complexity (Other Keyword)
1-18 (18 Records)
Traditional conceptions of power, hierarchy, and inequity focus on the relations between and among human communities. To a certain extent, objects and places are considered important aspects of human relations, but they are largely framed as inanimate tools wielded by human actors. This prevalent view is threatened by a rich body of research among non-Western societies that shows non-human things, places, and animals are often considered to be powerful beings imbued with agency and efficacy....
Another F-----g Basket Baper: Decorated Specimens from Huaca Prieta, Peru (2016)
Recent analysis of the basketry assemblage derived from the re-excavation of Huaca Prieta, Peru indicate the production of several highly complex “wall” types concurrently with escalating cultural complexity at this unique coastal site. These basketry variations include two expressions of twining which are presently unparalleled in South America. Both types also exhibit blue dyed elements and appear to have been intentionally dismembered before deposition. The technical attributes, chronological...
Are the Calusa Unique? Environmental Stewardship and Historical Contingency in the Pacific Northwest and Southwest Florida (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Complex Fisher-Hunter-Gatherers of North America" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Coastal societies of the northern Pacific and southwestern Florida were once thought anomalous because they achieved sociopolitical complexity without agriculture. The Calusa are often cited as especially unusual, or as the "pinnacle" of complexity among fisher-gatherer-hunters because they achieved a tributary, state-like political...
Beyond the Waters’ Edge: Complexity and Conservation Management of Underwater Cultural Heritage by Public Agencies in North Carolina. (2015)
Since the 1980s, heritage conservation has expanded in scope and complexity beyond just concern with technical preservation of tangible remains to also preserve intangible aspects. More than one conservation strategy may be possible but could have very different consequences for use of remains in the present and future. In many countries, those responsible for deciding which strategy to take are managers employed in public agencies. Understanding the nature of the system in which management...
Building a Network: Territorialisation and Deterritorialisation in 13th Century northern South Africa (2017)
Regional social complexity in southern Africa is closely tied to the rise and development of the Mapungubwe polity of 13th century South Africa. Expanding political power and influence meant that Mapungubwe increasingly articulated with communities on its periphery - a relationship that is reflected in shared material culture. These hinterland sites are all located in areas where there is an absence of earlier twelfth century occupation, which suggests a process of active settling of these areas...
A Comparative Approach to Understanding Ancient Agriculture Complexity in the Tropics (2016)
Archaeologists have continuously struggled with understanding the complexity exhibited within relic agricultural practices. In this paper, we will explore a comparative approach to addressing this dilemma using cases studies from the charter states of Southeast Asia (CE 800-1400) and the classic Maya kingdoms of Mesoamerica (CE 250-900). Special emphasis is placed upon the use of intensive practices and their resiliency within the agricultural strategy. Comparing the similarities and differences...
Creating the ‘Imagined Community’ of Mapungubwe (2017)
Mapungubwe’s influence spread deep into the regional hinterland, drawing in far-flung communities, trade networks and people. The traditional picture of a centripetal economy however has been challenged recently by work at these so called peripheries, indicating unexpected levels of autonomy and material wealth. While the place of these newly explored hinterlands need to be re-theorised and their agency acknowledged, there is danger in swinging the interpretive pendulum too far towards a...
Death and the Origin of Enduring Social Relations (2017)
Knowledge of Formative Period Mesoamerican archaeological sites often comes from narrow windows into buried sites. One feature has been a partial exception to this rule: burials. Groups of Formative Period burials, often accompanied by objects, have been recovered in many parts of Mesoamerica. Using models of mortuary treatment that saw burials as reflecting individual identity, burials provided one of the first ways researchers could examine the emergence of stratification within these...
Diffusion, Migration, and "Culture" in the Eurasian Bronze Age (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Wheels, Horses, Babies and Bathwaters: Celebrating the Impact of David W. Anthony on the Study of Prehistory" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The past 25 years has led to a completely new understanding of Eurasian Prehistory. Archaeometric analysis, landscape archaeology, and aDNA have allowed longstanding debates to be silenced, and fundamental principles underpinning key concepts such as social interaction,...
Early Cultural Developments and Adaptations in Hunter/Gatherer Communities: A Case Study from Keatley Creek on the Canadian Plateau (2015)
The emergence of socio-economically complex hunter/gatherer communities has been identified as one of the most critical theoretical issues in the study of early cultural evolution. In North America, one key geographical area for studying the emergence of complex hunter/gatherer societies has been the Northwest Coast and Plateau. The village site of Keatley Creek, one of the largest sites of complex hunter/gatherers in Western Canada, has featured prominently in understanding the emergence and...
Household Change and Social Complexity in Prehistoric Korea (2017)
Household archaeology has made important contributions to the study of large-scale social transformations through the remains of the everyday. This paper examines the role of households, themselves, in the social changes that occurred during the Early and Middle Mumun Pottery Periods (ca. 1500-500 B.C.) in Korea. During this time, incipient social inequality developed alongside another significant change—households that were previously composed of multiple families became single-family units....
The Inca Incorporation of the Canete Valley, Part 1: Conquest or Incanization (2015)
Field research by the Canete Archaeological Project has begun to unveil rich data regarding the Inca incorporation of the Middle and Lower Canete Valley. Utilizing both systematic survey and excavations, our work suggests a complex and intensive interaction between the Inca and those who occupied the valley before them. In this paper, we begin to tease out the imperial strategies of incorporation and local responses to them. SAA 2015 abstracts made available in tDAR courtesy of the Society for...
Levisa 1. Diversity and complexity in a key ¨archaic¨context of Cuba and the Caribbean (2016)
The archaeological site Levisa 1, in northeast Cuba, possesses one of the earlier radiocarbon dates for the so called ¨archaic¨ communities in this Island and one of the earliest one from the Caribbean region. For this reason that place is a basic reference for the study of the ¨archaic¨ groups. Also due to its location and potential link with other important archaic sites, and because possesses contexts that reflect diverse types and moments of pre-Arawak’s occupations, and even ceramic use....
Long-Distance Adoption of Exotic Cultigens in Northwest Peru: Problems and Processes (2015)
By 7,000-6,000 BP on the coast and in the western highlands of northern Peru, several long-distance food crops, whether domesticated or not, were adopted by local communities. Most of the crops are derived from Neo-Tropical environments far to the north, perhaps in the Ecuadorian and Colombian lowlands, or from the eastern side of the Andes. The technological, demographic and economic mechanisms and processes by which this adoption process took place is considered for several archaeological...
Practical and social storage among the Ohio Hopewell: Archaeobotanical and ethnoarchaeological evidence for delayed return of pre-maize crops (2015)
Social storage and social complexity indicated in the scale of Hopewell earthwork building, craft specialization, and mortuary goods suggest surplus created though subsistence intensification. However, artifacts and features associated with practical storage of such a surplus are uncommon at most Ohio Hopewell habitation sites. This study takes a step toward resolving this apparent contradiction by developing a predictive model from descriptive and quantitative characteristics of storage...
Putting the Pieces Together: Maax Na in Its Regional Context (2017)
Twenty years of research at the large prehispanic Maya site of Maax Na in northwestern Belize have yielded insights not only into site organization and function, but also into its role in the Three Rivers Region. Ongoing investigations of a marketplace and of local caves indicate that Maax Na, while probably not the political capital that its neighbor La Milpa was, nonetheless had a distinct and important regional function as a religious and marketing center. Investigation of water management...
Small-Scale Complexities: Tekkalakota and the Archaeology of the Southern Deccan (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper introduces the MAST project, a multi-year excavation program in South India that is designed to explore the role of small-scale societies in the development of larger interregional social formations. In particular this project will focus on areas of Iron Age and Early Historic occupation and production at the site Tekkalakota, and on the diachronic...
Tracing the World’s Edge:Northwest Coast interactions with the external world (2017)
In this paper, we address the extent to which Northwest Coast societies, and specifically those of the Salish Sea, were engaged in, participated in, or were connected to an external world beyond their own perceived borders. We consider four elements of the problem. First, we examine ethnographic data pertaining to the spatial extent of the known world, and trace its borders. We then consider the flow of exogenous and exotic materials into the Northwest Coast over time, and assess the...