Acquiring Status and Power in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies

Part of: Society for American Archaeology 90th Annual Meeting, Denver, CO (2025)

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "Acquiring Status and Power in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies" at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

In this session, we explore the archaeological, ethnographic, and ethnohistoric evidence of the multiple strategies that ambitious leaders in transegalitarian and chiefdom societies employ in order to attain and maintain social status, authority, wealth and power. Such strategies may include various ways by which political actors accumulate wealth, acquire or create inalienable or prized gifts and sacra, amass and garner surpluses for feasts, create and conduct ritual performances, facilitate collective action, orchestrate warfare, judiciously use force/coercion, and promote privileged access to supernatural powers by way of ancestor cults, secret societies, or other ritual organizations. We argue that aggrandizing leaders in transegalitarian and chiefly societies use diverse and overlapping means to garner opportunities for creating and bending social rules, as well as manipulating accepted political protocols for their own advantage and benefit. The goal is to shed light on the various means that permitted individuals to attain and maintain elevated social status in transegalitarian societies and to secure political power in middle range societies prior to the origin of the state.

Other Keywords
Social and Political Organization • Ethnohistory/History • Ethnography/Ethnoarchaeology • Worldwide

Resources Inside This Collection (Viewing 1-10 of 10)

  • Documents (10)
Documents
  • Acquiring Economic Power in Chiefdom Societies of Early Japan (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Ken-ichi Sasaki.

    This is an abstract from the "Acquiring Status and Power in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Japanese chiefly polities began evolving toward states during the Kofun period (middle third to early seventh centuries CE), as evidenced by the appearance of a key material symbol of increased social complexity and control: keyhole-shaped mounded tombs. Construction of these distinctive tombs reflects several...

  • Challenges to Chiefdoms: Māori Leaders in Aotearoa/New Zealand (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Mark Allen.

    This is an abstract from the "Acquiring Status and Power in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The title of this paper reflects two themes. First, the environmental and demographic reality of Polynesian settlement of temperate islands with substantial rainforests and marginal horticultural potential which prevented the development of large complex chiefdoms such as those of Hawai’i or French Polynesia. Māori...

  • Collective Action Problems Led to Increased Social Hierarchy in Ancient Samoa: Evidence from Architetural Chronologies and Paleoenvironments (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Ethan Cochrane.

    This is an abstract from the "Acquiring Status and Power in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. We have identified the evolutionary-ecological processes that explain the rise of increasingly hierarchical society in Samoa over the last 1000 years. Our lidar, ground survey, and rock-wall chronologies in the Falefa Valley demonstrate that the construction of large boundary walls began 900-600 years ago, shortly...

  • Leadership and Violence in the Small-Scale Societies of New Guinea (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Paul Roscoe.

    This is an abstract from the "Acquiring Status and Power in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The degree to which leaders of egalitarian and trans-egalitarian societies deployed violence to achieve and maintain their position has long been a matter of anthropological and archaeological discussion. I investigate this issue using a database of political information drawn from 148 New Guinea societies ranging...

  • Mississippian Chiefly Claims of Power (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only David Dye.

    This is an abstract from the "Acquiring Status and Power in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Early eighteenth century French accounts concerning the Choctaw and Natchez provide critical insights into the multiple strategies Mississippian chiefly elites employed to gain and legitimize power. I argue that ruling elites devised multiple means to garner, enhance, and legitimize holds over various sources of...

  • Power Divergences Among Pre-contact Puebloan and Mogollon Societies: Conflict and Cooperation in the American Southwest (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Ryan Harrod.

    This is an abstract from the "Acquiring Status and Power in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper explores how two contemporary pre-contact (AD 800-1200) cultures in the American Southwest compared in power structures and leadership roles. We investigate the Ancestral Puebloans of the Chaco region and the Mimbres Mogollon people of southwestern New Mexico. As these societies reacted to changing...

  • Predators and Preciosities: Acquiring and Displaying Status and Power in the Isthmo-Colombian Area (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only John Hoopes.

    This is an abstract from the "Acquiring Status and Power in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Isthmo-Colombian area served as a nexus for communication and exchange among chiefdoms and middle-range societies in southern Central America, northern South America, the Antilles, northern Amazonia, and the northern Andes. Political actors and especially ambitious leaders acquired and openly displayed finely...

  • The Rise of Complexity among the Bini (West Africa) (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Dmitry Bondarenko.

    This is an abstract from the "Acquiring Status and Power in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. <html> The paper examines the rise of socio-political complexity among the Bini of modern Nigeria. It is shown that this process took place mainly in the second half of the 1<sup>st</sup> millennium CE, was stimulated by the spread of agriculture and iron among the Bini, and is connected with their struggle for...

  • Rock art as a manifestation of power and status in Scandinavian Bronze Age rock art. (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Johan Ling.

    This is an abstract from the "Acquiring Status and Power in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In this paper we argue that the Scandinavian Bronze Age rock art can be associated with status and power and that the institutional idea of secret societies is the concept that best connects the warrior ideals shown in the rock art. It has recently been proposed that Scandinavian Bronze Age rock art was created by...

  • The Role of Captives in Status-Striving in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Catherine Cameron.

    This is an abstract from the "Acquiring Status and Power in Transegalitarian and Chiefdom Societies" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Ambitious leaders in transegalitarian and chiefdom level societies used a variety of approaches to achieve control over other people and the material wealth in their society. They organized or participated in raids and warfare, they led efforts to defend against raids of other groups, they hosted competitive feasts,...