In archaeology and anthropology, you've got to get over being squeamish, Angela Cales, a UAB graduate student in forensic anthropology, told Parker High School sophomore Barry McNealey Jr.
Barry was one of several Parker students trying to identify rounded bits of something he found by sifting soil through a mesh screen during a practice excavation on an athletic field at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Is it bone, a twig or rock?
There are a couple of surefire ways to find out if it's bone, Cales says. If you drop it and there is a hollow sound, it's bone. The other involves an ick factor: tasting it. If it's bone, your tongue will "drag" over the surface.
"Awesome," Barry replies.
Nine Parker students are taking a one-credit, college-level historical archaeology class offered by the University of Alabama at Birmingham. The class is part of UAB's continuing effort to reach out to the community, said Sharyn Jones, associate professor in UAB's Department of Anthropology. Classes started in January and finish later this month.
The excavation the Parker students recently undertook was an exercise in how to properly set up a dig site, collect relics and record the finds. Loretta A. Cormier, also a UAB associate professor in anthropology, Jones and several of their undergraduate and graduate students guided the students through the process.
Before the first layer of earth was brushed aside, the students set up a grid of their dig areas in two large planting boxes. With string and stakes pushed into the dirt, they marked out blocks one square meter in size. The grid system helped the students keep an accurate record of what they found.
Using trowels, paint brushes and whisk brooms, the students carefully uncovered what was underneath. They found bits of ceramics, shells and animal bones. The bones came from a deer, an opossum, song birds and a goose, Jones said.
The group meets one hour a week at Parker High for class instruction. The basics of archaeology and anthropology are covered. Birmingham's history through the 1930s provides a historical foundation for the class. Parker history teacher Barry McNealey Sr., the father of Barry Jr., teaches the city's history.
All semester, they've made regular field trips to Birmingham's historic sites, such as the Civil Rights Institute and Sloss Furnaces. They've also made several visits to the Southern History Department and the Birmingham city archives at the downtown Birmingham Public Library.
The students are researching the lives of everyday people, such as the Rev. Isaac Brown, using archival sources. Parker senior Kenneth Sutton is working on reconstructing Brown's life. One of the few things he knows for certain is that Brown died in 1918. Based on his findings so far, Kenneth believes Brown also was a miner and was in his early 60s when he died. Complicating his search are six or seven other people of that era with the same name.
McNealey said he likes that his students, most of them seniors, are getting a taste of college academic life.
The Parker students, like McNealey's son, said the class has been incredibly fun. "I wish I could take it twice," Barry Jr. said.
SEE MORE PHOTOS ONLINE
See more images from the Parker High School practice archaeological dig on the UAB campus on the Web at al.com, the online home of The Birmingham News: photos.al.com/birmingham-news