DEFENSE: “Infection and Complexity Embodied on Enamel: Oral Health and Dental Pathology at Ancón, Peru”
Anthropology Dissertation Defense
February 6, 2026
11:00 AM - 1:00 PM
Location
BSB 3160 and on Zoom
Calendar
Download iCal FileDissertation Defense by UIC Anthropology PhD Student Caitlin Monesmith
Abstract
This dissertation investigates the Ancón human remains collection housed at the Field Museum of Natural History, a legacy assemblage formed through nineteenth-century salvage archaeology and exhibition and later reshaped by unwrapping, rehandling, and lost provenience. Instead of treating these constraints as a barrier, I use them as a methodological proving ground to ask how diet and social participation were embodied in a coastal community drawn into Wari political economies (through the lens of chicha consumption) during the late Middle Horizon and early Late Intermediate Period (ca. 600–1000 CE).
Combining macroscopic recording of caries, abscessing, and antemortem tooth loss with scanning electron microscopy of dental calculus, I distinguish fermented from non-fermented maize starches to evaluate chicha exposure directly. Comparative SEM sampling from three contemporaneous middle-coast collections (Aramburú, Márquez, and Cerro del Oro) shows Ancón as a clear outlier: individuals average higher maize proportions and nearly double the fermented maize signal found at other sites, indicating sustained, habitual investment in fermentation practices.
These results align with community-wide dental disease patterns and suggest that access to chicha was not sharply stratified. Age and sex shape how infection and tooth loss accumulate. I argue that chicha functioned as a social technology that made alliances, hospitality, and imperial obligations tangible, while also producing chronic oral disease and tooth loss as embodied trade-offs. By combining microfossil evidence with curatorial history and experimental analytical techniques, this project shows how legacy museum collections can still yield rigorous biocultural narratives, and why those narratives must be interpreted alongside the colonial entanglements that mediate the way we understand Ancón.
Please note: This presentation will contain images of human skeletal remains and severe tooth decay in dry tissue.
Date posted
Feb 2, 2026
Date updated
Feb 11, 2026