Tijeras Pueblo at the Crossroads

Book excerpt: Tijeras Pueblo (LA 581) is a late precontact Ancestral Pueblo site, located just east of the modern city of Albuquerque, USA. Research using archaeological collections from the site has been generated over the past 40 years, illuminating the significance of Tijeras Pueblo as a cultural crossroad associated with dynamic social changes typical of the Pueblo IV Period in the American Southwest. In its modern context, this site continues to function as a bridge between cultures, the past, and the present. This book highlights a cross section of diverse perspectives and interests involved in understanding, interpreting, and preserving Tijeras Pueblo, including a summary of recent research on the site, the use of the site and its collections as a source for public education, a discussion of management challenges related to its location on a Forest Service administrative complex, and how interpretation and research have benefited from continued collaboration with descendant communities such as Isleta Pueblo. This book will appeal to a broad and diverse readership, including academics and vocationalists interested in late precontact Ancestral Pueblo archaeology and those with regional and global interests in cultural heritage management, curation of legacy collections, site preservation, and public education. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of Kiva: The Journal of Southwestern Anthropology and History.