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Written Website Reports On Cahokia Ancient Site
The Cahokia Ancient Site was designed in a ranting manner. The average tan color used on the website may not attractive enough. The use of graphics is limited especially due to the use of one color. The locations of links are not direct to anyone accessing the site. There are only two links at the top corners of the site but the immediate link on the left takes you to the same site with neither additional features nor new information (Steve). A link to the top right side of the site comprises a shortcut for some of its critical links consisting of home, hours and admission fee, the site maps, the way to join through subscription and contact information. This website has limited information such as exploring Cahokia Mounds and its interactive map, the location of the Cahokia Mounds, the available events and any plans by the website visitors to visit the Mounds. Any more information is indicated on the corresponding links that would tell the reader more about events, the city, and terms of joining.
The use of limited graphics makes the ease of access to any link on the website greater. There are no themes or even images standing for anything, not even some pictures or paintings of the Cahokia Mounds. Only the website’s tan color exists behind some black or red text that briefly describes each of the website contents. Designed by Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site staff in collaboration with Cahokia Mounds Museum Society, this website has a copyright dating from 2008. The web design and its content aims at capturing any reader’s curiosity into knowing more about the site. Every link on the website takes the reader to a more complex and more detailed site. Most readers may want to know the Cahokia mounds origin, its archaeology, any volunteer, or job opportunities, or even the site authors (Ken Keller).
Cahokia Mounds website is based on ancient civilization that encompassed a seemingly different culture and ethnicity from that exists in the modern society. The city was one of the greatest cities in its time. Situated between North American Arctic and Mexican deserts, it held the greatest civilization in history (Hodges). North American Arctic was the first American city. It center was at what is today the Collinsville Road. The site is included in the list of the eight main World Heritage cultural sites in the US because of its rich ancient American Indian culture content (Hodges).
The name of the city, Mound City, came as a nickname from the Indian mounds. Most of the Indian mounds ended with the beginning of the 20th century. This was pressured by agricultural development whereby famers wanted more settlement land beside other human development activities (Hodges).
Cahokia Mounds against its name is neither located in Cahokia City nor in Mound City but in Collinsville. Its direction is clearly stated including the critical starting points and the means of transport often used. The website management has as well indicated all suitable contact information including email address and telephone contact information. To verify any arising issue to any of the website visitors, all site events are indicated in a chronological order. Events on a given month are only include. An instance is on all event that happened this month of October 2012. There was a photograph contest on 1 October that required photos with themes based on Native American India (Hodges). American Indian was the ethnic group that held the culture existing currently at the Cahokia Mounds Site. On 6 October, contesting of photography, reception and judging was done while two days later was the opening of Columbus Day. On October 13, it was issues on Cahokia trails with flint knapping of the site workshop falling on 14th. The 14th day involved Larry Kinsella teachings that ran from noon to 4 p.m. a thirty dollar fee was the compensation. An archeological meeting for the site society was to be held on 18th but was cancelled because of a Regional Conference. Two Archeologists were destined to cover two different lectures on October 20 as a mark of the National Archeology Day.
One of the archeologists, Mike Fuller lectured on the influence of the Cahokia civilization by the Western Culture. This influence took place in AD 1100 (Ken Keller). The year AD1100 is termed to be the time that the Ancient City’s agricultural society population reached its peak. It is this same time that the Europeans came to influence the Cahokia pre-Columbian society and hence ended up enriching them with their culture. The website does not illustrate all this information. The use of photos and paintings were possible could have been used. The site only states the existence of a lecture on the Western Culture influence to the Cahokia Ancient society with no evident whether chronologically, literally, graphically or through citation.
Phyllis Steckel, a lecturer, on the other hand is said to have held a lecture on the ancient archeology and earthquakes that affected the scenery and landscape of Cahokia Mounds region (Ken Keller). This is the only information provided by the website. There is no further information on the agricultural societies that occupied the region and were probably responsible for the current geography and archeological setting of the site. The cultural background and American Indian civilization would have been a factor to consider whenever talking about the evident ancient civilization. The link between the ancient culture, western culture that came later in AD1100 and the existence of earthquakes is not shown. A readers would be forced to find more information for the same (Hodges). The fact that there are no links for such references could be complex to the less aggressive readers.
Referring to the chronological order of events, only recent past events is recorded. There is a contradiction on the website since some of the planned events did not happen or were cancelled. An example of a cancelled event is the Cahokia Archeological Meeting that was laid off in the expense of a conference. The website provides no information concerning the conference relationship with the Cahokia’s activities. It could follow that future events would be faced with similar problems hence discouraging many subscribers. This failure would even be worsened by the poor graphics quality of the website (Steve). There is no much information on the ancient society culture, a weakness that harden the understanding of the pre-Columbia culture and the American Indian civilization that existed before the western communities came in. There are no current events on the website with any future information and news being unclear. The website is closed for any new events for both fifth and sixth of November this year. All other information and news is based on obvious annual events. A calendar for the year 2013 also exists although it is prone to many changes in update and disappointments.
The structure of this website is unreliable in many aspects. There is much missing information or indication of contradiction events. The worst of it all is that some event contradicts with time, while some appointments and arrangements are not reliable. There is no evidence provided for any text on the website. Any links that exist takes a reader to a shallow description of whatever they indented to read. This makes it unreliable for academics. There are no references while little or brief information on events only last for not more than a month. It is a historic website that keeps no history of whatever has been happening within the cite. It does not either show a clue of who the targeted readers are or does it have any links with social networks hence making it unpopular, culturally, in learning or socially.
Works Cited
Hodges, Glenn. America’s Forgotten City. Nov 2012. 21 Oct 2012 <http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/01/cahokia/hodges-text>.
Ken Keller, Eric Young and Gary Kronk. Cahokia Mounds Historic Site and the Cahokia Mounds Museum Society. 2010. 21 Oct 2012 <http://www.cahokiamounds.org/>.
Steve. Drupal site structure – strategy advice sought. 28 May 2011. 21 Oct 2012 <http://drupal.org/node/1171780>.
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