Bones TV Series: Show's Approach to the Anthropology

Introduction

The field of forensic anthropology is critical in determining causes of death, sex, age, and time of death by studying the bones of the deceased. Anthropological procedures, such as trauma investigations, can help in ascertaining the object that hit a bone and possibly caused deformation, hemorrhage, and ultimate death of a subject. Hit films and TV shows also demonstrates forensic anthropology in a more restricted way, which is part of their plots, themes, and/or concepts. Obviously, TV shows aren't the most accurate, but the heavy information that it contains does gives the viewer some insight of what truly happens inside the minds of anthropologists.

The seventh season episode one of Bones (2011) provides an inside scoop on the endless efforts of how examinations are done to determine the cause and manner of death but misleads the audience of the unknown understanding of how blunt force trauma analysis, or BFT, is essential and vital to forensic anthropology and how it is used in everyday life and what appropriate steps it takes to examine the skeletal parts.

Episode summary

The seventh season’s first episode of the TV series Bones involves events that leads to the research of anthropological and forensic query. This episode opens with a competitive paintball brawl where one of the members fall and lands on an advanced decomposed body. This corpse lays in a shallow and muddy grave, which was later retrieved for examination. Before totally excarnating the body, the investigators, well in this show, noticed blunt force trauma that occurred both before and after the murder. Before this murder, she suffered from cranial damage which caused amnesia from an old assault, specifically to the upper body and skeleton. The focus of the investigation starts at the skull and jaw, which had some object lodged upward to the cranial part. Most of the damage done to the victims brain has placed her into an “blank” state of mind, which unfortunately cost her life.

The murder weapon seemed to be a heavy metal object with sharp edges which stated from the particulates founded in the cranium. The condition of the body was fully eroding and little to no body tissue was present. Soft tissue analysis and osteology were used to put the killer at the crime scene. How she was identified was by her pelvis, which cataloged her as a female. A significant part of the investigation was a piece of chewing gum, which belonged to her brain specialist. The woman has been missing for six months (a missing case report was filed by her husband) before her body was discovered. It was later mentioned that her specialist shot and killed her due to his gambling habits and the only way to replenish his pockets was to find the money and kill whoever was in his way.

Method Selection

The TV series Bones incorporates anthropological meaning and efforts by examining the cranial bones and the femur bone for trauma related to blunt objects and/or ballistics, in conjunction. Thus, this paper will focus on blunt force trauma (BFT) on a human skeleton and its remains. While the TV show took other approaches to find what happened to the victim, BFT is the best method that helps forensic anthropologists determine where and what was used in death cases. BFT has been used by forensic anthropologists for many reasons especially towards the skull to obtain an accurate estimate of sex, but most importantly, the brain. The cranial BFT investigation for trauma due to its ability to uncover causes of death due to hits from blunt objects. It would enable proper examination and true forensic anthropological approaches applied to BFT as a professional technique in determination of cause of death and weapon used.

It was mentioned that there was BFT in the clavicle, acromion process of the scapula and the frontal bone, which lines up with the remodeling done to her body six months prior to her death. That signals that it will be much more research/and examinations needed on her body. And there was the start of the investigation and the search for the killer who killed her.

Research on Original Method: BFT

Blunt force trauma (BFT) has been an active source in the anthropology field and several philosophers and engineers have researched the methodologies of BFT. The research in the 1940s was the pivotal point in anthropology studies because that is when BFT started to determine the various types of bone forces that causes damage to human skeleton. The group of professionals outside of forensic anthropology was supervised by a brain surgeon and anatomy scholar named E.S. Gurdjian, and focused on the morphological as well as biomechanical aspects of BFT.

Eventually, Gurdjian’s team published their findings on the method of evaluating BFT on cranial skeletons in 1975 in their book entitled Impact Head Injury: Mechanistic, Clinical and Preventive Correlations. This book is a snapshot of the critical findings that the bioengineers developed over several manuscripts done between 1940 and 1975, when the first critical academic outline of BFT emerged (Gurdjian, 1975). There have been other studies that have placed BFT in its highest point, which others have defined it in various terms/theories.

The persistence of the standards and principles of BFT as originally coined by Gurdjian (1975) remains essential as researches afterwards proved them essential to forensics anthropology. Later, scholars began to investigate BFT using animal specimens and bones of human that could easily procure. However, the non-human subjects became unsuitable as morphologies of animal skeletons differed critically from those of humankind. Indeed, human skeletons prove highly costly to procure for forensic anthropological studies to date.

As Passacqua (2012) elaborates, the groundbreaking findings of Gurdjian and his team enabled the setting of critical principles in BFT investigation by forensic pathologists. One of these was that human bones fracture or break predictably when subjected to blunt force – the pressure from a non-sharp object with low speed impact to a skeleton. Biomechanically speaking, the bones experience stress and compression as a result of blunt forces, with both occurring in every case of pressure to a bone (Passacqua, 2012). Thus, elasticity, plasticity, and depressions become major morphological deformations in human bones subjected to blunt force.

Examples of blunt force trauma include impact from an object (e.g. assault involving an object such as a fist, hammer, etc., or impact following a motor vehicle accident), but also includes the impact of a body with a surface (e.g., falls from heights where deceleration is involved), and compression of the airway or major vessels of the neck resulting from hanging, garroting, throttling, manual strangulation or choking (Blau, 2017). Skulls were analyzed using X-ray radiographs. Visual observations were also made to determine the type of trauma or fracture formed on the skull. All results were then recorded in a standard form and photographed (Pathol, 2014).

In many cases, blunt force trauma have been shifted and updated due to objectives of changing throughout the years. There are other types of traumas that were related to the TV show series Bones, such like Postmortem trauma. Postmortem trauma is the scientific phrase of bones that endure trauma after death. More the methods/terms that has been issued out or discussed over the years have truly evolved forensic anthropology and the ways it has been used and executed.

This report sheds light on the histology of death determination and what causes the factors that stems from it. Unlike most cases, there has been groups and observants that has shared their details amongst the anthropology field regarding what damages a bone. The most recent standards and principles for the BFT ways developed in 2011 by the Scientific Working Group for Forensic Anthropology (SWGANTH). SWGANTH (2011) emphasizes the principle of intent to determine the time and cause of trauma as the opening issue; then, it goes into the technological distinction suitable in forensic anthropology to achieve the goal. Also, SWGANTH (2011) furthers for proper recording of BFT results using images, text, and radiographic means. Afterwards, SWGANTH (2011) examines the best practices in trauma analysis in bones.

For instance, BFT comes with unique fracture patterns depicting blunt force, plastic bone deformations, existence of impact sites, and concentric marks that denote the blunt force (SWGANTH, 2011). In other words, holistic observations and recordings of findings on BFT analysis remains paramount to enable forensic anthropologists answer key questions related to a bone. It is interesting to note that the severity of trauma to the skull is closely dependent on several factors. The two important factors include characteristics of the blunt object that had acted as the weapon and the site of impact. Severity of trauma also depends on the amount and thickness of hair, the thickness of the scalp and skull at the impact site (Pathol, 2014). Blunt force trauma to the head could potentially result in death. When the victim is attacked on the head and neck with a blunt object, the presence of underlying damage to the brain or its covering is more likely to determine the outcome for the victim – alive or dead. It has been noted that death in this condition can occur without the presence of a skull fracture (Pathol, 2014).

Critique of the Episode’s Approach

The TV show Bones (2011) depicts the everyday life of how anthropologist deals with different, unique cases. From estimating sex, age, and stature to even determining what type of BFT occurred in bones. For instance, the nature of archaeological material and the ability of bone to retain some of its living characteristics for a short period after death, however, often obscures interpretation (Kranioti, 2015). The show did an okay effort on the ability to grasp all of what was going on, but missed the right approach to collect the evidence in its appropriate order.

Once the class of the weapon has been found, a more elaborate and accurate description can be realized making use of a polarized light microscope: the edges of an incision, their shape and size represent the negative imprint of a blade (Donato, 2016). Again, this is a TV show that limits the real scenarios that happen in real life. Also, in the in-laboratory handling of the cranial bones conforms to the requirements for accuracy. For instance, the head bone is handled with care and the removal of the inner content of the corpse skull happens after proper cutting the frontal bone as required. This just takes care of all proper cleaning and handling regarding the instruments involved.

The anthropologist tests the depth of the depression metrically using a sharp object inserted into the hole (Bones, 2011). Therefore, her judgment that the depression is not a normal one for a sinus or the normal bone morphology formed naturally becomes highly helpful in determining that the victim was hit by a blunt object on the head sometimes before death. Indeed, the selection of a skull for the investigation becomes useful in uncovering the possible violence against the victim. It helped find a blow with a blunt object to the head.

Similarly, documentation for the forensic investigation was a loosely done or missing almost entirely. For instance, the anthropologists never recorded the findings on the depression due to BFT anywhere for later reference. In fact, not even a notebook is used. Besides, no radiographic records are done for the skull; instead, only the projectile force of ballistic nature on the femur entail the computerized imaging system (Bones, 2011). Нe skeletal elements where processed through forensic anthropological examination. Once identified the human morphology of these elements, through macroscopic inspection, further examination have been carried on in order to determine sex, age at death, stature and all pertinent features useful for the identification of the victim (Donato, 2016).

Alternative Method

Even though this episode indulged in some far stretches of imagination, there are also some more methodologies that they could have scripted in to put more realism into the episode. Since the pelvis was one major thing that was pointed out at the crime scene, that could have been a method used to retrieve some data from. Making sure that you collect positive information could lead you to better results. Crimes in real life involves the victims/ and family, and if forensic aren’t aware of how powerful they are, then things could lead downhill. That said the more methods used in the course of analyzing the remains, the more it is that the estimation analysis will be accurate. In this case, skeletal remains of the cranial and pubic sexing methods are said to be the best methods for estimating age/sex.

Determination of the sex from human skeletal remains is of vital importance in the disciplines of bio archaeology and forensics. Without precise ascertainment of the sex, accurate estimation of age at death and stature are invidious, as the rates of growth, development and degeneration vary by sex and by population. Morphological sex estimation of human skeletal remains is mainly based on morphological traits of pelvis and skull. However, such estimation is most accurate in adult individuals with complete maturation, and thus differences in skeletal morphology (Proceedings, 2015). Through a pelvis show little evidence of aging, skulls show both age and maturity—such as in the sutures of the cranium, the wear in teeth, and other aids that forensic anthropologists share in attempt to identify remains. There are several different variations of cranial features that attribute to sex. Below is a chart, from the textbook, that illustrates how the mandible of the chin decides what sex it is:

Females are generally found to have a less pronounced supraorbital ridge, whereas, males are opposite. One will tend to think that because the measurements of one skull is different than any others and males and females have different counterparts. Other reliable methods can focus on facial features, like the nose area/opening. Most metric cranial features can be rated in all types of scales which are, personally, not realistic but assumes that needs to be done. As wotj tje pelvis, the skill can be sexed either anthroposcopically or metrically. Meaning that there are caution regarding what is really useful depending on what case it is. Also, the accuracy of the metric methods has been questioned due to the realization that the samples on which they are based on modern populations (Byers, 159).

Conclusion

All in all, “The Memory in the Shallow Grave,” episode is by far not an instructional way to gain knowledge about what happens behind the scenes of anthropologists and their profession. Actual forensic anthropologist would not televise the horrors of what they experience because it takes a lot of energy and dedication to bring evidence to the table. The shows give a snippet of what potentially goes on, but in real life, its deeper than the eye can see.

Though the characters gave the audience their best efforts, it seemed too quick of an episode to reveal the information on a homicide/murder case compared to real deal professionals. it lacks some details that would reinforce the validity and relevance of the conclusions the forensic anthropologists make of the nature of force and the resultant skull deformation experience. While some element of original BFT analysis were applied, such as morphological determination of the time and cause of deformation occurred, material handling, recording, and critical metric methods remained highly inadequate. It also gives the audience the wrong picture of the profession since this is an “play-on” of what it seems like in real life.

Unfortunately, it is just not that easy to glance over an advanced decomposing corpse and tell what happened and why, but to bring logic into the mix--- and that takes a pretty long time. Although Dr. Brennan Bones was using her osteological efforts to call out what she saw, the appropriate approach is to lay out the body after defleshing, and start from the very beginning-- the crime scene and so forth. It takes multiple people to gather up vital evidence/information dealing with a crime scene, in and outside the laboratory. So, through all of this, pelvis sexing and/or BFT analysis on the skull has to be the two most reliable sources to determine age, sex, stature and other methods following behind.