Charles C. Kolb, Honorary Associate Editor for Archaeological Ceramic
Ceramic Ecology XXXV: Unsettling Landscapes
AAA Annual Meeting, Seattle, WA (November 12, 2022)
Organizer: Sandra L. López Varela, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México Chair: Kostalena Michelaki, Arizona State University
Discussant: Charles C. Kolb, National Endowment for the Humanities, USA (Retired)
Session Abstract: For 34 years, the Ceramic Ecology session at the American Anthropological
Association has provided an open and supportive venue to present current research and insights
on all aspects of ceramic studies: production, consumption, trade, and their economic, political,
social, aesthetic, cosmological, and phenomenological implications. ‘Unsettling Landscapes’ is
this year’s AAA theme, giving us a unique opportunity to push the boundaries of our research
covering many aspects of ceramic studies. It is an opportunity to reflect on our responsibility in
reckoning with disciplinary histories, harms, and possibilities; think about to whom are we
giving evidence, toward what ends, and for whom are we writing. In this session, participants
will approach these questions and present new data on archaeological ceramics, methodological
applications, and insights into the struggles of pottery communities in today’s world.
Paper Abstracts
Mobilities of potters and pot painters in the ancient Mediterranean: the test cases of
Athens and Southern Italy
Eleni Hasaki* and Marco Serino**
*University of Arizona
*University of Turin, Italy
This paper will cover the mobility of potters and pot painters throughout the Greek world
between 600-300 BCE. It will approach the migration of artisans from the eastern Mediterranean
to Athens in the 6th century BCE and into neighboring cities of Corinth and Boeotia, and from
Athens to western cities in southern Italy, in the 5th and 4th centuries BCE. The 6th century BCE
mobility phase was part of a coordinated incentivizing campaign to recruit foreign artisans from
eastern regions and bring them into Athens to expedite its government's cultural and political
dominance. Triggered by Perikles’ ambitious program, the 5th century BCE mobility from
Athens to western cities in southern Italy was accelerated by a prolonged civil war and a
pandemic. Here, we examine how these different mobility models influenced potters and pot
painters, as they adjusted to local ceramic ecologies for shape and slips and how pot-painters had
to modify their iconographical repertoire and their application on local shapes to understand
better serve the regional market requests. We critically approach previous mobility models by
suggesting a model of local adaptations of imported ceramics produced by local work crews.
Finally, we revisit the ceramics terminology (e.g., Corinthianizing or Atticizing) to capture and
explain the similarities between products made at different places.
Ceramic Evidence of the Development of El Pilar as a Major Center in the Late Preclassic
Anabel Ford*, Andrew Kinkella*, Sherman W. Horn III, Andrew Kinkella**, and Paulino
Morales***
*MesoAmerican Research Center, University of California Santa Barbara
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