Harvesting Seagrass at l’akayamu

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

This project is a collaborative effort driven by a multi-tribal Chumash community to reawaken cultural knowledge while simultaneously generating new archaeological data about the well-preserved Chumash village of l’akayamu. Located on limuw (Santa Cruz Island, the largest of California’s Channel Islands), l’akayamu is a historical village that was connected to broader sociopolitical and economic systems in the Chumash world. During a recent multi-tribal excursion to limuw, seagrass cordage was identified in eroding deposits at l’akayamu. Subsequently, the tribal chair of the Barbareño Band of Chumash Indians made a request for the cordage to be excavated in order to preserve the item, while reawakening and maintaining tribal knowledge of manufacturing cultural items using seagrass.

Dr. Jeanne Arnold’s prior research at the village focused on site structure, intra-site relationships between households, and inter-village variability on Limuw. The cordage excavation presents a unique opportunity to directly build on Dr. Arnold’s research with minimally invasive techniques. Most importantly, this project is designed to ensure that knowledge about traditional material culture is developed for and by the Chumash community itself, supporting the acquisition and application of Chumash cultural knowledge for the future.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 37160.0