Jeffrey L. Hantman
Professor
Ph.D. Arizona State University 1983
Specialties
Eastern Woodland archaeology; ethnohistory; colonialism; regional systems; archaeological method and theory; indigenous archaeology; archaeology and communities.
My research in archaeology is concerned with the writing of anthropological histories of Native American societies. I focus on the writing of long-term regional histories, with a particular interest in the intersection of indigenous worldviews and the events of the early colonial era. I am equally concerned with changing relations within and between indigenous peoples at this time. My recent research and writing attempts to engage in the practices of indigenous and collaborative archaeology, framing new questions of the archaeological record that are rooted in native concepts of power, landscape, history, and hierarchy. My earliest (and some recent) publications are concerned with long-term demographic and political processes in the Pueblo region of the American Southwest. For the past two decades, my research has focused primarily on the greater Chesapeake region of the Eastern United States.
Monacan leaders Karenne Wood (PhD candidate, Anthropology), former Chief Kenneth Branham and Danny Red Elk discussing Monacan history In the Rotunda Dome Room at the University of Virginia. (2004)
I am presently focused on writing a long-term history of the Monacan people of Virginia, and identifying the varied responses of the Virginia Monacans and the neighboring Powhatans to European colonization. I have worked with the Monacan Indian Tribal Association and the Monacan Cultural Museum on issues of writing collaborative histories and the repatriation of human remains and museum collections. I, along with several graduate students in Anthropology, recently assisted the Monacan Tribe in the documentation and analysis of a National Park Service collection of over 24,000 artifacts associated with ancestral Monacan history to facilitate its return to the Monacan Tribal Museum. I am also working with the Astor collection of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Native American art at the University of Virginia Art Museum but originally displayed at the Astor Hotel (Times Square) in New York City between 1904 and 1937.
Selected Publications
2023 - Scholar, Activist, Humanist: A Portrait of Eric Wolf in Charlottesville (1955-1959), BEROSE: International Encyclopaedia of the Histories of Anthropology, Paris. (in press, May 2023).
2023 - Recent Monacan Archaeology in Albemarle County: Long-Term Perspectives and Colonial Era Representation, The Magazine of Albemarle Charlottesville History Vol. 80. (in press, Spring 2023)
2020 - "Brooks Notes." Twelve essays on the architecture and history of the Lewis Brooks Museum, University of Virginia. Published online in the Virginia Anthropology Society Firewalker. https://uvavas.wixsite.com/anthro/blog
2020 - Preface for Second Edition: "Monacan History: Our Story" by Karenne Wood and Diane Shields, published by Monacan Ancestral Museum and Albemarle County Office of Diversity and Equity.
2019 - Eugenicists, Sentimentalists, Activists: Social Theory at the University of Virginia, 1926-1960. Magazine of Albemarle County History 76/77: 71-99. (Winner of the Jane Moore Essay Award)
2018 - Monacan Millennium: A Collaborative Archaeology and History of a Virginia Indian People. University of Virginia Press, Charlottesville, VA. (Released in paperback in 2021)
2018 - The University Cemetery Cache: A Unique Native American Archaic-Era Biface Cache in Virginia. Ms. On file, Office of the Architect, University of Virginia and Virginia Department of Historic Resources, Richmond. Revisions in progress for publication in 2021. (with Benjamin Ford)
2014 - Archaeology in the American Enlightenment. In Encyclopedia of the American Enlightenment, ed. M.G. Spencer, pp. 85-88. Continuum Publishing Group, New York.
2013 - Sites in History, History in Sites: Archaeology, Historical Anthropology and Indigenous Knowledge. In: The Death of Prehistory, eds. P. Schmidt and S. Mrozowski, pp. 201-220. Oxford University Press, Oxford.
2010 - Long-Term History, Positionality, Contingency, Hybridity: Does Rethinking Indigenous History Reframe the Jamestown Colony?. In Across a Great Divide: Continuity and Change in Native North American Societies, A.D. 1400-1900, eds. L. Scheiber and M. Mitchell, pp. 42-60. University of Arizona Press, Tucson.
2009 - Indigenous Archaeologies: The Quiet Revolution is Here. American Antiquity 74: 202-206.
2008 - Jamestown's 400th Anniversary: Old Themes, New Words, New Meanings for Virginia Indians. In Archaeologies of Place: Monuments, Memories, and Engagement in Native North America, P. Rubertone, ed. Pp. 217-241. One World Archaeology Series, Left Coast Press, California.
2006 - Managing Archaeological Data: Essays in Honor of Sylvia W. Gaines. Anthropological Research Paper No. 57 (ed. with R. Most). Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona.
2006 - Regional Population Dynamics in the Northern Southwest. In Managing Archaeological Data: Essays in Honor of Sylvia W. Gaines. J. Hantman and R. Most, eds. Anthropological Research Papers No. 57 (with J. Neitzel). Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona.
2005 - Colonial Legacies and the Public Meaning of Monacan Archaeology in Virginia. SAA Archaeological Record 5 (2): 28-32.
2004 - Of Parsimony and Archaeological Histories: A Response to Comment to Boyd. American Antiquity 69: 583-585. (with D. Gold and G. Dunham).
2004 - Across the Continent: Jefferson, Lewis and Clark and the Making of America (ed. with D. Seefeldt and P. Onuf). University of Virginia Press, Charlottesville.
2004 - Science, Geopolitics, and Culture Conflicts. In Across the Continent: Jefferson, Lewis and Clark and the Making of America. (with P. Onuf). University of Virginia Press, Charlottesville.
2004 - Monacan Meditation: Regional and Individual Archaeologies in the Contemporary Politics of Indian Identity. In Places in Mind: Archaeology and Communities. P. Shackel and E. Chambers, eds. Routledge Press, New York.
2003 - Collective Burial in Late Prehistoric Virginia: Excavation and Analysis of the Rapidan Mound. American Antiquity 68 (1). (with G. Dunham and D. Gold).
2002 - The Woodland in the Middle Atlantic: Ranking and Dynamic Political Stability. In The Woodland Southeast. D. Anderson and R. Mainfort, eds., pp. 270 - 291. (with D. Gold). University of Alabama Press.
2001 - Monacan History and Archaeology of the Virginia Interior In Societies in Eclipse: Archaeology of the Eastern Woodland, AD 1400-1700. D.S. Brose and R. C. Mainfort, eds., pp. 107–124. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, DC.
2000 - Writing Collaborative History. Archaeology 53(5): 56-61. (with K. Wood and D. Shields)
1995 - The Middle Atlantic: Resistance to Foreign Colonies, and, Jamestown. In Invisible America: Unearthing Our Hidden History. M. Leone and N. Silberman, eds. Pp. 68-69, 74-75. Henry Holt and Co.: New York.
1994 - To Seek the Peace of the City: Jewish Life in Charlottesville. (with C. Ely and P. Leffler). Museum Exhibit Catalog, Albemarle County Historical Society. https://explore.lib.virginia.edu/exhibits/show/seek
1992 - Caliban's Own Voice: American Indian Views of the European Other in Colonial Virginia. New Literary History 23: 69-81
1990 - Between Powhatan and Quirank: Reconstructing Monacan Culture and History in the Context of Jamestown. American Anthropologist 92: 660-676.