Chronicles of Colonialism: Unraveling Temporal Variability in Indigenous Experiences of Colonization in California Missions

Part of: Society for Historical Archaeology 2024

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "Chronicles of Colonialism: Unraveling Temporal Variability in Indigenous Experiences of Colonization in California Missions," at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

Historical archaeologists of colonial California often refer to the “mission period” as encompassing the specific timeframe when missionization took place between 1769 and 1833. But this conceptual shorthand masks considerable complexity. From a top-down perspective, this period covers several distinct historical realities—Spanish colonization, the Mexican War of Independence, and Mexican governance of the missions–not to mention over a decade of the secularization process, beginning in 1833, during which the mission system effectively collapsed. For Native people, these events carried particular implications for how they navigated the ever-shifting colonial landscape. This session explores the methodologies and interpretive approaches employed by archaeologists to understand the temporal variability within the entire period in which the missions operated (1769-1848) and Native experiences under distinct forms of colonialism.

Other Keywords
Missions • California • Ethnohistory • Beads • Paleoethnobotany • Housing • Tribes • Foodways • California Missions • Grease rendering

Geographic Keywords
California • Southern San Francisco and Northern Monterey Bay

Resources Inside This Collection (Viewing 1-8 of 8)

  • Documents (8)
Documents
  • Archaeology and Paleoethnobotany of The Indian Family Housing Site at Mission San Juan Bautista (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only GeorgeAnn M. DeAntoni.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Chronicles of Colonialism: Unraveling Temporal Variability in Indigenous Experiences of Colonization in California Missions", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Established in 1797, Mission San Juan Bautista was the fifteenth of the Spanish missions built in Alta California. From the time of its construction until its secularization in 1835, Indigenous peoples lived in, ate at, created homes around and fostered...

  • Civil War Behind Mission San Luis Obispo 1813-1823 (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Marie C Duggan.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Chronicles of Colonialism: Unraveling Temporal Variability in Indigenous Experiences of Colonization in California Missions", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Through the economic lens, Missions I: 1769-1810 were different than Missions II: 1811-1834. In Missions I, production on missions was by and for native congregations, native people moved back and forth between the space of the unconverted and the...

  • Exploring a Glass and Ceramic Cache in the Native Barracks at Mission La Purísima Concepción: Inferences to Indigenous Negotiations of the Waning Spanish Frontier (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Kaitlin Brown.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Chronicles of Colonialism: Unraveling Temporal Variability in Indigenous Experiences of Colonization in California Missions", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. In 1963/64, James Deetz conducted an examination of the Native adobe barracks at Mission La Purísima Concepción, where he uncovered a substantial concentration of glass and ceramic vessels under the floor in one apartment unit. Subsequent reevaluation of...

  • Foodways within the Alta California Mission System: Assessing Colonial and Indigenous Diet within Mission Santa Clara de Asís (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Sarah J. Noe.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Chronicles of Colonialism: Unraveling Temporal Variability in Indigenous Experiences of Colonization in California Missions", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Within Alta California, research on Spanish mission sites has focused on how diverse Indigenous populations residing within mission settlements continued to incorporate traditional objects into their daily practices, as well as modify the production,...

  • From Source to Disposition: Olivella Shell Bead Economics within Missions Santa Cruz and Santa Clara. (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Mark G. Hylkema.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Chronicles of Colonialism: Unraveling Temporal Variability in Indigenous Experiences of Colonization in California Missions", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Shell beads made from Olivella biplicata have been important to ancestral Native Americans of the southern San Francisco Bay for nearly 10,000 years. Variations in types and assemblages are temporally diagnostic and well documented; however, continued...

  • Housing for the Families of Mission Indian Ciudadanos, 1822-1824 (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Glenn J Farris.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Chronicles of Colonialism: Unraveling Temporal Variability in Indigenous Experiences of Colonization in California Missions", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Under Spanish rule, the mission Indians of California were called “neofitos,” neophytes who remained incomplete in their transformation to being Christian subjects of the king of Spain. With the culmination of the Mexican Revolution in 1821 it seemed...

  • Reading Colonial Transitions: Archival Evidence and the Archaeology of Indigenous Action in Mexican California (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Lee M. Panich. Gustavo Flores. Michael Wilcox. Monica V. Arellano.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Chronicles of Colonialism: Unraveling Temporal Variability in Indigenous Experiences of Colonization in California Missions", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Recent archaeological research in the San Francisco Bay Area has demonstrated that Indigenous people maintained diverse cultural practices—such as the production and conveyance of stone tools and shell beads—during the region’s Spanish mission period....

  • San Buenaventura's Chumash Community during the Late Mission Period (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only John R. Johnson. John R. Johnson.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Chronicles of Colonialism: Unraveling Temporal Variability in Indigenous Experiences of Colonization in California Missions", at the 2024 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Mexico's independence from Spain resulted in major changes impacting California's Mission Indian communities. Important documents from the1820s permit a fascinating glimpse into the economic organization and social fabric of Mission San Buenaventura's...