This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).
With National Science Foundation support, Dr. Suzanne Eckert will investigate pottery and stone tool production during the Polynesian Plain Ware Period on Tutuila Island, American Samoa. Although ethnographic Polynesia is one of the model societies for which the development of chiefdoms in other parts of the world is compared, and craft production is recognized as an important aspect of such development, very little is known about the specifics of production in ancestral Polynesian society. Were early Polynesians making items in their own homes for their own uses? Were talented craftspeople producing more difficult-to-make items for use by their community? Were specialists making highly sought after items specifically for chiefs to use? Answers to these questions will help unravel the complexities of how craft production articulated with political organization as well as create an avenue through which models for production organization in chiefdom-level societies throughout time and space can be evaluated and refined archaeologically.
Answering the above questions requires an understanding of how and where artifacts were produced. Attribute analyses focused on form, function, and style will provide insights into the technology of pottery and stone tool production on Tutuila, nd provide insight into the skill level of individual artisans, as well as the relative number and concentration of producers. Data informing on where artifacts were produced requires more technical studies. Specifically, Laser Ablation Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) will be used to determine which clays on island were used to produce pottery, while Energy Dispersive X-ray Fluorescence (EDXRF) will be used to determine which basalt quarries were used for stone tool production during this period. Through the use of exploratory data analyses, the collected LA-ICP-MS and EDXRF data will be used to group ceramic and lithic samples, respectively, into chemical compositional groupings. These groupings, when matched to geological sources, will represent evidence of production within a specific area or village.
Once completed, this study will have broader impacts in at least five realms. First, as the first study specifically designed to explore the organization of both pottery and stone-tool production during this period in Samoa, this study will add substantially to the growing body of knowledge on the development of ancestral Polynesian craft production. Second, by providing data comparable to studies performed on other islands, this study will allow for a discussion of production organization in Samoa in perspective with production organization in other areas of the South Pacific. Third, this study will augment understanding of the roles that production and played in the development and maintenance of chiefdoms. Fourth, Samoan and U.S. students will participate in this project to enhance their training and increase their knowledge of Polynesian prehistory. Fifth, during this research the people of Samoa will be informed of the ongoing research in order to promote archaeological awareness. In recent years, some Samoans have challenged the value of historic preservation; in response, this research will help to provide a positive framework for Samoan views of archaeology and historic preservation.
