Indigenous Anatomies

Summary

Bioarchaeological research in the Andes has shed important light on Andean lifestyles in the past. From identifying diseases such as tuberculosis and juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, to analyzing migrations, dietary patterns and interpersonal violence, bioarchaeology has demonstrated a unique capacity to evaluate certain categories of human behavior not accessible through other forms of analysis. For the purposes of interpreting the past, bioarchaeologists broadly view the body as a complex amalgam of both biological and cultural attributes; however, an emic understanding of the body itself is just beginning to emerge in Andean studies. In this paper, I will review the corpus of bioarchaeological research that deals specifically with manipulations of the living and dead body, specifically as it relates to broader theoretical trends regarding ontologies of the body. Based on these studies, I propose a more contextualized interpretation of the body based on perspectives from the indigenous worldview, as opposed to a strictly Cartesian model.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)   •
• Andean Ontologies: New Perspectives from Archaeology, Ethnohistory and Bioarchaeology

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Spatial Coverage