July 21, 2005

EXPERT TO ADDRESS ANCIENT HISTORY OF SALMON IN COLUMBIA BASIN

Dr. Virginia Butler, an expert on ancient fishing patterns, will deliver a free lecture titled "On the Holocene History of Salmon in the Columbia Basin," at 1 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 20, in the Boise State University Student Union Farnsworth Room. The Holocene is the name given to the last 11,000 years of the Earth's history — the time since the end of the last major glacial epoch, or "ice age."

Butler’s talk will explore ways ancient fish remains from the Holocene era contribute to understanding past human subsistence patterns and paleoecology. She draws on foraging models from evolutionary ecology to examine patterns of human resource use and change over time and space.

Butler is an associate professor in the department of anthropology at Portland State University. Her primary geographic focus is the American West, where she has examined ancient fishing practices in the Columbia Basin, the Great Basin and the Puget Sound. She has also collaborated on projects in Oceania. Her speech is sponsored by the Boise State department of anthropology in the College of Social Sciences and Public Affairs.

-30-

Mark Plew

Anthropology

426-3444

Kathleen Craven

Boise State communications and marketing

426-3275

Return to News home