Private Lives, Public Histories brings together diverse methods from archaeology and cultural anthropology, enabling us to glean rare information on private lives from the historical record. The chapters span geographic areas to present recent ethnohistorical research that advances our knowledge of the connections between the public and private domains and the significance of these connections for understanding the past as a lived experience, both historically and in a contemporary sense. We discuss how the use of different sources-e.g., public records, personal journals, material culture, the built environment, letters, public performances, etc.-can reveal different types of information about past cultural contexts, as well as private sentiments about official culture and society. Through an exploration of sites as varied as homes, factories, plantations, markets, and tourism attractions we address the public significance of private sentiments, the resilience of bodies, and gendered interactions in historical contexts. In doing so, this book highlights linkages between private lives and public settings that have allowed people to continue to exist within, adapt to, and/or resist dominant cultural narratives.

Private Lives, Public Histories brings together diverse methods from archaeology and cultural anthropology, enabling us to glean rare information on private lives from the historical record. The chapters span geographic areas to present recent ethnohistorical research that advances our knowledge of the connections between the public and private domains and the significance of these connections for understanding the past as a lived experience, both historically and in a contemporary sense. We discuss how the use of different sources-e.g., public records, personal journals, material culture, the built environment, letters, public performances, etc.-can reveal different types of information about past cultural contexts, as well as private sentiments about official culture and society. Through an exploration of sites as varied as homes, factories, plantations, markets, and tourism attractions we address the public significance of private sentiments, the resilience of bodies, and gendered interactions in historical contexts. In doing so, this book highlights linkages between private lives and public settings that have allowed people to continue to exist within, adapt to, and/or resist dominant cultural narratives.

Tobacco, Pipes, and Race in Colonial Virginia investigates the economic and social power that surrounded the production and use of tobacco pipes in colonial Virginia and the difficulty of correlating objects with cultural identities. A common artifact in colonial period sites, previous publications on this subject have focused on the decorations on the pipes or which ethnic group produced and used the pipes, "European," "African," or "Indian." This book weaves together new interpretations, analytical techniques, classification schemes, historical background, and archaeological methods and theory. Special attention is paid to the subfield of African diaspora research to display the complexities of understanding this class of material culture. This fascinating study is accessible to the undergraduate reader, as well as to graduate students and scholars.

This volume focuses on the anthropological concept of trade as a fundamentally social activity concerned not only with the movement of goods, but also on the social context and consequences of that exchange. The distinguished contributors discuss trade on a range of scales--from a solitary confinement cell to trans-oceanic networks--in settings around the world and over the past 3000 years. They address themes such as exchange as a communicative act, the ways in which exchange transforms the relationship between people and things, the significance of agency and power in contexts of trade, and how sites of consumption and discard speak to processes of exchange. The volume merges traditional archaeological concerns about trade and exchange with more contemporary issues of agency, identity and social meaning.

This volume focuses on the anthropological concept of trade as a fundamentally social activity concerned not only with the movement of goods, but also on the social context and consequences of that exchange. The distinguished contributors discuss trade on a range of scales-from a solitary confinement cell to trans-oceanic networks-in settings around the world and over the past 3000 years. They address themes such as exchange as a communicative act, the ways in which exchange transforms the relationship between people and things, the significance of agency and power in contexts of trade, and how sites of consumption and discard speak to processes of exchange. The volume merges traditional archaeological concerns about trade and exchange with more contemporary issues of agency, identity and social meaning.

Tobacco, Pipes, and Race in Colonial Virginia investigates the economic and social power that surrounded the production and use of tobacco pipes in colonial Virginia and the difficulty of correlating objects with cultural identities. A common artifact in colonial period sites, previous publications on this subject have focused on the decorations on the pipes or which ethnic group produced and used the pipes, "European," "African," or "Indian." This book weaves together new interpretations, analytical techniques, classification schemes, historical background, and archaeological methods and theory. Special attention is paid to the subfield of African diaspora research to display the complexities of understanding this class of material culture. This fascinating study is accessible to the undergraduate reader, as well as to graduate students and scholars.