The Search for the First Americans: Science, Power, Politics by Robert V. Davis

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Search for the First Americans: Science, Power, Politics by Robert V. Davis G. Richard Scott The Search for the First Americans: Science, Power, Politics. By Robert V. Davis. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2021. ix + 145 pp. Notes, bibliography. $45.00 cloth. Davis, a nonspecialist in the field of First American studies, breaks his book into three parts: (1) First American Theories, Myths, and Evidence, (2) First American Science, and (3) Community. Each part includes several chapters that cover a range of topics from American Indian creation myths and the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act to how archaeologists, linguists, bioanthropologists, and geneticists address the issue of First Americans. On several occasions, Davis quotes Jim Adovasio, who says the basic problem is "who the hell are these people, where did they come from, and when did they get here" (ix). Davis adds that "Although much has been documented, science is no closer today to finding an answer than at any time since the arrival of Columbus. In short, it has been a failed endeavor" (ix). I have many colleagues who would take umbrage with such a pessimistic view of progress in the search for the First Americans. A short review cannot do justice to the strides made in this endeavor, and these strides are in every field Davis discusses, from archaeology and linguistics to dental anthropology and genetics. Perhaps Davis is thinking there should be a dramatic paradigm shift like plate tectonics in geology. The impact of genomics on this problem comes close and may reach that status at some point. Davis focuses attention on the Clovis culture, with special reference to Blackwater Draw in New Mexico, and how the technology of this culture with its distinctive lanceolate fluted points evolved to serve as the bellwether of First Americans. Following in the footsteps of Paul Martin and Vance Haynes, a Clovis-first position developed in the 1960s and hardened over several decades. I have known and worked with Clovis-first archaeologists, but they are not wedded to the "fact" that the Clovis tradition represented the earliest peoples in the Americas. They are "wedded" to the position of "show me the evidence." For many early claims of pre-Clovis, the evidence was questionable, and many sites were dismissed as pre-Clovis. In recent times, things have changed—there are now sites most agree are pre-Clovis, so the "Clovis police" is shrinking. Moreover, many scholars who thought First Americans arrived via the Bering Land Bridge and then traversed an ice-free corridor through Canada now acknowledge that a maritime route is likely given the late opening of the corridor. Granted, I am a First American scientist, but I appreciate the space Davis devotes to American Indian creation myths. Unfortunately, some pit these creation myths against science, but that is not a position with which I am familiar. Most of us in the field are anthropologists, so we understand the nature of creation myths. They are a cultural universal that meets a human need to know how everything was created, including specific groups of humans. They have no empirical basis and cannot be falsified, and none of us are in the business of doing that. As a nonspecialist, Davis does a good job summing up alternative viewpoints on the question of First Americans. His sections on history are useful and enlightening but his treatment of First American science is dated. He discusses mtDNA and Y chromosome variation, but these have been supplanted by genomic studies that analyze thousands of single nucleotide polymorphisms. The human footprints found at White Sands in New Mexico that are older than 20,000 years were reported after the book was published. I mention this because it adds another notch in the pre-Clovis belt [End Page 59] and generates a whole new set of questions on when and by what route the First Americans arrived in the "New World." For readers unfamiliar with the history of First American science and Native American creation myths, this book is a good starting point. Davis is to be commended for taking on such a thorny issue. It brings to the forefront the Native American position of...