When and by which routes did Paleoindians enter the Americas, and how did they adapt to inhabit different ecological zones?
Our group seeks to understand the timing, routes, and environmental setting of the earliest human dispersals in western South America.
We integrate archaeology, physical anthropology, genetics, and quaternary science to study prehistoric settlement systems - linked archaeological sites situated in multiple ecological zones from the Pacific coast to the high Andes.
This work provides information about the long-term history and co-evolution of humans and ecological systems, and the formation of landscapes.
New Publications
Rademaker, K., M.D. Glascock, D.A. Reid, E. Zuñiga, and G.R.M. Bromley
2021 Comprehensive mapping and compositional analysis of the Alca obsidian source, Peru. Quaternary International
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2021.11.029
Reports geographic patterning and geochemical composition of the Alca obsidian source, one of South America's largest sources of obsidian, used by people over 12,000 years.
Meinekat, Sarah A., Christopher E. Miller, and Kurt Rademaker, 2021, A site formation model for Cuncaicha rock shelter: Depositional and postdepositional processes at the
high‐altitude keysite in the Peruvian Andes. Geoarchaeology
DOI: 10.1002/gea.21889
Detailed >12,000-year sequence of site formation processes and environmental change recorded in the highest-elevation Pleistocene archaeological site in the Americas.
Recent Presentations
Rademaker, K., D.A, Reid,, M.D. Glascock, and B. Kaiser, 2021. A 12,000-year sequence of human use of the Alca obsidian source, Peru. International Association for Obsidian Studies 2021 conference.
Watch here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wjv7wAP-Y3U
