Elsbeth Dowd
I am an anthropologist and registrar at the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History. My interests include museum anthropology, Eastern Woodlands and Plains archaeology, Caddo language revitalization, pottery and lithic analysis, iconography, cultural preservation, public outreach, and relations between museums,archaeologists, and indigenous communities. My current research projects include a study on indigenous perspectives on the Spiro Mounds site, the ritual architecture and pottery of late prehistoric communities in eastern Oklahoma, and the history of films produced about the Spiro site.
As registrar at the Sam Noble Museum, I am responsible for the documentation, safety, and security of objects in the museum's care, including the permanent research collections, loaned objects and exhibition material. I work extensively with both the Exhibits Department and the Collections and Research Division to advance the museum's mission: inspiring minds to understand the world through collections-based research, interpretation, and education. I also truly enjoy interacting with students, volunteers, and visitors, sharing all the museum has to offer.
For my dissertation (2012), I looked at the sociopolitical dynamics of the ancestral Caddo living along the upper Mountain Fork River in southeastern Oklahoma from ca. A.D. 1200-1600. I used pottery analysis, radiocarbon dating, and paleobotanical analysis to study the chronological and social relationships between these small communities, identifying shifts in regional affiliation and the use of ritual architecture. I received grants from the National Science Foundation and the SRI Foundation. Based on my research and community outreach I developed a traveling exhibit, "True to Tradition: History and Heritage of the Caddo People", with an accompanying website https://caddoheritage.wordpress.com/.
Supervisors: Dr. Patrick Livingood
As registrar at the Sam Noble Museum, I am responsible for the documentation, safety, and security of objects in the museum's care, including the permanent research collections, loaned objects and exhibition material. I work extensively with both the Exhibits Department and the Collections and Research Division to advance the museum's mission: inspiring minds to understand the world through collections-based research, interpretation, and education. I also truly enjoy interacting with students, volunteers, and visitors, sharing all the museum has to offer.
For my dissertation (2012), I looked at the sociopolitical dynamics of the ancestral Caddo living along the upper Mountain Fork River in southeastern Oklahoma from ca. A.D. 1200-1600. I used pottery analysis, radiocarbon dating, and paleobotanical analysis to study the chronological and social relationships between these small communities, identifying shifts in regional affiliation and the use of ritual architecture. I received grants from the National Science Foundation and the SRI Foundation. Based on my research and community outreach I developed a traveling exhibit, "True to Tradition: History and Heritage of the Caddo People", with an accompanying website https://caddoheritage.wordpress.com/.
Supervisors: Dr. Patrick Livingood
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