Dance Hall of the Dead (1973)

The commonly used title of an ordained Catholic priest. In the Catholic Church, a priest is a man who is authorized to perform as a mediator between his congregation and the Christian god. His authority enables him to conduct liturgies and masses, and serve in both a spiritual and administrative capacity within the sphere of the Church’s influence and authority.

A Franciscan is a Christian who belongs to the Franciscan order, which is a Catholic sect that follows the teachings and guidance of St. Francis of Assisi. Preaching a life of repentance, poverty, and service to the poor by attempting to explicitly follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ, Saint Francis's teachings began spreading in Rome and its surrounding regions in the 12th century, and grew increasingly popular across Europe after his death in the 13th century. The Franciscan order has a distinct view of nature as a manifestation and mirror of the divine. Even the plants and animals are brothers and sisters to be cherished, because all life retains the ability and duty to praise the Christian God. Because of this relatively open and welcoming practice, the Franciscans were integral in establishing and maintaining colonial outposts at the fringes of Western empires, specifically the Spanish empire in the Americas. Thus, as early as the fifteenth century, the Franciscans, along with the Spanish military, established outposts that brought together military and religious rule in order to control and convert indigenous peoples throughout the Americas.

The influence of Franciscan missionaries is still felt in many Christian establishments in the U.S. Southwest, and has a particularly strong presence in churches located on Native American reservations.

Bitter, as an adjective, can mean sour, acidic, or biting. Bitter can also refer to emotions or attitude, suggesting that when one is bitter, one is filled with resentment, spite, and maybe even a little anger or jealousy.

The condition of having little or no protection from the natural elements. Severe and prolonged exposure to heat, cold, thirst, or hunger can lead ultimately to death.

The manner in which a book is put and held together, especially in the area of its spine.

An archaeological reference to a manually produced small, relatively flat, sharp-edged piece of stone that is made when one stone is struck by another. Flakes can often be further manipulated into sharp-edged stone cutting tools. Flakes are also associated with the debris produced at a site where stone tools were produced.

A portable, usually handheld, illumination device. Typically, a flashlight consists of a stem, comprised of a hard casing that doubles as a handle and as the housing for batteries that power the flashlight, and a head, a bulbous protuberance topped by a durable lense. It is within the head that the lightbulb is fixed. Depending upon the size of the bulb and the batteries powering it, the beam produced by the flashlight is powerful, diffuse, focused, or intermittent.

A scholar working within the discipline of anthropology, which is the study of humans. As a discursive field of studies, anthropology can be broadly divided into four areas: Cultural Anthropology (Ethnology), Physical Anthropology (Evolutionary Anthropology), Linguistics, and Archaeology. Each area can be divided into sub-categories. For example, physical anthropology covers zoology, evolution, and ecology, each of which can be further broken down into subfields of specialization.

A basin and watershed area in northern New Mexico. It receives water run-off from the Sangre de Cristo mountains to the north and drains into the Rio Grande to the southeast. Because of its ideal location between two rivers (the Rio Grande and the Pecos) and near three mountain ranges (the Sangre de Cristos, the Jemez, and the Sandias), the Galisteo Basin has been occupied by Puebloan peoples for centuries, making it one of the richest archaeological, historical, and cultural sites in North America.

A widely-dispersed and fast growing grass that, depending on the species, can grow as large as a tree. Paleolithic deposits of petrified bamboo have been documented around the world, as have long-standing and traditional uses of the plant for construction, medicine, food, and as objects of daily utility. Bamboo remains one of the most sustainable and versatile materials on the planet.