Anthropology major Zenus Francis recently attended his first professional association to present on his research. As part of a senior thesis project, supervised by Dr Armando Anzellini, Zenus researched social class, identity, and cranial modification in the ancient Andes. He presented his findings in a poster session the American Association of Biological Anthropologists annual meeting in Baltimore over spring break.
The research sought to investigate the relationship between cranial modification and eliteness across the Ancient Andes to determine if modification was a method of ascribing status. Zenus hypothesized that cranial modification would be more prevalent in sites where it was associated with eliteness than in sites where it was indeterminate of elite status. Methods: he conducted a meta analysis on the relationship between elite status and cranial modification from a data base of sites across the Andes region. I built a dataset that differentiated sites where cranial modification was associated with elite status and where it determined to not be associated and conducted statistical analysis comparing populations of unmodified and modified individuals. This analysis was conducted between sites, within sites, and across temporal periods to understand the dynamics and change of these patterns. Results: Using a chi-square test he was unable to show any statistical difference between eliteness and modification populations. Additionally, he was unable to observe a statistical difference in the unmodified and modified populations across all sites. Conclusion: Conducting a meta-analysis of cranial modification across the Andes region, he was unable to support the hypothesis that cranial modification was a tool for inscribing elite status. Conducting a meta-scale analysis of cranial modification can help us understand large geographical and temporal patterns of cranial modification, which can illuminate its relationship to social structure.
Zenus is a senior with a double major in anthropology and psychology. After graduation this May, he will pursue a Masters in Anthropology at the University of Victoria in British Columbia, Canada.