North American Archaeologist

Eighty-one whole and partial vessels recovered from domestic structures and burial contexts at two Barnett phase sites in northwestern Georgia have been analyzed for evidence of surface alteration resulting from use. Three types of use alteration found on these vessels—sooting, oxidation discoloration and interior surface pitting—are described, and the processes by which they were produced are identified. The associations that exist between types of surface alteration and the morphological vessel types characteristic of the Barnett phase vessel assemblage are described and interpreted. Because these types of surface alteration are the result of actual vessel usage, they are a source of reliable evidence for identifying the function of individual vessels and of morphological vessel types.

Soils studies generated during recent archaeological investigations at the Abbott Farm Site Complex in New Jersey have partially resolved many of the stratigraphic problems and inconsistencies inherent in the earlier landmark work of Dorothy Cross, especially as concerns her excavations on the Abbott Farm “bluff.” The interaction of wind blown sediments with on-site erosion and redeposition of soils are viewed as the natural processes affecting site burial and the integrity of the cultural deposits on the high Delaware River terrace bluff. The burial of multiple “humuses” at Cross' Excavation 14 in the lowlands and the implications of burial processes for the archaeological remains are also reevaluated. The general applicability of these studies to other Eastern North American archaeological sites is discussed.

A general model of stockraising settlement systems on the High Plains is presented. Major characteristics of cattle and sheep ranching as these activities have been practiced for the past century are discussed. The presentation of this model is necessary because a large body of archaeological information is currently being collected on the remains of stockraising activities which needs an interpretive framework. This model is designed to serve this purpose.

It is argued that much of American archaeological research proceeds in the ignorance of a fundamental paradox which continues to befuddle the rest of anthropology. If historical archaeology reinvents itself as the processual interpretation of emerging capitalist society, then it becomes less difficult to differentiate the practical reason of the modern West from premodern cultural orders. Henry Glassie and James Deetz have begun to renovate the discipline through a structuralist theory of meaning yet they have mischaracterized the history of early modern America. Data associated with a variety of historical episodes and institutions demonstrate that one characteristic of modern ideology — individualism — did not begin to emerge until well after the American Revolution. This process of cultural separations was reflected in both texts and artifacts, was enacted in everyday life, and seemed to represent new social and economic orders. While the analysis is preliminary, it does reveal that historical archaeology can be transformed through an alliance with Neo-Marxist thought.