HST_343 Web Report 2

Southwest Landscapes and People is a section of the American Southwest Virtual Museum that highlights prominent landscapes and ancient peoples of the American Southwest. It can be found at: http://swvirtualmuseum.nau.edu/gallery3/index.php/Southwest and is a collaborative virtual museum project from several individual National Parks and Monuments, Northern Arizona University Anthropology Laboratories, the Museum of Northern Arizona, and the Learning Center of the American Southwest. The site features continuous modifications meaning material will not necessarily be the same at any given point in time. Southwest Landscapes and People is a section of the larger site called the Southwest virtual museum and contains two subsections titled: Landscapes and Prehistoric People and Culture. Landscapes - The Landscapes section features 12 different landscape types found in the Southwest. 9 of these are well-defined, specific geographic areas such as the Southern Rockies, Mogollon Rim, the Great Plains, and Colorado Plateau. Three are more generalized highlights of various features and aspects of the southwest such as Sand and Rocks, Water Sculpture, and Fall Reflections. The majority have accompanying color pictures. For example, the section for the Colorado Plateau has pictures of areas within the plateau such as coyote gulch, death hallow, Zion narrows, and wahweap badlands. Each landscape sub-section has an accompanying short explanation of the region generally as well as sections explaining the geographic dimensions, precipitation, elevation, life zone, vegetation, and geology of the area. Each section also has a link(s) to other sub-sections within the accompanying Prehistoric People and Culture side of the exhibit as well as a list of National Parks in that area. This helps to tie the ancient peoples site of the exhibit to the area(s) they once inhabited. Prehistoric Peoples and Culture This section contains 17 sub sections highlighting ancient people who have lived in various regions of the southwest. The majority of these also have accompanying pictures of the peoples dwellings, artifacts, area of inhabitance. Each contains a historical explanation of the group of people, of various lengths, that usually make note of the time period they lived in, region they inhabited, what their culture was like generally and what it is best known for now, as well as their mode of dress, eating, travel, religious life etc. Many sections give an explanation of how they got their name or what their name means. For example, the Mimbres people occupied southwestern New Mexico from A.D. 800 1250. According to the exhibit their name is Spanish for willows. Much of their architecture and pottery resembles the Mogollon culture. They are known for producing pottery depicting humans, geometric designs, and animals. Overall, the exhibit shows no indications of being specifically geared toward a certain demographic, although some of the accompanying text is fairly specific and in depth. It does a good job of allowing viewers to be exposed to multiple regions and peoples of the southwest at large and to be able to obtain relevant historical and geographic information about each. The site is completely free to visit and has not sign up process. It seems to be a good hybrid site between public and academic history. It also offers viewers the option to link up with Facebook to alert them when updates happen.

Southwest Virtual Museum. Southwest Landscapes and People. swvirtualmuseum.nau.edu. http://swvirtualmuseum.nau.edu/gallery3/index.php/Southwest. (Accessed March 30, 2014)