"Written in Bone: Forensic Files of the Seventeenth-Century Chesapeake." Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, Washington, D.C. http://anthropology.si.edu/writteninbone/

Abstract

Temporary exhibition, Feb. 7, 2009–Feb. 6, 2011; Douglas Owsley and Karin Bruwelheide, curators; MFM Design/VossWords, designers. The hit television series csi: Crime Scene Investigation has spawned a craze for forensic science. Since the show's debut, the number of academic programs in the field has doubled, the number of graduates from those programs has tripled, and legal commentators have complained about “the csi effect” in courtrooms, where juries now expect indisputable forensic evidence and acquit defendants when prosecutors cannot supply it (Glen Paul Jackson, “The Status of Forensic Science Degree Programs in the United States,” Forensic Science Policy and Management, Spring 2009, pp. 2–6; Donald E. Shelton, “The ‘csi Effect’: Does It Really Exist?,” National Institute of Justice Journal, March 2008, http://ssrn.com/abstract=1163231). A similar faith in conclusive forensic evidence informs the newest exhibit at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History, “Written in Bone.” The...