Q&A with PhD student Trevor Lamb
Trevor Lamb is a 3rd year PhD student whose dissertation research focuses on the foodways of the Alutiiq/Sugpiag and Unangan Peoples in what is now called Southwest Alaska
Q: Tell us about yourself and what you’ve been working on.
A: I am interested in foods and how animal and plant foods are combined into meals. I did my Bachelors at the University of Maine in Anthropology and minored in Earth Science, which is where my interest in northeastern Turtle Island hunter gatherer societies began. Then I received my Masters in Anthropology at University of New Brunswick, applied to BU and here we are! This semester, I’ve been presenting at talks, and spent 2 weeks over the summer collecting over 100 contemporary plant specimens in Alaska for an herbarium.
Q: Why anthropology?
A: Anthropology was largely unintentional, though it all started for me in kindergarten when I wanted to be an archaeologist. By the time I got to high school (I went to vocational HS in Massachusetts), I also wanted to learn more about commercial plant nurseries and wanted to study environmental science. Many of my anthropology undergrad peers were focusing on stone tool collections, largely ignoring pottery material culture. My advisor at the time suggested I look at pottery as a tool to cook meals – to cook plants – this nudge led me to look at not so much pottery design, but pottery residue analysis. This informed my ideas around Indigenous foodways and ancient plant use, connecting my two passions: plants and archaeology. Once I got into BU, I knew I wanted to continue my master’s topic, but I was curious about a different area in the north. So when I found out about Dr. Catherine West’s Ancestral Foods project in Southwest Alaska, I knew I wanted to join and help.
Q: What is an herbarium? Why an herbarium?
A: Herbariums are long term archives. 4000 years ago, Alaska was warmer, so I originally went to look at hunting tools to see if people were hunting on the sea ice or whether they were hunting in open water, in essence testing the environment for hunting. Unalaska Island is an open landscape in the Aleutian Islands off mainland Alaska. There are no bears. No mosquitos. No ticks. It looks and feels almost like Ireland or Iceland. It’s pretty mild, green, and lush. The perfect spot to collect over a 100 species of plants. Most field studies want to preserve the most you can, so I luckily brought two plant presses. It was a good idea with the constant wetness and rain, one being for collection, and the other I kept in the airbnb for transferring the samples. My hope and point for the herbarium is that future researchers can use it and look to it to create macro and microscopic comparative collections with ancient samples.
Q: What is something fun/surprising/interesting about your research?
A: A random fact is that with regard to tubers, we have this idea that people just dig them up; but up there, traditionally tubers are harvested from rodent-caches! You can find them by the feeling of squishy earth underfoot, and rob the rodents of their tubers – though this is always done respectfully by leaving fish for them as payment and gratitude. There are so many small root vegetables that people wouldn’t think to dig for, but are incredibly culinarily important.
Q: What comes next for you?
A: My plan is to go to Kodiak Island next (where there are lots of bears) to do both research and excavate. I want to excavate 600-year-old houses with fire pit features, and research 1990s excavations with cooking features along with 1960s pottery in museum archives.
