SCIENCE LOOKS at facts to support or disprove theories. In searching for the earliest Native Americans, scientists such as archaeologists and anthropologists study ruins and objects left behind, such as pottery and cave paintings, to learn about the people who lived long ago.
As knowledge and technology expand, we also look for answers from different places. One of these is linguistics, the study of languages. By studying language patterns and history, linguists look for connections between cultures in different parts of the country or from different periods in history.
Before Europeans arrived in the Americas, it’s estimated that there were about 1,000 native languages. Linguists who specialize in Native American languages have found almost 200 language families, some with very complex grammar. The variety and differences among the languages suggest that the people that make up Native American groups came from many, many different places.
Early DNA research provided conflicting information about the relationship between early Native Americans and other populations. A study at the University of California at Davis, published in 2009, identified a gene common in most of the 41 Native American populations they tested. This marker, called the 9-repeat allele, was not present in any of the 54 Eurasian,
Thomas Jefferson.
THE FIRST ARCHAEOLOGISTS
An archaeologist is a scientist who studies humans and cultures of the past by recovering and examining evidence, such as pottery, tools, and even trash. Thomas Jefferson is often credited as the father of American archaeology because of his curiosity about Native Americans.
In the state of Virginia where Jefferson lived, mounds provided evidence of early Native American cultures. Additionally, Jefferson had discovered bones of ancient people near his Monticello home.
He also had a mastodon tooth from a western Virginia site near the city of Saltville. Jefferson believed clues about the history of Native Americans could also be found in the languages they spoke. Due to his curiosity, Jefferson sent Meriwether Lewis and William Clark to learn more about the Native Americans of the West in hopes of answering his questions.
Archaeology and the closely related science anthropology have provided more information about ancient native people. In so doing, these sciences have also contributed to the destruction of cultures by removing items or communicating erroneous information, either intentionally or by accident. Some descendants of ancient cultures believe that these social scientists have contributed to discrimination through stereotyping cultural groups.
The first known anthropological study in America was documented in the 1851 paper, "League of the Ho-de-no-saunee, or Iroquois" by Lewis Henry Morgan, who received an enormous amount of help from a young Seneca man, Ely S. Parker. A century later, in 1952, Edward P. Dozier graduated from the University of California at Los Angeles with a doctorate in anthropology. As a member of the Pueblo band, Dozier was the nation's first Native American anthropologist. Throughout his career, Dozier had to balance his native values with scientific methods. His work led to the establishment of an American Indian Studies program at the University of Arizona. Today, the number of American Indian Studies programs at universities, and the number of Native American anthropologists, archaeologists, and ethnologists, continues to grow.
World History
