Degree(s) Details
My doctoral work focused on archaeological and contemporary socio-cultural uses of malacological assemblages at the Forte and Ibama sites in the Baia de Caxiuanã, Pará, Brazil.The primary occupation at the Forte site, dated to about 2,000 years before present (BP) was characterized by Late Formative Period ceramics generally associated with Incised Rim Tradition people (sometimes linked to Arawak speaking groups), and is unusual in also containing several dense deposits of freshwater shell, deposits that are typically not associated with the Incised Rim Tradition. The Late Formative is defined across Amazonia by a shift from a reliance on foraged resources, (house-garden) horticulture and arboriculture, and semi-mobile settlements, to more intensive cultivation of root crops, particularly manioc, and a contemporaneous increase in sedentism.
My work focused on food habits and associated technologies, explored within a culinary landscape or taskscape, the Gastroscape. I focused on the diverse use of freshwater mollusks by the people who occupied the Forte site. This research employs mixed methods, including site contextualization, zooarchaeological (archaeomalacology), and ceramic techno-functional analysis of the archaeological assemblages. These were combined with experimental methods including study of modern bivalves, recording impacts on shell of various cooking methods, and using shells as tools and ceramic temper. I also integrated contemporary knowledge of local bivalve communities and other food resources through participatory methods and ethnographic research. These combined analyses are used to evaluate Formative activities at the Forte site and local variation in the Baia de Caxiuanã region through time and space.
My goal was to consider the ‘something more’ of shells as including functions beyond food-processing, (i.e., tempering ceramics), and broader roles as contributors to changing landscapes through the primary deposition of shell remains and secondary use deposition. This provides an important new set of data for Amazonian studies.
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