CHAPTER 3

Of Pots and People: AND SOCIAL

TIWANAKU STATE CERAMIC STYLE

IDENTITY IN THE

JOHN WAYNE JANUSEK

INTRODUCTION

Understanding the emergence and consolidation of past states requires that we address social identity. Most archaeologists skirt the problem because of the difficul­ties involved in relating identity to material culture, or of observing identity in the dirt. Ceramics,inmanysocieties some of the most expressive material remains, are also ~e ~ost .anathematized of artifacts used to approach past ldentlty, m part a response to early idealistic attempts to relate ceramic style with residential and kinship patterns (Hill 1970; Longacre 1964). The abundant critiques are well founded and we are armed with a wealth of cau­tionary tales (e.g., DietIer and Herbich 1998; Hodder 1982), but we now face an aversion to addressing mate­rial culture as an expression of social identity at all The conceptual bath water needs reconsidering, but we have prematurely discarded some of the most important potential expressions of human activity.

I examine material expressions of group identity and their role in the prehispanic state of Tiwanalrn (AD 500-1150), a polity centered in the southern Lake

34

Titicaca basin of contemporary Bolivia (Albarracin­Jordan 1992, 1996;Alconini 1995; Be:rmann 1990,1994; Janusek 1994; Kolata 1991, 1993; Manzanilla 1992· Mathews 1992; Rivera 1994; Stanish 1994). I argu~ that certain classes of ceramic vessels in the ancient Lake TIticaca basin, through both their crafting and use, became involved in the expression and negotiation of status and social identity. "What we require in order to "see" identity in the past is a cautious, multidimen­sional approach to the relation between human action and material culture. I compare excavated residential compounds in the urban centers of Tiwanaku and Luknrmata. I examine patterns of conformity and dif­ferentiation in ceramic style in relation to other aspects of residential life, indludlng spatial organization, craft production, diet, and burial patterns. A conjunction of material patterns, representing multiple dimensions of practical consciousness and social activity, point to the central place ofidentityin the organization and day-to­day formulation and reproduction ofTiwanaku society. Ceramic vessels were significant vehicles not only for