A new materialist archaeology of antimarkets, power and capitalist effects in colonial Guatemala
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- This dissertation develops an approach to the archaeology of capitalism within Spanish colonial contexts in Guatemala through the archaeology of San Pedro Aguacatepeque, a multicomponent Kaqchikel Maya community occupied from at least 900-1800 AD. I draw on new materialist and postcolonial theories to craft an archaeology of colonial capitalism that challenges classical trait-based definitions of capitalism which have proven insufficient in studying the Guatemalan colonial context. Working from Braudel and DeLanda's conception of capitalism as a system of "antimarkets", defined as power-manipulated markets, rather than the "free" markets of neoliberal models of capitalism, I attempt to move beyond the baggage-laden and uniquely 19th and 20th century definitions of capitalism that downplay how unequal power affords and sustains the practices and institutions iconic of capitalism. I do so by reorienting analyses toward the unequal power dynamics that undergird the changes in economic engagements and daily practice routinely attributed to the disembodied, abstract influence of Capitalism rather than the human actors and material configurations that catalyze these changes to the benefit of some and the detriment of others. Ceramic and lithic elemental characterization and provenance analysis, documentary research, and palynological analysis provide the bulk of data used to track changes in production and consumption at Aguacatepeque. From this data, I draw out the specific genealogy of the development and reconfiguration of production and consumption practices (namely, increasing market dependence and specialization of production), the antimarkets that afforded and sustained them, and their subsequent effects on practice and experience at Aguacatepeque. In short, this dissertation lays a groundwork for moving beyond static, global north biased models of capitalism and its effects, towards identifying the "actual details of economic history" that better explain the character and direction of change in Spanish colonial Maya economic practices.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic; electronic resource; remote |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Publication date | 2014 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Associated with | Pezzarossi, Guido |
|---|---|
| Associated with | Stanford University, Department of Anthropology. |
| Primary advisor | Voss, Barbara L, 1967- |
| Thesis advisor | Voss, Barbara L, 1967- |
| Thesis advisor | Hodder, Ian |
| Thesis advisor | Joyce, Rosemary A, 1956- |
| Thesis advisor | Wilcox, Michael V. (Michael Vincent), 1967- |
| Advisor | Hodder, Ian |
| Advisor | Joyce, Rosemary A, 1956- |
| Advisor | Wilcox, Michael V. (Michael Vincent), 1967- |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Guido Pezzarossi. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Department of Anthropology. |
| Thesis | Thesis (Ph.D.)--Stanford University, 2014. |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2014 by Guido Pezzarossi
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