Clement Woodward Meighan

Clement W. Meighan (1925–1997) was an archaeologist who made notable contributions to reconstructing the prehistory of southern California, Baja California, and west central Mexico.

Early life and education

Meighan was born in San Francisco and raised in that city, in Phoenix, Arizona, and in California’s San Joaquin Valley. Serving in World War II, he was severely wounded. After the war, while still convalescing, he began studies at the University of California, Berkeley, where he received his undergraduate and doctoral degrees in anthropology.

Career

Meighan was hired as an instructor in anthropology at the University of California, Los Angeles in 1952 and continued at UCLA until his retirement in 1991. He founded UCLA’s Archaeological Survey, chaired its anthropology department, and played key roles in several regional and national organizations. His fieldwork was widely dispersed, including stints throughout various parts of California and in Utah, Arizona, Baja California, western and central Mexico, Belize, Costa Rica, Chile, Guam, Nubia, and Syria.

Meighan published scores of archaeological monographs, and reviews. Topically, his contributions to faunal analysis, rock art studies, and obsidian hydration analysis may be particularly noted. His work was seminal for the prehistoric archaeology of at least four regions: southern California’s Channel Islands, San Diego County, Baja California, and west central Mexico.

In his later years, he advocated for retention of archaeological collections on merit of their scientific value, a perspective that has been hotly contested since his passing.

gollark: Ones higher than LEO will stick around for a while. They won't *work* for a hundred years though.
gollark: I imagine you can probably pick out lots of bad things in any generation's time-spent-growing-up.
gollark: Cool how .money is a top level domain.
gollark: Just put all the ideologies in an arena and see who comes out alive.
gollark: I hope if this happens again it's handled better, at least.

References
  • Dillon, Brian D. 1997. “In Memoriam: Clement Woodward Meighan, 1925-1997.”
  • Dillon, Brian D., and Matthew A. Boxt (editors). 2005. Archaeology without Limits: Papers in Honor of Clement W. Meighan. Labyrinthos, Lancaster, California.
  • Johnson, Keith L. (editor). 2005. Onward and Upward: Papers in Honor of Clement W. Meighan. Stansbury Publishing, Chico, California.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.