Social network analysis (SNA) in archaeology has become important for a range of theoretical and methodological approaches that can more generally be characterized as relational. They are relational ...in that it is the ties between actors (or nodes) that define social connections. Archaeologists are currently employing a diversity of theoretical approaches to networks, and the perspective taken in this review is that SNA can provide insights into a number of different social processes using different theories. Following a brief historical overview, I discuss two aspects of SNA: the structural position of the actor or node, and characterizations of whole networks. I then summarize several broad classes of archaeological networks: historical, spatial, and material. I conclude with a call for more bridging approaches to span alternative theoretical and methodological approaches in the archaeology of networks.
This article draws upon ethnographic accounts of female potters' movement and intermarriage into multi-ethnic Pueblo communities in the U.S. Southwest to illustrate how marriage networks created ...opportunities for innovation through the production, distribution, and consumption of boundary objects. These objects did not define boundaries but facilitated boundary crossing or bridging by potters. I argue that the concept of boundary objects is more useful than hybridity for understanding the processes of culture contact and material culture diffusion. Archaeological evidence for late twelfth through thirteenth century migrations from the Four Corners to the southern Colorado Plateau is used to make a case for a high degree of intermarriage and post-marital movement of women. Such patrilocality challenges normative views of post-marital residence, including those employed by early ceramic sociologists working in the same area of the Southwest and even at the same sites. The case that I discuss provides a contrast to other Southwest examples in which conformist transmission was more common, and helps to solve a paradox in explanations of the Southwest Pueblo Sprachbund. I conclude that the concept of boundary objects complements formal social network approaches in archaeology by bringing out the active role of objects in linking social actors.
The late pre-Hispanic period in the US Southwest (A.D. 1200–1450) was characterized by large-scale demographic changes, including long-distance migration and population aggregation. To reconstruct ...how these processes reshaped social networks, we compiled a comprehensive artifact database from major sites dating to this interval in the western Southwest. We combine social network analysis with geographic information systems approaches to reconstruct network dynamics over 250 y. We show how social networks were transformed across the region at previously undocumented spatial, temporal, and social scales. Using well-dated decorated ceramics, we track changes in network topology at 50-y intervals to show a dramatic shift in network density and settlement centrality from the northern to the southern Southwest after A.D. 1300. Both obsidian sourcing and ceramic data demonstrate that long-distance network relationships also shifted from north to south after migration. Surprisingly, social distance does not always correlate with spatial distance because of the presence of network relationships spanning long geographic distances. Our research shows how a large network in the southern Southwest grew and then collapsed, whereas networks became more fragmented in the northern Southwest but persisted. The study also illustrates how formal social network analysis may be applied to large-scale databases of material culture to illustrate multigenerational changes in network structure.
The application of method and theory from network science to archaeology has dramatically increased over the last decade. In this article, we document this growth over time, discuss several of the ...important concepts that are used in the application of network approaches to archaeology, and introduce the other articles in this special issue on networks in archaeology. We argue that the suitability and contribution of network science techniques within particular archaeological research contexts can be usefully explored by scrutinizing the past phenomena under study, how these are abstracted into concepts, and how these in turn are represented as network data. For this reason, each of the articles in this special issue is discussed in terms of the phenomena that they seek to address, the abstraction in terms of concepts that they use to study connectivity, and the representations of network data that they employ in their analyses. The approaches currently being used are diverse and interdisciplinary, which we think are evidence of a healthy exploratory stage in the application of network science in archaeology. To facilitate further innovation, application, and collaboration, we also provide a glossary of terms that are currently being used in network science and especially those in the applications to archaeological case studies.
Three COVID-19 vaccines have received FDA-authorization and are in use in the United States, but there is limited head-to-head data on the durability of the immune response elicited by these ...vaccines. Using a quantitative assay we studied binding IgG antibodies elicited by BNT162b2, mRNA-1273 or Ad26.COV2.S in an employee cohort over a span out to 10 months. Age and sex were explored as response modifiers. Of 234 subjects in the vaccine cohort, 114 received BNT162b2, 114 received mRNA-1273 and six received Ad26.COV2.S. IgG levels measured between seven to 20 days after the second vaccination were similar in recipients of BNT162b2 and mRNA-127 and were ~50-fold higher than in recipients of Ad26.COV2.S. However, by day 21 and at later time points IgG levels elicited by BNT162b2 were lower than mRNA-1273. Accordingly, the IgG decay curve was steeper for BNT162b2 than mRNA-1273. Age was a significant modifier of IgG levels in recipients of BNT162b2, but not mRNA-1273. After six months, IgG levels elicited by BNT162b2, but not mRNA-1273, were lower than IgG levels in patients who had been hospitalized with COVID-19 six months earlier. Similar findings were observed when comparing vaccine-elicited antibodies with steady-state IgG targeting seasonal human coronaviruses. Differential IgG decay could contribute to differences observed in clinical protection over time between BNT162b2 and mRNA-1273.
Chaco Canyon’s concentration of monumental architecture and the replication of its great house/small house architectural distinction throughout a broad region has often been regarded as unique and ...one of the world’s archaeological ‘Anomalous Giants’. Rather than seeing Chaco as unique, this contribution argues that Chaco should be seen in light of (1) its early position as a frontier zone of households with diverse backgrounds that periodically used the canyon and its surrounding areas; (2) continued mobility of individuals and households engaging in collective large-scale construction, alliance building, and population redistribution in a semi-arid environment; (3) collective governance; and (4) low-density urbanism. Taking a historical approach to Chaco’s trajectory, recent research is marshalled to show when and how each of these models adds complexity to current interpretations that contrasts with typological ascriptions of Chaco society.
Ceramic bowls from the Greater Southwest are used to show how changes in the exterior decoration of serving vessels are associated with the proxemics of ritual performances. Across the northern ...Southwest the first use of exterior designs and polychrome ceramics is during the Pueblo III period, which corresponds to a shift in settlement aggregation and the use of open plaza spaces. With the transition to the more enclosed plazas of the Early Pueblo IV period, smaller and less visible exterior designs were used. The trend reversed itself with the use of larger plazas at later Pueblo IV period sites, where serving bowls with greater visual impact were used. Panregional trends are bolstered by a case study from the Mogollon Rim region of Arizona to show how changes in the visual performance characteristics of bowls are associated with the spatial and social proxemics of suprahousehold feasting rituals. I use several characteristics of serving bowls including their size, slip colors, paint and slip contrasts, and the size of exterior designs. These are related to the size and diversity of performance spaces, including plazas, and to other evidence for changes in feasting practices, such as roasting features and faunal remains. I conclude that the changes seen in serving vessels are important for looking at shifts in the scale, visibility, and diversity of public gatherings within Ancestral Pueblo social and ritual trajectories.
Southwestern ceramics have always been admired for their variety and aesthetic beauty. Although ceramics are most often used for placing the peoples who produced them in time, they can also provide ...important clues to past economic organization. This volume covers nearly 1000 years of southwestern prehistory and history, focusing on ceramic production in a number of environmental and economic contexts. It brings together the best of current research to illustrate the variation in the organization of production evident in this single geographic area. The contributors use diverse research methods in their studies of vessel form and decoration. All support the conclusion that the specialized production of ceramics for exchange beyond the household was widespread. The first seven chapters focus on ceramic production in specific regions, followed by three essays that re-examine basic concepts and offer new perspectives. Because previous studies of southwestern ceramics have focused more on distribution than production, Ceramic Production in the American Southwest fills a long-felt need for scholars in that region and offers a broad-based perspective unique in the literature. The Southwest lacked high levels of sociopolitical complexity and economic differentiation, making this volume of special interest to scholars working in similar contexts and to those interested in craft production.
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