Social networks and the spread of Lapita

2008/09/01 by Robin Torrence, Pamela Swadling · 5 citations
Social Sciences · Earth and Planetary Sciences · #Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies #Archaeology and ancient environmental studies #Historical and Cultural Archaeology Studies

paper · doi:10.1017/s0003598x00097258

Abstract

Lapita pottery seems to arrive in the Pacific out of the blue, and signal a new social, economic or ideological network. The authors show that widespread interaction, articulated by obsidian tools and stone mortars and pestles decorated with various motifs, was already in existence in New Guinea and New Britain. These earlier networks provide a preview of the social interaction that was to light up with the advent of Lapita.

Cited by

• Archaeology and the Austronesian expansion: where are we now?
• AN ASSESSMENT OF THE CURRENT APPLICATIONS AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS OF OBSIDIAN SOURCING STUDIES IN ARCHAEOLOGICAL RESEARCH*
• Social networks, language, and material culture on New Guinea
• Resolving the ancestry of Austronesian-speaking populations. [europepmc]
• Leveraging known Pacific colonisation times to test models for the ancestry of Southeast Asians. [europepmc]

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