INTRODUCTION

Mortuary remains have long served to define archaeological culture groups, providing both the materials for delineating discrete assemblages and the evidence of unique, culturally bounded manners of treating the dead. Graves also provide evidence of trade and exchange, such that materials are seen to reflect the exchange of ideas and the seeds of social change.

Stanish (1992: 29-30, 2005; Aldenderfer and Stanish 1993), however, has taken issue with the use of grave goods for the study of ethnic affiliation. To trace colonies of core communities in far-flung regions, it is best, he feels, to work with domestic contexts that are not characterized by such high variability in stylistic expression, and objects of high ritual and symbolic value. A true ethnic colony will be expressed in the more mundane world of the household. It follows, of course, that graves are thus not ideal places to look at evidence of interaction as they typically contain higher proportions of high-status goods, including mobile pieces such as exotic non-local ceramics (see Sutter 2005 and Stovel 1997 for complementary discussions). Thus using exclusively mortuary remains would lead one to exaggerate non-local interaction and the impact of foreign communities.

Clearly a broad-based approach to material production and consumption is necessary for any well-grounded archaeological proposition. But should graves be discarded from consideration of identity and interaction as Stanish states? Is it the context that creates the conditions for exaggerating the significance of a non-local component or is it the expectation that non-local objects carry the value of distance and difference? Might it be that because we (the archaeologists) are looking at a grave, we exaggerate the exotic importance of the non-local goods we find there?

Handbook of South American Archaeology, edited by Helaine Silverman and William H. Isbell.

Springer, New York, 2008

The following case study demonstrates the possibility that non-local ceramics can express membership in a regional cultural field by representing mundane relationships between community members. It is specifically in the context of the tomb that such relationships might be captured by those engaged in the burial rite. This argument is grounded in the persistent, low-level, and long-term inclusion of non-local vessels from the same regional communities into the graves of prehistoric inhabitants of San Pedro de Atacama, northern Chile (Figure 49.1). It is also grounded in the persistence of discrete, identifiable ceramic traditions from these interconnected communities over 1,500 years of regional integration despite much shared material culture. Although some of these vessels undoubtedly

Reflect prestige economies manipulated by local elites—and there are interesting changes in interaction patterns throughout San Pedro prehistory—the regular reoccurrence of often single, potentially emblematic pots brings us to question their exotic value.

This paper addresses these issues through use of the concept of the social field (discussed below) in an attempt to put forth a more complex social model for the unique cultural landscape of prehistoric interaction in San Pedro de Atacama.