News in brief

In the news with Andrew Gillreath-Brown, PhD candidate

In the summer of 2017, I worked for the WSU Museum of Anthropology to document a collection excavated in 1972 from Turkey Pen Ruin in southeastern Utah by professors Bill Lipe (WSU, emeritus) and R.G. Matson (University of British Columbia), who worked extensively in the area as part of the Cedar Mesa project. I discovered among the artifacts an ancient tattoo tool and then conducted extensive analyses on it, working with several other WSU researchers. We concluded the artifact dated to about 2,000 years ago and is the oldest tattooing artifact in western North America.

This discovery resulted in a publication in the Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports in February 2019. The story garnered widespread attention from national and international news media, including National Geographic, Newsweek, Smithsonian Magazine, Archaeology Magazine, National Geographic History Magazine, and a Utah Public Radio podcast as well as many international agencies, such as Stern magazine, National Geographic Spain, CBC Radio, Al Jazeera, La Vanguardia, Les Cahiers de Science & Vie, and Illustreret Videnskab Historie. (See the full list.)

In total, I did around 22 interviews with different news and science organizations. It was definitely an amazing experience and not one that I will ever forget.

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Nancy McKee retires

Associate Professor Emeritus in Cultural Anthropology, Nancy McKee, an anthropological linguist and cultural anthropologist with a specific interest in inequality and poverty, retired from WSU in May 2019. She taught for more than 30 years in the Department of Anthropology after earning her PhD at WSU. McKee was a pioneer in WSU’s distance-learning program, offering classes through various digital media until her recent retirement. She also chaired and served on numerous MA and PhD committees in Anthropology.