster, a technique known as fresco. “Depending on the function of the room, walls might be painted with imaginary architecture, still lifes, mythological scenes, or purely decorative motifs” (Thompson 2007).

The decoration of the walls was meant to communicate the wealth and sophistication of the villa’s owner through the elegant details and the costly pigments used. For instance, Egyptian Blue and Cinnabar Red were the most expensive pigments. Cinnabar was 30 times more costly than other pigments. Cinnabar also caused miners to die excruciating deaths – it is the ore of mercury. 

Based on the frescos discovered in Pompeii, art historians have divided ancient Roman paintings into four styles. The first style reproduced the appearance of a wall built of stone or colored marble. The second style portrays actual architecture, painted in perspective, between which one can catch a glimpse of the landscape. The third style is divided into panels, in which a large mythical subject most often fills the central panel. The fourth style mixes elements from the second and third styles, but with greater diffusion of pictures in the central panel. Because there were few windows in most homes, frescoes decorated the interior walls.

The walls of the triclinium at Oplontis were painted around 50 B.C., in what is called the Second Style. The decoration has a podium at the bottom, over which rise columns of marble colored or decorated metal  segments. In the center of the east and west sides of the door, beyond which one can see temples, with statues of female divinities inside and perspective colonnades. On the north wall, beyond the gate, a  tall column supports a statue of a feminine divinity in a garden. The most interesting feature of this wall is the decorative motif consisting of figs. 

Southern Utah University (SUU), home of our Utah Project Archaeology Program, received a Landmarks of American History and Culture from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). The project will employ the rich archaeological record, four notable landmarks, the oral traditions of contemporary descendant communities, and primary sources to illuminate the ancient Fremont. The Fremont, horticulturalists and part-time foragers, thrived in what is now the state of Utah between AD 1 and AD 1300. We will use four important landmarks (Parowan Valley Fremont sites, Cedar Breaks National Monument, Fremont Indian State Park, and Frontier Homestead State Park) to explore the impacts of climate change on cultures, how humans meet their universal needs for food and shelter, and how people communicated the circumstances of their lives through art work etched and painted on rock walls.

In the words of Utah writer Terry Tempest Williams (1989) “… of what value are objects of a past people if we don’t allow ourselves to be touched by them. They are alive. They have a voice.” Workshop participants will learn how to hear the voices of the past through engaging with artifacts, living descendants, and the magnificent landscape of southwestern Utah.

The voice of American Indians is a true ‘National Treasure’ and has long been disregarded. Their oral histories span all of human history and explain many of the natural occurrences inexplicable to scientists. Their cultural knowledge is irreplaceable and valuable to all. Oral histories of descendant community members representing the five tribes of Utah (Shoshone, Goshute, Ute, Paiute, and Navajo) claim Fremont ancestry. When asked what he thought happened to the Ancient Fremont, Paiute Elder Rick Pikyavit, simply said, “We are still here.” The Fremont are still here.

Sadly, the history and contributions of indigenous peoples are often omitted from American history and from state history. People who are invisible in the past continue to be invisible in contemporary society. The main goal of archaeology and of this project is to bring the rich history of these peoples to teachers and their students and help Native Americans take their rightful place in the national narrative and in present-day society. By honoring the history and cultural heritage of past peoples we are honoring the living descendants with whom we share citizenship.

Teachers attending the workshop will engage in meaningful interactions with tribal elders who are enthusiastic about sharing their culture and knowledge. Participants will forge friendships that transcend culture and time working together to bring the indigenous voice to the forefront and redefine the American narrative. This rare opportunity allows teachers and their students to know the Fremont through their living descendants.

The Voices of the Ancients workshops will bring 72 teachers from across the nation to southwest Utah in the summer of 2020 for two week-long institutes. Applicants can choose to attend Session 1 (June 28-July 3) or

The Moquitch (Fremont people) grew corn, beans, and squash. They hunted wild animals and ate wild plants to complete their diet. Corn was the most important of these food sources because the seeds could be dried and stored for three or more years. Corn needs warm soil, warm weather, and water and requires a three-month frost-free growing season.  If it is too cold in the spring, corn seeds will not start growing.  Too much heat can dry out the soil. Too much water can flood corn fields and wash away the plants.  Too little water means the plants won’t produce much food.

Weather is the combination of temperature, rain or snow, wind, and other conditions we experience daily. Climate is the combination of many years of weather that might be hot or cold, dry or wet. During Fremont times the climate was warm and wet enough to allow farming of corn, beans, and squash. Weather varied from year to year, and from region to region within the lands occupied by the Fremont. Because they could store corn seeds for years, they could still have food for two or three bad years.

Landscape at Fremont Indian State Park in Utah. Photo by Courtney Agenten.

Teachers observe rock art (writing) at Fremont Indian State Park in Utah. Photo by Courtney Agenten.

Today, we want to focus on something that is at the core of Project Archaeology curricula – Descendant Community Member Voices. We want students to link archaeology to the people connected to it today. Understanding this connection helps students explore the importance of archaeology, their own culture and the culture of other people, and how they can become engaged citizens. Project Archaeology’s founder, Dr. Jeanne Moe, wrote about how descendent community member collaboration was essential to the creation of our curricula. The collaboration resulted in descendant community members acting as a guide throughout the curricula. This voice not only shares vital information about the archaeological site and its connection to a culture, but the person also shares about their life today.

Project Archaeology curricula teach four overarching Enduring Understandings:

1. Understanding the past is essential for understanding the present and shaping the future.
2. Learning about cultures, past and present, is essential for living in a pluralistic society and world.
3. Archaeology is a systematic way to learn about past cultures.
4. Stewardship of archaeological sites and artifacts is everyone’s responsibility.

Descendant community member voices, when combined with archaeology, present great opportunities for classroom discussions around race, socioeconomic differences, gender identity, and many other topics that can be difficult to address in the classroom. Facilitating these kinds of conversations helps students meet the four Enduring Understandings. Students who learn about culture, critical thinking, and multiple viewpoints, as well as understanding those topics in relation to archaeology, have the potential to become engaged citizens that shape the future, support a pluralistic society, and are agents in the stewardship of archaeological sites.

While piloting Project Archaeology: Investigating Shelter’s regional investigation, Investigating a Shotgun House, researchers Linda Levstik and A. Gwynn Henderson (2015) used the curriculum to represent the perspectives of residents in the working class neighborhood of Davis Bottom in Lexington, KY. Davis Bottom was a historically integrated community that started as a neighborhood for free or newly freed African Americans after the Civil War. Students learn about residents through oral histories and documentary films that feature the people who live or lived in Davis Bottom, census records, and the material objects from archaeological excavations of a neighborhood house. Levstik and Henderson reflected on the connection between archaeology, descendant community member voices, and race.

In emphasizing the importance of understanding working class people and the significance of integration in Davis Bottom, students called attention to the power of studying race as a connective rather than divisive feature of community, and identifying collective agency as a powerful response to racism. As one of the seventh graders explained, people were “willing it to stand up for their rights, stand up against racist people” in order to “change… how life would be for future generations” (HM7).
(Levstik and Henderson 2015)

Students are the future. Curricula that feature descendent community members’ voices as experts, residents, archaeologists, scientists, and activists can

Medicine Rocks State Park

The park is located in southeastern Montana, 11 miles north of Ekalaka and 25 miles southwest of the town of Baker. It encompasses 330.34 acres of low rolling grassland prairie hills interspersed with sandstone formations that include caves, columns, pillars, flat-topped towers, holes, arches, and spires.

The history of Medicine Rocks extends long into the past, back to times when the area was said to have been used by the Crow, Northern Cheyenne, and Sioux nations for sacred and ceremonial purposes. EuroAmericans referred to the area as The Hole-In-Rock as evidenced by early military maps, including a “War Department Map of the Yellowstone and Missouri Rivers and their Tributaries” made in 1859-60. By 1880, settlers started moving into the Medicine Rocks area, followed by hunters and cattle ranchers.

In 1883 Teddy Roosevelt visited Medicine Rocks (Butte) and is quoted in his journal stating the future state park was “as fantastically beautiful a place as I have ever seen.” In 1919 the first homestead records were recorded in Medicine Rocks State Park area. The purchase of the county land decreased the future park size. Carter County had ownership of the remaining land until the county commissioners deeded the land to the state of Montana in 1957 for a state park.

The main attraction that brings people to the park are the unique sandstone pillars that have historic pictographs and petroglyphs painted and carved on them respectively. The distinctive Medicine Rocks State Park geology is estimated to be between 60 and 65 million years old as it is part of the Fort Union sandstone ridge system that has been eroded into sandstone pillars. Most of the park occurs within the Fort Union Formation and the sandstone shapes found at Medicine Rocks State Park were caused by deposits from ancient tides and sand bars.

In 2017, Medicine Rocks State Park was inducted into the National Historic of Historic Places for its cultural and natural resources. Rock art and historic inscriptions, many with dates, indicates continual visitation and use of the site. Inscriptions related to indigenous, a few suggesting early 1800 visitation, followed by early Euro-American inscriptions indicating late 1870s-early 1880s settlement of the area, continuing right through to the present cover the sandstone outcrops of the park.

Although a small number of stone rings, rock shelters, a buried lithic component, and a light scatter of lithics are found within the park, petroglyphs, mostly in the form of historic inscriptions, dominate the resources found throughout the park, as well as throughout the immediate region. Although the earliest archaeological remains in the area, dating back to around 11,000 years B.P., are associated with the Mill Iron Site, 28 miles southeast of Medicine Rocks State Park, Medicine Rocks itself has not yet yielded evidence of such antiquity. Artifacts identified at Medicine Rocks

Rebecca (Becca) Simon is the Assistant State Archaeologist in the Office of Archaeology and Historic Preservation at History Colorado. Growing up in Washington, D.C., Becca visited the Smithsonian often and fell in love with history and archaeology. Becca’s experience includes teaching, interpretation, collections management, and cultural resource management. She has field experience in Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, Kansas, and southern Jordan. Her interests include Southwest archaeology, the protohistoric era, public outreach, preservation, skiing, ultimate frisbee, roller derby, and most importantly her dog, Minnie.

At some point between December 2007 and the end of January 2008, I was sitting in my tucked away office above the loading dock of the National Museum of Natural History. I was an intern for the former illustrations researcher of the Handbook of North American Indians and emeritus anthropologist, Joanna Scherer. I spent most of my time deciphering curly-cues and squiggles of ethnographic field notes from the turn of the twentieth century. Joanna walked in one day and handed me a flyer one day and said, “You need to do this” (I am 5 foot 11 inches, but her 5 foot something-self was not to be messed with).

The flyer gave details of a “facilitator workshop” by Project Archaeology. I didn’t really understand what Project Archaeology was beyond “educational” and having to do with kids. Prior to making the leap into archaeology professionally, I worked for nursery schools and after-school programs for almost ten years and had a lot of hands-on experience with education. Knowing that I ran from the office each day to go to my second of three jobs at the after-school program, Joanna made the easy connection. I don’t think either of us thought it would be life-changing, but it kind of was.

In February 2008, I received my “Project Archaeology Facilitator” certificate learning the curriculum, Investigating Shelter, in a draft form (the book wasn’t published until 2009). During that workshop, I learned there was a very direct way for me to use my crudely acquired education background and my passion to be an archaeologist AT THE SAME TIME.
My mind was slightly blown, but not particularly forward-thinking. So for a few days, I thought I was going to make some big moves, but the reality was I went back to deciding if it was an “s” or an “f” and didn’t think about Project Archaeology for a couple of years.

Getting a job in archaeology is not easy. I have been fortunate to be at the right place at the right time with the right email address on several occasions. Making the move from Washington, DC, to Colorado involved a lot of faith and luck. I hoped I was going to become a technician for

As archaeologists, we wear many hats – shovel bums, researchers, theoretical discussants, grant writers, etc. However, the hat I (Val) prefer to wear is educator. I joined Project Archaeology in 2018 as the Louisiana State Coordinator. I also work full-time as the Outreach Coordinator for the Louisiana Division of Archaeology in the Department of Culture, Recreation, and Tourism. I didn’t know what to expect when I attended my first Project Archaeology Leadership Academy.

At the conclusion of the Academy (which is awesome and if you’ve not applied to attend, then I highly suggest you do), we had a chance to meet with current interim direction, Erika Malo, and Jeanne Moe, the former director. I had several questions and ideas, but the one that struck me the most was “How do we make archaeology accessible?”

I remember talking to Erika and Jeanne about the lack of options for people with disabilities. We spoke at length about curriculum design, cost, and the need for creative partnerships. I left the Academy with one goal – to make Project Archaeology curricula accessible. It took several months to find a creative partner, but the opportunity arose when I met with the Louisiana School for the Visually Impaired (LSVI). They wanted to know if we had any artifacts from the Poverty Point World Heritage Site that the students could feel and if someone would be willing to give a presentation on the site. I jumped at the opportunity. I was so excited! I showed them the Division of Archaeology’s teacher kits and said we could adapt them to suit their needs. While reviewing the notes after that initial meeting, I thought, “I can do better.”

I went back to the principal and assistant director and asked if I could implement certain material from the Project Archaeology curriculum along with the Poverty Point teacher kits. They mentioned that the timeline would be tight, as they were doing a summer camp focused on STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) activities. I thought, “This is it!” Here’s the thing about Project Archaeology – it’s all STEM and STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math) materials. The creators of the curricula have carefully crafted each activity in such a manner that an educator can teach math, science, social studies, art, and engineering using archaeology as the focus point. I explained this to the staff at LSVI. They were cautiously overjoyed.

So, we had the materials…but how to adapt them to students who are visually impaired? Turns out, you have to be really creative and have colleagues willing to entertain and implement your crazy ideas. After many design sessions, trips to the craft store, and buying stock in glue guns, we created a three-week Discover Archaeology program adapted from materials found in Investigating Shelter, Investigating a Fremont Pithouse, Intrigue of the Past, and