Creating Frames of Reference for Seaweed Consumption in the Americas: A Cross-Cultural Approach

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Archaeophycology: New (Ethno)Archaeological Approaches to Understand the Contribution of Seaweed to the Subsistence and Social Life of Coastal Populations" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Though seaweed consumption has only been exceptionally documented in most archaeological contexts, ethnographic data accounts for the extensive and intensive use of seaweeds and seagrasses. This study uses ethnographic data to propose new hypotheses that can inform future archaeological research by showing recurrent and non-case-specific choices. In this paper, we present a preliminary study aimed at investigating the different types of seaweed consumption across Indigenous societies from North, Central, and South America. We use the eHRAF (Human Relation Area Files) ethnographic databases corresponding primarily to the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in order to retrieve data on how these societies use a number of seaweed species for different purposes. The study shows the uses of seaweed for food, salt, seasonings, and as a commercial resource. Seaweeds were also integrated into recreational and social activities, as well as into the symbolic dimension. Such results will allow us to assess the relative importance of seaweed consumption in hunter-gatherer, horticulturalist, pastoralist, and agriculturalist societies.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Archaeophycology: New (Ethno)Archaeological Approaches to Understand the Contribution of Seaweed to the Subsistence and Social Life of Coastal Populations   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 38838.0