Theses and Dissertations

Advisor

Lambert, Shawn

Committee Member

Miller, D. Shane

Committee Member

Barry, Katherine

Committee Member

Boudreaux, Tony

Committee Member

Hardin, James

Date of Degree

8-12-2026

Original embargo terms

Visible MSU Only 2 Years

Document Type

Graduate Thesis - Campus Access Only

Major

Applied Anthropology

Degree Name

Master of Arts (M.A.)

College

College of Arts and Sciences

Department

Department of Anthropology and Middle Eastern Cultures

Abstract

The Hester site (22MO569), located near Amory, Mississippi, is an open-air site with intact Late Paleoindian and Early Archaic components dating back to the terminal Pleistocene and Early Holocene. I use morphology and a low-power use-wear approach to analyze the lithic tools from the Late Paleoindian and Early Archaic components. I examine the vertical distribution of lithic tools to understand Hester’s site function through time as interpreted through a gendered framework. I draw on ethnographic, ethnohistoric, and previous archaeological work to formulate these interpretations. I conclude that Hester was primarily a masculine-oriented logistical retooling and hunting camp during the Late Paleoindian Dalton component, became a residential camp with activities more focused on feminine-oriented tasks like subsistence plant processing and late stage hide processing in the Early Archaic Big Sandy/Jude component, and returned to a masculine-oriented logistical retooling and hunting camp in the Early Archaic Kirk Corner Notched component.

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