social inequality (Other Keyword)
1-14 (14 Records)
Intensification has long been equated with the rise of tightly-controlled economies, often in association with incipient social inequality. Previous research has sometimes suggested that centralized control is necessary both for the development of intensification as a viable economic strategy, and for the management of its repercussions. Here, we present evidence from Kolomoki, Crystal River, and Roberts Island, three prominent Late Woodland (ca. A.D. 500-1000) mound centers of the American...
Ethnic Disparity and Stress in Prehispanic Peru: A contextualized analysis of Cranial Pathology and Facial Asymmetry (2015)
This study evaluates the effects of stress on a prehistoric population from the south-central highlands of Andahuaylas, Peru during the Late Intermediate Period (LIP: AD 1000 - AD 1400). This era was characterized by skyrocketing violence, resource competition, and increasing social inequality. We test the impact of these phenomena by examining cranial lesions and fluctuating facial asymmetry--both indicators of non-specific stress-- among different ethnic groups, identified by the absence,...
Examining Segregation between Chinese and Euroamerican Railroad Workers at the Townsite of Terrace Using Spatial Modeling (2020)
This is a poster submission presented at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. By using spatial and statistical methods, this research aims to analyze patterns of social behavior at the historic townsite of Terrace, located in Box Elder County, Utah along the Central Pacific Railroad. The results of these analyses—a combination of field survey, cluster analyses, suitability modeling, and non-metric multidimensional scaling—are expected to answer several questions...
Forgetting (2016)
The production of history is inherently political and often involves legitimating the status quo by obscuring the historical roots of contemporary inequality. This paper investigates how residents of an affluent suburb on Long Island came to remember one of their historic places as a site representing white, colonial history and heritage exclusively when in fact it was a historically diverse household comprised of white family members and nonwhite laborers. The masking of plural space and...
Household Practice and Early Forms of Social Inequality in Huaca Negra, Viru Valley (2016)
This research attempts to understand daily household practice in Huaca Negra, a coastal site that was occupied from 5,000 to 3,000 B.P. in the Viru Valley, to answer two interrelated research questions: (1) Were there signs of institutionalized social inequality represented at the household level in Huaca Negra during its occupation? (2) If so, through what kinds of daily household practices did potential leaders in this particular community differentiate themselves from others? Alternatively,...
Interregional Exchange and the Rise of Inequality in the Intermediate Area (2015)
Interregional exchange has long played a prominent role in explanations of hierarchical development among early complex societies in lower Central America and throughout the Intermediate Area. It is argued to have been a primary basis of social power among highly developed chiefdoms of the sixteenth century, and to have played a vital role in the onset of inequality approximately 1000 years earlier. However, while interregional exchange was undoubtedly an important element of early inequality in...
The Marginal Utility of Inequality (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The emergence of hereditary social inequality resulted in enormous impacts on human history, yet its causes remain heavily debated and unexplained. Here we propose and evaluate an environmentally informed model explaining the emergence of social inequality based on the interaction between circumscription and environmental inequality. We demonstrate how the...
Measuring Household Inequality in Hohokam Society: An Analysis of Domestic Architecture at Pueblo Grande (2017)
Recent archaeological efforts to explain the emergence and persistence of social inequality have been hampered by a lack of information about how wealth was transmitted across generations and how it may have accumulated or diminished over time. Building on studies that have shown domestic architecture to be an excellent material expression of household wealth, we provide a method for reconstructing the amount of labor invested in house construction at Pueblo Grande, taking into account different...
Mimbres Inequality
Appendices to Will G. Russell's dissertation
New Investigations at Holtun: A Preclassic Maya Ritual Center (2016)
The site of Holtun is located in the department of the Peten at about 12 km south of the site of Yaxha and 35 km from Tikal. Holtun is considered a civic-ceremonial center and is part of a Group of Preclassic epicenters located south of Yaxha Lake. This paper will summarize the results of the field and lab seasons from 2012-2015. We will also discuss the preliminary results of the analysis of radiocarbon, fauna, lithics, ceramics, and soils. The analyses suggest that Holtun was a Preclassic...
Quality of Life Changes in an Ancient Maya Community: Longitudinal Perspectives from Altar de Sacrificios, Guatemala (2018)
Inequality is a prominent and persistent feature of all large-scale human societies that has significant impacts on everyday life. Variation in material wealth and social capital as well as differential access to specialized knowledge and other resources directly impacts household quality of life (QOL) within ancient and contemporary communities. For the ancient Maya, the establishment of political institutions centered on divine rulership significantly contributed to QOL changes during the...
Restricted Forms of Knowledge in Pre-contact Coast Salish Lithic Craft Traditions (2015)
Recently anthropologists have increasingly recognized the role that the control of knowledge has in the production and reproduction of social inequality in small scale societies. In the case of the pre-contact Coast Salish of the Pacific Northwest, ethnographic data emphasizes the role that the control of elite prerogatives had in the maintenance of their status. Drawing upon cultural transmission models, these social relationships would be reflected not only in the prestige goods often...
Social Inequality and Food Storage at Hohokam Platform Mound Sites in the Phoenix and Tonto Basins (2017)
Some social theorists contend that the critical threshold in the development of complex, ranked societies is the emergence and institutionalization of inequality, or a formalized hierarchical organization that is inherited and reproduced. One pathway that elites take in establishing and institutionalizing political power is by attaining control over the economy. A key strategy of establishing economic power is to mobilize and store food surpluses. For the prehistoric Hohokam of southern Arizona,...
Wet-Preserved Living Spaces : Measuring Social Inequality from Circum-alpine and Central European Pile and Bog Dwellings (2023)
This is an abstract from the "To Have and Have Not: A Progress Report on the Global Dynamics of Wealth Inequality (GINI) Project" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Neolithic and Bronze Age wet preserved settlements are among the most fascinating sites of European prehistory. The circum-alpine sites (“pile-dwellings”) in particular attracted attention early on: because of their excellent preservation, they promised an immediate interpretative access...