Identity Crisis: Archaeological Perspectives on Social Identity
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Identity Crisis: Archaeological Perspectives on Social Identity Proceedings of the 42nd (2010) Annual Chacmool Archaeology Conference, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta Edited by Lindsay Amundsen-Meyer, Nicole Engel and Sean Pickering Published by: Chacmool Archaeological Association University of Calgary 2011 We would like to thank all the contributors for allowing us to include their research in this volume and for their patience as we moved through the editing process. Thanks are also owed to the members of the 2009 Chacmool Conference Committee, without whom this examination of archaeological aspects of identity would not have occurred. We would also like to thank Dr. Gerry Oetelaar for his continued help and guidance throughout all stages of the publication process. Finally, thanks to the Chacmool Archaeological Association for continuing to sponsor both the annual Chacmool Conference and the publication of each year‘s proceedings. Table of Contents Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 1 Lindsay M. Amundsen-Meyer Paradox and Praxis in the Archaeology of Identity ...................................................................... 11 Andrew Gardner Adorning Identities: Brooches as Social Strategy in Early Medieval Europe .............................. 27 Heather M. Flowers Health and Social Status in early Anglo-Saxon England: A Consideration of Cemetery Evidence from Edix Hill (Cambridgeshire) .................................................................................................. 37 Julia A. Gamble Age and Gender Identities and Social Differentiation in the Central European Copper Age ...... 49 Jan Turek Funerary Rites as a Means of Land Appropriation ....................................................................... 62 Lieve Donellan Lifting the Veil: Identity and Dress of Brides on Athenian Vases ............................................... 74 Renee M. Gondek Practical Identities: On the Relationship between Iconography and Group Identity.................... 86 Christopher M. Roberts The Costume of Crisis Reinforcing Local Identity in Later Etruscan Art .................................... 96 Eoin M. O'Donaghue Kashrut and Shechita – The Relationship Between Dietary Practices and Ritual Slaughtering of Animals on Jewish Identity ......................................................................................................... 106 Haskel J. Greenfield and Ram Bouchnick "It Is Very Difficult to Know People...": Cuisine and Identity in Mycenaean Greece ............... 121 Julia Hruby ―I Discard, Therefore I Am‖: Identity and Leave-Taking of Possessions .................................. 132 Monica L. Smith Does Ethnicity Matter in Colonial Relations? The Case of South Italy ..................................... 143 Edward Herring Theatres of Memory: Second Life and the Cyber Identity of the Middle Ages. ........................ 157 Megan Meredith-Lobay Identity Negotiation during Tiwanaku State Collapse ................................................................ 167 Nicola Sharatt The Archaeology of Death on the Shore of Lake Nicaragua ...................................................... 178 Sacha Wilke, Geoffrey McCafferty and Brett Watson A Different Kind of Afterlife: The Cultural Biography of Headstones ...................................... 189 Katherine Cook The King is Dead, Long Live the King: Mimesis and Identity in the Cultural Projects of the New Order at Tikal .............................................................................................................................. 199 Joshua Englehardt Hybrid Objects, Hybrid Social Identities: Style and Social Structure in the Late Horizon Andes ..................................................................................................................................................... 211 Cathy Lynne Costin Sex, Drugs and Rock Gods: Examining Nicaraguan Stone Sculptures ...................................... 226 Sacha Wilke Ceramic Analysis from the Site of La Delicias, Nicaragua ........................................................ 235 Lorelei Platz Bling and Things: Ornamentation and Identity in Pacific Nicaragua ......................................... 243 Geoffrey McCafferty and Sharisse McCafferty Who was that Masked Man: Iconography and Identity in the Middle Classic Maya Ballgame 253 Priscilla Mollard Continuity, Cultural Dynamics, and Alcohol: The Reinterpretation of Identity through Chicha in the Andes .................................................................................................................................... 263 Guy S. Duke Harmony and Conflict: The Balseria Feast and Central Panamanian Chiefly Societies ............ 273 Mackenzie K. Jessome Distinguishing Social Identity in the Archaeological Record: The Toyah/Tejas Social Field ... 285 John Arnn Architecture and Social Identity: Observances from Two Historic Sites in Calgary ................. 299 Dale Boland Social Memory and Identity as Reflected in the Reuse of a Residential Group at the Maya Site of San Bartolo.................................................................................................................................. 311 Diane Davies ―Everything Necessary for a Comfortable Existence‖: Colonialism and Identity in the Petit Nord, Newfoundland ............................................................................................................................. 321 Jennifer Jones A People for All Seasons: Expressions of Inuit Identity over the past 500 Years in Southern Labrador ...................................................................................................................................... 332 Lisa K. Rankin A Theory of Complexity, Archaeological Data, and the Ouroboros Problem: A Critical Analysis of Archaeological Practice on the Northern Plateau, British Columbia ..................................... 341 Lucille E. Harris and Michael Wazenreid An Anthropology of Third-Wave Mayanism: Emic Rationales Behind New Age (Mis)appropriations of Ancient Maya Calendrics and Symbology ............................................ 352 Marc Blainey Identiy Crisis: Archaeological Perspectives on Social Identity Introduction Lindsay M. Amundsen-Meyer Department of Archaeology, University of Calgary, 2500 University Dr. NW, Calgary, Alberta, T2N 1N4 The Conference Sponsored and organized by the Chacmool Undergraduate Association in the Department of Archaeology at the University of Calgary, the Chacmool Conference is one of the largest annual archaeology conferences in Canada. The papers included in this volume were drawn from close to 120 papers presented at the 43rd Annual Chacmool Conference in November 2009. This Conference was especially meaningful, as the mayor proclaimed the week prior to the Conference ―Archaeology Week‖ in the City of Calgary, an event which drew together the Chacmool Archaeological Association, Graduate Archaeology Student‘s Association and Archaeological Society of Alberta to promote public awareness of archaeology. Entitled ―Identity Crisis: Archaeological Perspectives on Social Identity‖, the conference was meant to attract papers that would contribute to a dialogue on and the study of social identity in the archaeological record. The response to the call for papers was extensive with topics ranging from technological and culinary practices as markers of identity to material and spatial aspects of households and communities as signs of identity, In fact, identity followed individuals to the grave as indicated by the treatment and disposition of human remains in mortuary contexts. Furthermore, participants in the conference came from the Circumpolar North to Latin America and from Western Canada to, Greece and Rome. Identity Crisis As a component of daily practice, identity itself is a characteristic of both individuals and groups. The construction and maintenance of identity in the past may not have been straightforward; many of our social categories such as race, gender, and social status likely did not hold the same meaning to the people of the past (Meskell 2001; Wynne-Jones and Croucher 2007). Theorizing social identity in archaeology thus warrants recognition that, although our subjects are dead and long-buried, they were once people with lives, friends, goals and senses of self. We should, therefore, study past identities through the reconstruction of daily practices and social interactions to gain a greater understanding of the people of the past. Michel Foucault has argued that identity is a form of social construction which people impose on themselves and others (Foucault 1994). The contributions to this volume highlight the fact that there are, indeed, multiple, layered and plural identities, created through both self-definition and the perceptions of others. Consequently, the concepts and definitions of identity discussed in this volume are dynamic, changing with history, environment and socio-political relations (Martindale 2009; Wynne-Jones and Croucher 2007). For archaeologists who are forced to examine a static record, it is important to recognize the dynamic nature of social identity and to adopt a more active view of the archaeological record in which the construction of identity occurs as a fluid and continuous process (Meskell 2001). 1 | P a g e Identiy Crisis: Archaeological Perspectives on Social Identity As archaeologists,