User:Scjett

Stephen C. Jett 1. Stephen Clinton Jett (1938-) is a cultural geographer and professor emeritus of Geography and of Textiles and Clothing, University of California, Davis. He is known particularly for his publications on the Navajo and on transoceanic contacts bertween Old and New worlds before the time of Columbus. He is also a journal editor. 2. 2.1. Biography. Jett was born 12 October 1938 in Cleveland, OH, to Richard Scudder Jett and Miriam Ida Horn Jett. He attended Shaker Heighs, OH, public schools through seventh grade and then transferred to The University School, receiving a diploma cum laude (1956). He was awarded an A.B. cum laude in Geology at Princeton University (1960) and a Ph.D. in Geography at The Johns Hopkins University (1964), and also studied at the University of Arizona (1963) and with the Experiment in International Living, in France (1960). Following a year as instructor in Geography at The Ohio State University (1963-1964), he moved to the Department of Geography at the University of California, Davis, where he spent the remainder of his career; when the Department of Geography was terminated in 1996, he joined the Division of Textiles and Clothing. In 1971, he married Mary Frances Manak of Cleveland Heights, OH, and the couple had a daughter, Jennifer Frances Jett, now an attorney; they divorced in 1977. In 1995, he married Lisa Sue Roberts, a geography teacher then at McNeese State University, LA, and originally of Abingdon, VA, a town to which they retired in 2001. 2.2. Navajo research. One of Jett's specializations is Navajo culture and history. In 1967, with the photographer Phillip Hyde, he published NAVAJO WILDLANDS: 'AS LONG AS THE RIVERS SHALL FLOW' (Sierra Club/Ballantine Books), which received two awards. The American Libraries Association named his 1981 NAVAJO ARCHITECTURE: FORMS, HISTORY, DISTRIBUTIONS (University of Arizona Press), written with Virginia E. Spencer, one of the Outstanding Academic Books and Nonprint Materials of 1981, in Anthropology. In 2001, Jett published NAVAJO PLACENAMES AND TRAILS OF THE CANYON DE CHELLY SYSTEM, ARIZONA (Peter Lang Publishing). In addition, Jett has published on Navajo settlement patterns, textiles, and sacred places, as well as on tourism in the Navajo Country. 2.3. Southwest archaeology. Jett has written about Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi) migrations and on archaeological split-twig figurines from AZ and UT. His HOUSE OF THREE TURKEYS (Capra Press), with photographer Dave Bohn and about an AZ cliff-dwelling, appeared in 1977. He has also studied fish imagry on ancient Mimbres pottery from NM and cairn trail shrines in the New World. 2.4. Transoceanic-contacts research. Jett has been a leader in considering the evidence for important early contacts and exchanges by sea between the Old World and the Americas. Forthcoming is ANCIENT OCEAN CROSSINGS: RECONSIDERING THE CASE FOR CONTACTS WITH AMERICA BEFORE COLUMBUS (UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA PRESS). Particular interests in this context are the blowgun, textiles and dyeing, watercraft, and biological evidence. He is vice-president of The Epigraphic Society and founded and edits PRE-COLUMBIANA: A JOURNAL OF LONG-DISTANCE CONTACTS. 2.5. other interests and publications. Jett is author of FRANCE, in the Modern World Nations series (Chelsea House). He is also active with the Natural Arches and Brdges Society. 2.6. Textiles research and exhibitions. Jett's interest in Navajo and Southwest and Central Asian textiles has led to several publications and exhibitions, most notably his 2006 "Woven Jewels of the Black Tents: Baluchi, Aimaq, and Related Weavings of Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan," at the Georgia Museum of Art. 3. 3.1. order of sections. 1, Stephen C. Jett; 2.1, Biography; 2.2, Navajo and Southwest Research; 2.3, Transoceanic-contacts research; 3.1, order of sections; 3.2, selected publications; 3.4, notes. 3.2. selected publications. 3.4. notes.