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In the Wake of Contact Biological Responses to Conquest Clark Spencer Larsen and George R. Milner, Editors The Columbian Quincentennial has sparked a new wave of research into the effects of European expansionism on the indigenous peoples of the Americas and Pacific Islands. This volume offers an authoritative overview of recent bioanthropological investigations of the demographic and epidemiologic consequences of the European influx, encompassing such areas as disease transmission, dietary changes, and cultural impact. Each chapter in the book focuses on either a specific geographic region or ethnic population. Assembling data from archaeological and skeletal evidence, the text provides a detailed account of the complex changes experienced by a population over time. The book considers not only the direct effect of the arriving Europeans, but also examines how precontact developments within a society dynamically affected the way it responded to conquest. This volume explores such topics as:
* Late prehistoric and early historic diet in gulf coast Florida
* Trade, contact, and female health in northeast Nebraska
* Historic epidemics of the American Pueblos
* The decline of the Chumash Indian population
* Biological effects of European contact on Easter Island
* An osteological assessment of health and disease in precontact and historic Hawaii
In the Wake of Contact: Biological Responses to Conquest is a text of major importance to the scientific study of the results of New World/Old World contact. This work provides a compelling new look at the age of conquest that will prove both fascinating and insightful for anthropologists, archaeologists, and population biologists.