Goodbye Archeology of Death

It's been a good run, but it is coming to an end.

I am glad I took this class, it opened my eyes up quite a bit to the world of archeology. I even used some of the stuff I learned already in my Art History classes (how exciting right?). I enjoyed Erin's teaching style immensely and felt that it was one of the reasons that I enjoyed the class so much. So thank you Erin for not making this class boring and too disturbing.

I loved my group and I enjoyed the projects we completed together. They alone taught me a wealth of Anthropology vocabulary. I tried to teach them some Art History but they were just having none of it.

The readings for this class were engaging and not too dense that I didn't understand what was going on. I did share with some of my friends some information about ancient burial practices and even some more modern ones. They mostly had my reaction: interest with a side of disgusted.

All in all I am glad I took a chance and registered for this course. I learned things that I would have never known otherwise. Even though an Anthropology is definitely not for me I had a lot of fun talking to the people it is perfect for and learning from them. 

Deviant Burial Group: A Love Story

THE HORROR

I have never, ever, I mean since primary school had a positive experience with a group project. There is always someone who does not do their work and slacks off or someone who produces work that they really didn't put effort into and now you have to go back a re-do the project. So you can imagine that when Erin assigned a huge group project worth a considerable chunk of our marks my face was reminiscent of Harry Potter when Dobby dies.

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Our first meeting as a group was the awkward "hey guys, we are going to be working together for the next few months. Hope everyone is going to pull their weight...haha". Fair enough every group has that not so enjoyable first encounter. After we did get to know each other a bit love was in the air and we started to become one big happy family. It all started with the burial park, really our first date. Surrounded by the deceased and looking at young men who had given their lives for their country we all started to realize that this was going to be good.

Our weekly meeting turned into something that was looked forward to, we could hear about each other's week. Usually the discussion turned into the subject of Anthro classes since 3/4 of the group major in the field. Once the discussion turned down that road I kind of just sat there and (for the most part) was pommeled with disturbing facts like the existence of "Body Farms". It was all in good fun though.

We had our last meeting a week ago Tuesday. At the end Rachel stood up and exclaimed how happy she was our project was finished then quickly added that she would miss us and in a softer voice added we can all still hang out. I AM HOLDING YOU TO THE RACHEL!

To sum it up this was the best group experience I have ever had in my life. We worked well together, everyone brought different strengths to the group and we all did our work well and on time. I could not have asked for better people to work with and would do a project with them again in a heart beat.

The Art of Taxidermy

While I was looking at my classmates blogs I stumbled across an interesting post by Ethan. The post was about a video that posed the question why don't we taxidermy humans?

First off I should give a little back story: I'm not an Anthropology major, not even an Anthropology minor. I took this class on a suggestion of one of my History in Art professors. When my group realized that I was no akin to the world of dead humans they began to find merriment in finding new ways to gross me out every time we met. I don't know if they like the faces of horror I make or giggle at my complete lack of knowledge that there are places that actually take dead people and stick them in something called a body farm. I swear this shit is straight outta "Bones".. The point is that Ethan is in my group and he has once again completely put me out of my element by posting that video

When I watched it my toes were a bit curled I won't lie. My initial reaction was gross, why would I want my dead Grandma in the living room, I might as well be the creepy guy that keeps his dead mom from "Psycho". Then I remembered that probably the biggest thing I have learned during my time in the Anthropology department is to have an open mind and give things a chance before I make a judgement.

With that in mind I still don't want Grams sitting on the couch with me but I can appreciate the video and I do find it interesting.