Labor and the Rise of the Tiwanaku State (AD 500-1100): A Bioarchaeological Study of Activity Patterns

Labor and the Rise of the Tiwanaku State (AD 500-1100): A Bioarchaeological Study of Activity Patterns Public Deposited

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Becker, Sara K.
- Affiliation: College of Arts and Sciences, Department of Anthropology

Abstract

This dissertation focused on understanding labor during the development of Tiwanaku (AD 500-1100), one of the earliest Andean states. Prior archaeological research (Kolata 1991, 1993a, b; Stanish 1994, 2003) argued that Tiwanaku labor was centralized under a corvée mit'a system. Labor was controlled and distributed by elites living within the city of Tiwanaku under a hierarchical political organization (Kolata 2003a). Other research (e.g. Albarracín-Jordán 2003; Erickson 2006) argued that local and decentralized control of labor, with workforce cooperation and collaboration under a heterarchical political system, was an important factor to the state's emergence, formation, and expansion. The author interpreted bioarchaeological research on Tiwanaku skeletal remains in order to answer questions about the Tiwanaku workforce, possible agriculture or craft-based activities performed, workload levels, gendered division of labor, as well as the political structure of the state. Skeletal samp

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