Responding to Regional Collapse: A Late Mississippian Community on the Georgia Coast

Summary

Communities are social fulcrums, situated within multiple scales of interactivity. Understanding the discursive relationship between regions and households through the lens of the community can allow for a better understanding of social transformations. In the decades preceding 1400 C.E., chiefdoms in the Savannah River Valley collapsed and the region became depopulated. Settlement evidence suggests large scale population movements from the valley to the Georgia Coast, with significant social changes occurring among coastal groups concomitant with this movement. Data from intensive shovel test surveys on and near Sapelo Island, Georgia demonstrate how households and communities reacted to and

engendered these regional shifts.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)   •
• Reconsidering Mississippian Households and Communities

Keywords

Spatial Coverage