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Reading the Human Skeleton

Activity: Talk or presentation types › Invited talk

Description

This talk will discuss the techniques that can be used to gain an insight into individuals and populations from the past by analysing their skeletal remains. Using examples from her research Dr Dawson-Hobbis will discuss how biological anthropologists interpret information from the skeleton to determine identity information such as sex and age-at-death, as well as details of the lived experience including pathological lesions. How the discipline utilises evidence from scientific sampling to aid in determining how long ago an individual died (radiocarbon dating), and evidence for migration and diet (stable isotope analysis) will also be discussed.

Case studies will be drawn from her recent work on the Winchester Cathedral project ‘Kings and Scribes: the birth of a nation’, her appearance on the Channel Four programme ‘The Bone Detectives’ detailing some of her work on nineteenth century skeletal collections from Bristol, and research on medieval collections from Somerset and Winchester.
Period3 Aug 2020
Degree of RecognitionRegional