Showing papers on "Culture change published in 1981"

Cultural-Ecological Aspects of the Pithouse To Pueblo Transition in a Portion of the Southwest

Abstract: Southwestern archaeologists have traditionally devoted much attention to inventory and description of material culture change between the Pithouse and Pueblo periods. Unfortunately, our understanding of the ecological, demographic, and organizational aspects of the Pithouse-to-Pueblo transition is much less advanced. The present study attempts to remedy this deficiency for at least one portion of the Southwest, relying largely on survey data from the Mogollon culture area of extreme western Texas. Three major aspects of Pithouse-to-Pueblo change are considered. These are demographic change, subsistence pattern change, and social-organizational change. Basically, the transition is seen as a fundamental adaptive reorientation in which a small-scale, extensive, generalized adaption is replaced by one which was larger in scale, more intensive, and more specialized in focus than ever before. Factors motivating this transition are considered, and the supra-local applicability of the resulting model is discussed. DURING THE FIRST MILLENNIUM A.D. settlement in much of the southwestern United States consisted of relatively small villages of semisubterranean structures termed "pithouses." Beginning around the end of the millennium, however, there occurred a transition from pithouse villages to communities composed of the blocks of contiguou ms which we know as pueblos. This transition was certainly one of the major events of Southwestern culture history, although it is presently poorly understood at both local and regional levels. Traditional Southwestern archaeological studies have been directed largely at inventory and description of stylistic and material culture development from Pithouse to Pueblo times. A few current studies (e.g., Martin and Plog 1973) have begun to consider Pithouse-to-Pueblo change in terms of ecological relations and reorientation of adaptive strategies. Nevertheless, we still understand all too little of the environmental, demographic, and organizational aspects of the transition between what appear to have been two very different ways of life. This deficiency is a significant one, in that it is only through ecological and organizational data that we can hope to approach explanation of the Pithouse-to-Pueblo transition. It is impossible, in other words, to explain the transition without reference to the fundamental modes of operation of the societies involved. Before proceeding to the data bearing on this question, it remains to specify the perspective on cultural stability and change within which the present analysis is carried out. This study contends that cultural change of the sort exemplified by the Pithouse-to-Pueblo transition is neither automatic nor random. Rather, cultural systems change when they must in order to maintain homeostasis, which has been defined as "a set of goal ranges on corresponding sets of variables which are necessary or favorable operating conditions of the system in question" (Rappaport 1971b:24). The receptivity of cultural systems to change should thus be seen as inversely proportional to achieved stability within their physical and social environmental fields. In other words, the simple availability of alternate modes of operation need not lead to systemic change. Cultures do change, however, largely because they are open, adaptive systems. Cultures are open in the sense that they exchange matter, energy, and information with their physical and

The Cemetery and Culture Change: Archaeological Focus and Ethnographic Perspective

Abstract: Publisher Summary This chapter provides an overview of the cemetery and culture change A cemetery reflects the local, historical flow of attitudes about community It is, after all, a community of the dead, created, maintained, and preserved by the community of the living The community cemetery offers some distinctive strategic concerns for the ethnographic observer Death is rarely taken lightly, but however it is taken, it happens to everyone Because it is a universal passage, its associated rituals and materials are likely to be conservatively employed while remaining sensitive to long-range shifts in community value emphases It is not the dead individual but the living community that determines and maintains the cultural frame within which mortuary practices and perceptions occur It is ethnographically useful to see the cemetery not only as a historical record but as a current status report, and it is advantageous to conjoin both views to develop syntheses about community-in-process

Culture Change in an Amish Community

Abstract: Since 1934, the Amish-Mennoite community of Plain City, Ohio has shifted its religious affiliation from the Old Order Amish Church to several more liberal Mennoite denominations. Research conducted in this community in 1977 indicates that this change in religious affiliation has resulted in major changes in other aspects of culture, including language, family patterns, occupations, and education. The results of this study suggest that the Mennonite churches may serve to facilitate the movement of Amish individuals into mainstream American culture.