transience (Other Keyword)
1-3 (3 Records)
The years following the Civil War and leading up to the Great Depression are largely left out of archaeological discourse. Whether as a result of perceived temporal insignificance (it’s not old enough!), or the assumed ephemerality of such assemblages, peoples dispossessed of their homes as a result of the greatest crisis in modern capitalism have been forgotten in mainstream discourse and effectively ignored by archaeologists. A focus on capitalism within historical archaeology supports this...
Excavating an Ephemeral Assemblage: An Archaeology of American Hoboes in the Gilded Age (2016)
Hobos and other transient laborers were integral to the development of industrial capital in the United States. They traversed the country filling essential temporary positions at the behest of capital interests. Yet, they frequently utilized alternative market practices in their labor arrangements, relying partially on direct trade over monetary payment. They likewise maintained intricate social networks, the material remains of which lay extant in past hobo campsites. Despite fulfilling a...
(What’s) Left of the Commodity: Archaeology and the Creative Resuscitation of Spent Goods (2018)
Hobo jungles and other transient laborer and homelessness related sites present a sustained material critique of Capitalism. These kinds of sites provide insight into the creative strategies people employ to circumvent commodity markets when capital is not available. Whether residual evidence of an intentional statement against an oppressive system, or of a means to persist in the most desperate of situations, the assemblages left behind by people who reside on the fringes of...