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An Archaeology of Structural Violence: Life in a Twentieth-Century Coal Town

Michael P. Roller

Using evidence of historical changes in landscape, community life, and material culture from a coal mining company town in the Anthracite Coal Region of Northeast Pennsylvania, Michael Roller ... More

Using evidence of historical changes in landscape, community life, and material culture from a coal mining company town in the Anthracite Coal Region of Northeast Pennsylvania, Michael Roller introduces an archaeological approach to the structural violence on workers, citizens, and consumers that developed across the twentieth century. The study begins with an analysis of a moment of explicit violence at the end of the nineteenth century, an event known as the Lattimer Massacre, in which as many as nineteen immigrant miners were shot by a posse of local businessmen. From this touchstone, material history and theoretical contexts across the twentieth century are documented in a manner both locally specific and broadly generalizable. Historical archaeology is used strategically, opportunistically, and dialectically, supported, amplified, and illuminated by archival and ethnographic research, spatial analysis, and social theory. In the process, attention is brought to contradictions, ironies, and absences in our understandings of this formative era in labor history. This study illuminates the development of systematized violence and soft forms of social control enacted by the collusion of state and capital through materialities such as infrastructure, urban redevelopment, mass consumerism, governmentality, biopolitics, and the shifting boundaries of sovereign power. Varied in its use of sources, the study returns again and again to the material life and the shifting landscapes of the company towns and shanty enclaves of the region, as well as the violence of the Massacre. This archaeology of the recent past shows us the unconscious material foundations for present social troubles.Less

Beyond the Walls: New Perspectives on the Archaeology of Historical Households

Kevin R. Fogle, James A. Nyman, and Mary C. Beaudry (eds)

Household archaeology is a methodological and theoretical approach to domestic sites that can address essential social issues in the past. Beyond the Walls brings together contributions from today’s ... More

Household archaeology is a methodological and theoretical approach to domestic sites that can address essential social issues in the past. Beyond the Walls brings together contributions from today’s leading archaeologists and scholars who study the archaeology of households. This volume represents the breadth of perspectives on, and approaches to, the archaeology of households in North America. While previous volumes tackling this subject tend to be limited in scope, the research presented here is not restricted to a single historic time period, region, or culture. Instead, readers are exposed to the diversity of ways in which the people of the past navigated, negotiated, and contested the circumstances of their lives, as reflected in the archaeological remains of their dwellings. Beyond the Walls serves to inspire students and professional archaeologists alike to think differently about the archaeology of households within the historical sphere. It highlights current innovative ideas and methods in the field of household archaeology and provides an important contribution to the study of both the archaeology of households and the cultural landscapes they inhabit.Less

An Archaeology of Asian Transnationalism

Douglas E. Ross

This book is about how displacement associated with long-distance population movements and the relationships migrants maintain with both home and host societies shape their consumer habits and the ... More

This book is about how displacement associated with long-distance population movements and the relationships migrants maintain with both home and host societies shape their consumer habits and the formation of collective diasporic identities. These themes are addressed using an interpretive framework rooted in interdisciplinary literature on transnationalism, diaspora, and material consumption and are developed through an archaeological study of the everyday lives of Chinese and Japanese immigrant laborers at a turn-of-the-twentieth century industrial salmon cannery in British Columbia. Results demonstrate that migrant consumption patterns draw on traditions from the homeland but are influenced by a range of factors at the local, regional, and international levels. Furthermore, diasporic identities are as much a product of the migration process as of homeland traditions, and consumer goods play an important role in how they are constructed and maintained. Overall, this study accomplishes three things: (1) it paints a portrait of the contextual factors affecting how migrant consumers maintain some homeland practices and adapt others from the host society; (2) it develops a model of ethnicity that is shaped and transformed as cultural traditions from home and host societies come together; and (3) it outlines a framework for how migrant communities use consumer goods and practices to maintain a sense of diasporic identity in the face of displacement and associated culture change. This research is one of the first in-depth studies in historical archaeology on overseas Japanese migration and the first detailed comparison of archaeological material from Chinese and Japanese sites.Less

French Colonial Archaeology in the Southeast and Caribbean

Kenneth G. Kelly and Meredith D. Hardy (eds)

The French colonial presence in the southern United States and Caribbean shaped the history and development of these regions in unique ways. These case studies analyze and assess the French impact ... More

The French colonial presence in the southern United States and Caribbean shaped the history and development of these regions in unique ways. These case studies analyze and assess the French impact throughout this area. Using studies from French colonial sites in Maryland, South Carolina, the Gulf Coast, the lower Mississippi Valley, the Caribbean, and French Guiana, the contributors seek to reveal how French colonial life was both different from and similar to that of Spanish and English settlements, how it influenced the character of the communities, and how French identity was maintained in these locales. Subjects examined include French Hugenots in South Carolina, French colonial and creole cuisine and food technology, the broad concept of creolization, impacts of the French–Chickasaw War in Louisiana Territory, and the differences in plantation and slave practices among individuals in various French settlements. Featuring investigations into both urban and plantation settings, the book reveals the range of insights archaeological investigations can bring to a wide variety of historical milieux.Less

Jefferson's Poplar Forest: Unearthing a Virginia Plantation

Barbara Heath and Jack Gary (eds)

This edited volume is the outcome of twenty-five years of continuous archaeological research at Poplar Forest-Thomas Jefferson's retreat home and working plantation. Through in-depth case studies, ... More

This edited volume is the outcome of twenty-five years of continuous archaeological research at Poplar Forest-Thomas Jefferson's retreat home and working plantation. Through in-depth case studies, drawing on rich archaeological and documentary sources, this book investigates the plantation and the lives of the enslaved African and African American laborers residing at Poplar Forest between the American Revolution and the Civil War. Authors focus on archaeological investigations into Poplar Forest's agricultural and ornamental landscapes, the ceramics used by Jefferson at his private retreat, and the material, dietary, and social worlds of enslaved laborers, including the production and distribution of stone pipes, the social organization slave quarters, slaves' engagement with the consumer economy, and the use of plants by enslaved people living on the property during the antebellum period. Additional chapters introduce readers to the history of the property and situate it within a broader body of scholarship in contemporary historical archaeology, particularly plantation archaeology. Together, the volume's authors consider issues of race, class, gender, and historical memory as they played out on a central Virginia plantation.Less

Reluctant Landscapes: Historical Anthropologies of Political Experience in Siin, Senegal

François G. Richard

Reluctant Landscapes analyzes the political history of rural communities in the Siin province (Senegal) over the last 400 years. Much of Africa’s global history has been told from the standpoint of ... More

Reluctant Landscapes analyzes the political history of rural communities in the Siin province (Senegal) over the last 400 years. Much of Africa’s global history has been told from the standpoint of states, but less is known about peasants, whose past has often been written as a tale of political rupture or cultural persistence. Drawing on archaeology, history, and anthropology, this book charts how Siin villagers variably accommodated, resisted, or evaded the incursions of indigenous states, the Atlantic economy, colonialism, and postcolonial government. It pays particular attention to the role of material world – both the landscapes crafted by farmers over generations, and the systems of objects with which they interfaced through trade – in mediating between villagers and broader historical forces, and in shaping their political experiences. Over time, these material worlds incorporated the coordinates of a changing political economy, yet they also conserved certain principles of political life, whose expressions continue to orient collective expectations about politics today. Grounded in Siin’s history and cultural geography, the book not only intends to sharpen historical understanding of peasant communities in Senegal, but it also essays wider critical reflections about capitalism, international slavery, colonial governance, and post-independence statecraft in rural West Africa.Less

The Archaeology of Utopian and Intentional Communities

Stacy C. Kozakavich

Intentional communities, including religious, utopian, and communal societies, have long been a feature of the American social and economic landscape. This volume describes and discusses historical ... More

Intentional communities, including religious, utopian, and communal societies, have long been a feature of the American social and economic landscape. This volume describes and discusses historical archaeology’s contributions to our understanding of intentional communities throughout American history. Scholars across many disciplines have long been interested in communal experiments for their optimistic ideals, dramatic methods, and often eventual failures. Archaeologists’ focus on the material world and lived experiences of community members adds depth and complexity to our historical knowledge about these people. Sometimes our work demonstrates the ways that communitarians enacted their ideals. At other times it shows how daily practices diverged from a group’s ideal path. Often it makes us rethink the questions we ask about how communities are formed and maintained. Structured according to the scale of methodological focus—from settlement patterns and landscape, to the built environment, to artifact studies—the case studies presented in this volume will give readers a thorough introduction to archaeological research to date in this field. An expanded case study will describe archaeological research on the Kaweah Co-operative Commonwealth of late nineteenth-century California. The closing chapter discusses the social and political implications of retelling past experimental communities’ stories in publications and historical reconstructions.Less

Archaeology of Identity and Dissonance: Contexts for a Brave New World

Bernice Kurchin

Diane F. George  (ed.)

In situations of displacement, disruption, and difference, humans adapt by actively creating, re-creating, and adjusting their identities using the material world. This book employs the discipline of ... More

In situations of displacement, disruption, and difference, humans adapt by actively creating, re-creating, and adjusting their identities using the material world. This book employs the discipline of historical archaeology to study this process as it occurs in new and challenging environments. The case studies furnish varied instances of people wresting control from others who wish to define them and of adaptive transformation by people who find themselves in new and strange worlds. The authors consider multiple aspects of identity, such as race, class, gender, and ethnicity, and look for ways to understand its fluid and intersecting nature. The book seeks to make the study of the past relevant to our globalized, postcolonized, and capitalized world. Questions of identity formation are critical in understanding the world today, in which boundaries are simultaneously breaking down and being built up, and humans are constantly adapting to the ever-changing milieu. This book tackles these questions not only in multiple dimensions of earthly space but also in a panorama of historical time. Moving from the ancient past to the unknowable future and through numerous temporal stops in between, the reader travels from New York to the Great Lakes, Britain to North Africa, and the North Atlantic to the West Indies.Less

Simplicity, Equality, and Slavery: An Archaeology of Quakerism in the British Virgin Islands, 1740-1780

John M. Chenoweth

How do both a religious community and a religion change when their members must face contradictions between their ideals and the society in which they live? This question is answered here by using ... More

How do both a religious community and a religion change when their members must face contradictions between their ideals and the society in which they live? This question is answered here by using archaeological and archival information to trace the life of a group of Quakers (members of the Religious Society of Friends) residing in the British Virgin Islands between 1741 and 1763. A group of mostly poor, white planters formed this unique community inspired by the ideals of equality, simplicity, and peace. However, these ideals were enacted in a slave society, with all or nearly all the members holding enslaved people themselves, attempting to improve their lot through the violent appropriation of labor from others on plantations. Combining archival and archaeological evidence, the book shows how modern expectations of “Quakerly” behavior are not met in this community. Instead, we find Quakerism being negotiated in creative ways that fit within a slavery-based economy and society: through foods, relationships with other planters and the enslaved people themselves, and social advancement. Community is often conceived as something every member shares equally, but the historical archaeology approach and anthropological analysis of this volume shows how social groups like religions are full of conflicting perspectives and goals—in this case, conflicts which led to the group’s end after one generation. By examining how one small group interpreted Quakerism’s ideals in the contrasting environment of the eighteenth-century Caribbean, we learn what a religion is and how it matters in the daily lives of its members.Less