Ceramics, Categorical Identification, and the Changing Social Structure of the Spanish American Colonies

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Archaeologists frequently have used distinct decorative styles, often found on serving vessels, as indicators of social identity and status. For the Spanish American colonies, focus has been placed on tableware, particularly majolica, as a measure of economic status and socio-racial identity, linked to Spanish-European commensality. Growing research throughout Latin America has demonstrated wide variability in the distribution of majolica tableware that challenges simplistic interpretations. Geographic location, settlement function, and transformations in the colonial social structure all contributed to diverse patterns in ceramic distribution. In this paper, we examine diachronic variation across three centuries and two geographic locations within the Spanish American empire: Port of Veracruz and Northwest Florida. Historians have documented at least three large-scale shifts in the organization of colonial society, from the géneros de gente (types of people) – based on categorical distinctions borrowed from Iberia – to the more well-studied casta system and, finally, to incipient economic classes. Through an examination of assemblages from Veracruz and Florida, we critically evaluate the changing role of majolica as a symbol of categorical distinction in colonial Mesoamerica and the borderlands.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)   •
• SAA 2021: General Sessions

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 32585