Technology and Material Life PDF

Technology and Material Life
Oxford Handbooks Online
Technology and Material Life*

Kacy L. Hollenback and Michael Brian Schiffer
The Oxford Handbook of Material Culture Studies
Edited by Mary C. Beaudry and Dan Hicks
Print Publication Date: Sep 2010 Subject: Archaeology, History and Theory of Archaeology
Online Publication Date: Sep DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199218714.013.0013
2012
Abstract and Keywords
Humans live in a world of things. They are surrounded by artefacts. Referred to as the social shaping of
technology, this has been an interesting area of research in the recent past. The focus of this article is on the
material life of human beings, and the place of technology within it. The authors approach this topic from the
discipline of archaeology, specifically behavioural archaeology, but also draw on research in other fields. This
article, expands this framework to include the life histories of technologies and associated material practices. This
article further contextualizes contemporary technology studies, primarily in archaeology, and considers how
theoretical concepts from behavioural archaeology and social constructivist studies of technology might be
combined. Archaeological studies of technology are explained in details in the following section with special
emphasis on performance characteristics. This article also explains the life history of technology which helps us
conceptualize material practices in relation to objects and technologies.
Keywords: technology, material life, behavioral archaeology, material practices, social constructivist
Introduction
Humans live in a world of things. From hairpins to computers and cars, we surround ourselves with artefacts. What
distinguishes humans from other animals is not that we make and use tools. Rather, it is our total reliance on these
objects (Schiffer and Miller 1999), for our lives are shaped by, and in return shape, technologies (Bijker 1995;
Chilton 1999). This social shaping of technology and the technical shaping of society (Bijker 1995: 3) has been an
increasing focus of research in many disciplines in the past two decades. In archaeology, however, the study of
things has been at the heart of the discipline since its inception in the late nineteenth century.
(p. 314) The focus of this chapter is on the material life of human beings, and the place of technology within it.
We approach this topic from the discipline of archaeology, specifically behavioural archaeology (see Schiffer
2008a), but also draw on research in other fields. Behavioural archaeology strives to understand people
technology interactions at every scale, from individuals to nation states. One of its most important conceptual tools
is the life history framework, which aids in structuring research questions and in developing methods for studying
material culture. In this chapter, we expand this framework to include the life histories of technologies and
associated material practices (but more on this below).
The past 30 years have witnessed debate over what technology is, what role it plays in cultural change, and how
technology should be studied. At the outset, we must consider definitions of the terms technology and material
life. Technology has been an integral part of human life for millennia. It can be defined as the things that humans
create. This definition encompasses varied phenomena, from individual artefacts to complex technological
systems, but has limitations. An alternative definition, which recognizes three dimensions of technology, has been
proposed by sociologists (MacKenzie and Wajcman 1985: 34; Bijker et al. 1987: 4) and archaeologists (Schiffer
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and Skibo 1987: 595). In this formulation, technology comprises: (1) physical objects or artefacts; (2) activities or
processes; and (3) what people know as well as what they can do. By recognizing technology as artefact,
technology as practice or process, and technology as knowledge, we gain greater insight into the diversity of
technology studies. Material culture studies in archaeology and sociocultural anthropology tend to focus on only
one or two of these dimensions. Different definitions of technology may be appropriate for different research
projects. However, using a term with many meanings can lead to confusion and unnecessary debate if researchers
do not appreciate that studies of technology can have different foci and goals, depending on the dimension
stressed (Killick 2004; Kuhn 2004; Schiffer 2004).
In our view, the concept of material life is redundant since it is impossible to imagine a human life that is
immaterial. Human interactions, human belief systems, and human cultures require intimate ties to things. Culture is
not something that is possessed; rather it is participated in and continuously created (Christensen 1995; Chilton
1999: 1) Artefacts are not just tools for survival; rather, artefact manufacture, use, discard, and reuse are
constitutive processes that make culture (Chilton 1999: 1). Sociocultural anthropologist Merete Christensen
(1995), for example, argues that potters' and other artisans' creative reshaping of their physical surroundings
through the production and use of material culture is an essential activity in traditional societies. The same
processes occur in modern societies, as people structure and arrange their homes and workspaces, filled with the
artefacts of everyday activities. Such activities provide contexts for social interaction, the development and
transfer of knowledge, as well as produce (p. 315) goods needed for both physical and cultural survival. What
makes human life a material life is our total reliance on artefacts.
In this chapter, we contextualize contemporary technology studies, primarily in archaeology, and consider how
theoretical concepts from behavioural archaeology and social constructivist studies of technology might be
combined. To illustrate the utility of this combined approach we provide two case studies. The first examines the
electric car in the United States during the early twentieth century; the second explores the role of ceramic
technology in MandanHidatsa society (in presentday North Dakota) before and after smallpox epidemics in the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Archaeological Studies of Technology
Multiple theoretical approaches to the study of technology have developed during the past century. In the field of
archaeology, the myriad theoretical approaches have different origins, development, and foci (e.g. Killick 2004;
Kuhn 2004; Schiffer 2004).
In the late nineteenth century, material culture studies played a central role in anthropology (Conkey 1989: 14). At
the time, the discipline was based mainly in museums. The divisions between ethnology and archaeology were not
sharp, and there was overlap between the subfields. Scholars in British and American museums, such as the
Smithsonian Institution, worked freely across disciplinary boundaries, as they were later developed, by collecting
materials and recording production processes from both contemporary and past societies. In the United States, one
of the first syntheses of these materials, The Origins of Invention: a study of industry among primitive peoples,
was written by ethnologist and Smithsonian curator Otis T. Mason (1895). Most nineteenthcentury Smithsonian
scholars studied both archaeological and ethnographic material culture (Cushing 1886; Fewkes 1891, 1892, 1985
[1903]). Scholars such as John Wesley Powell, the first director of the Bureau of American Ethnology (BAE),
collected artefacts copiously, especially among the pueblos of the southwestern United States (Powell 1895;
Fowler and Fowler 1971). Although many of these early collections obtained for exhibitions or as salvage
ethnography were little studied, later researchers and contemporary scholars make extensive use of these unique
resources. In England and in continental Europe, early ethnographers were engaged in similar collecting and
reporting activities (see Lucas this volume, Chapter 9).
In the early twentieth century, the strength of anthropology rested in its focus on material culture, social
organization, and physical anthropology (Pfaffenberger 1992: 491). Indeed, part of the legacy of anthropologist
Franz Boas (18581942) in North America was to institutionalize a holistic approach to the study of humankind, built
around the concept of culture, which included material culture (Trigger 1989; Willey and Sabloff 1993). Some of the
discipline's most prominent Boasians, many of themlike Boas himselflong based in museums, published
monographs during the intensive era of salvage ethnography in the first decades of the twentieth century (Wissler
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1910; Lowie 1922; Linton 1923; Boas 1927; Goldenweiser 1931). Ethnographers at this time not only studied living
groups, but also documented the suites of technology that these peoples made and used. At the time,
archaeologists made strong contributions to anthropology by recording and describing material remains from past
human societies, which furnished direct evidence on ancient technologies (Thompson and Parezo 1989). Early
efforts in archaeology and cultural anthropology yielded detailed descriptions of artefacts and the techniques
employed to create them. The goal of these studies was to identify, characterize, and classify cultures. These
endeavours, however, were mainly descriptive.
In the 1940s and 1950s a rift began to form between the subdisciplines in North American anthropology, and
included debates over the importance of material culture in human life (Bidney 1944; Hutton 1944). At the core of
the debate was disagreement over what culture is, and whether or not technology is a part of culture (Amsbury
and Ehrich 1964). Leslie White (1949: 16), for example, included technology in culture as an extrasomatic or
suprabiological adaptation. Most sociocultural anthropologists, however, came to see culture as superorganic.
In Kroeber's use of the term, culture is composed of ideas, beliefs, and customs (Kroeber 1917; see also Bidney
1944). Not surprisingly, archaeologists saw material culture as an integral part of culture and what it is to be human
(Watson 1995). Unfortunately, the former position, which served to deny the materiality of human life, became
dominant in sociocultural anthropology during the twentieth century, which marginalized studies of material culture
and technology. In archaeology, studies of material culture were about to take some interesting turns.
It has been argued that the birth of processual archaeology, also known as New Archaeology, in the 1960s
further marginalized the study of material culture (Conkey 1989: 17; Stark 1998a: 34). New archaeologists saw
archaeology as ethnography of the past (Binford 1962; Longacre 1964; Watson 2007). Employing a systems
perspective, which treated society as a set of interdependent subsystems linked by flows of matter, energy, and
information, processual archaeologists assumed that patterns inarchaeological data are coded information
about variability in past cultural systems (Conkey 1989: 17; see Binford 1965; Clarke 1968). Thus, artefacts were
studied for what they could tell us about activities and organizations of past cultural systems. The goal of
archaeology and anthropology was to infer social phenomena, not to understand the complex relationships
between humans and material culture.
(p. 317) In the 1970s, there was growing dissatisfaction with some of the basic tenets of the New Archaeology,
which led to a proliferation of alternative theoretical and methodological approaches. These included behavioural
archaeology (Reid et al. 1975; Schiffer 1976), neoDarwinian or evolutionary archaeology (Dunnell 1978, 1980,
1982), and postprocessual archaeology (Leone 1977; Hodder 1982c, 1984, 1985; Shanks and Tilley 1987b;
Preucel 2006: 122146), all of which prioritized the study of material culture. These theoretical trends were
paralleled by the growing interest in longterm ethnoarchaeology (Longacre and Skibo 1994; David and Kramer
2001) and in experimental archaeology (Schiffer et al. 1994b)research strategies that also emphasized the study
of technology.
The 1970s also witnessed the development of sciencetechnologysociety studies (STS), which sought new
socialscientific approaches to exploring issues and problems relating to modern technology (Bijker 1995: 411).
Emerging especially from the sociology of science and the history of technology, this approach seeks to
understand the relationships between technology and society and to engage issues of sociotechnical change
(Bijker 1995: 6). STS was highly influential in advocating constructivist studies of technology, which originally
combined historical and sociological perspectives (Latour and Woolgar 1979; Bijker 1995: 67). Today the social
construction of technology (SCOT) approach is applied in a number of disciplines, including archaeology (e.g.
Killick 2004).
In the late 1970s and 1980s, the rift between archaeology and sociocultural anthropology began to mend, when a
modest interest in material culture reappeared in the latter (Spier 1970; Oswalt 1976; Stott and Reynolds 1987;
Conkey 1989; Pfaffenberger 1992). Unlike the detailed descriptions of the early twentieth century, this new
research engaged technology as a subject worthy of study in its own right. Two books are often taken to mark this
reemergence: The World of Goods (Douglas and Isherwood 1979) and The Social Life of Things (Appadurai
1986a). This trend continues today with publications such as the Journal of Material Culture.
One reason for the renewed interest in material culture studies was participation in sociocultural anthropology by
archaeologists. Daniel Miller, who trained as an archaeologist at Cambridge under Raymond Allchin, is the most
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prolific and influential sociocultural anthropologist studying material culture today. His focus on the material world
seems to have come about after his ethnoarchaeological fieldwork in India (Miller 1985). During the late 1980s and
1990s, Miller (1987, 1994, 1998c, 2001b, 2001d) developed ethnographic and theoretical studies of material
culture that were focused on consumption processeshow material culture is acquired and usedin the modern
world. This work built upon Miller's early training in archaeology, where consumption, along with production, is one
of the technological processes that stands out most clearly in the archaeological record. In the United States, some
archaeologists were drawn to the study of material culture in sociocultural anthropology as well. For example,
Richard Wilk was trained in Mayan archaeology, behavioural archaeology, and cultural ecology at the University
(p. 318) of Arizona in the late 1970s and early 1980s. He has investigated both production and consumption, at
various organizational scales, in the field of economic anthropology (Wilk 1989, 2006). In any event, by the late
1980s, studies of technology had achieved legitimacy in both archaeology and cultural anthropology.
At present, the diversity of technology studies in archaeology and anthropology is dizzying (Schiffer 1992, 2001a,
2004; Lemonnier 1993; Lubar and Kingery 1993; Schiffer and Miller 1999; Killick 2004; S. Kuhn 2004; H. ML. Miller
2007). Each field generates its own methods and theoretical approaches for addressing the dynamic relationships
between human society and technology. We believe that archaeology contributes unique elements to this
discourse because of the long history of the discipline's engagement with the subject matter and its diachronic
perspective. In the rest of this chapter, we discuss perspectives from behavioural archaeology on the study of
technology in the hopes of building interdisciplinary bridges and provoking new dialogues.
Behavioural Archaeology and the Study of Technology
Behavioural archaeology draws together archaeology, material culture studies, and ethnology (Reid et al. 1975;
Schiffer 1976, 1995a: 124). Unlike previous conceptions of archaeology, behavioural archaeology seeks to
redefine the discipline as the study of the relationships between human behaviour and material culture (Reid et al.
1975; Schiffer 1976: 4; McGuire 1995: 165). In this view, human behaviour can be usefully understood as people
artefact interactions (Walker et al. 1995; Schiffer and Miller 1999). Thus, unlike the archaeology of preceding
decades, behavioural archaeology privileged material things, such as technology, in the study of human behaviour
(Schiffer and Miller 1999).
Behavioural archaeologists investigate interactions between people and artefacts in all times, in all places, and at
all scales (Rathje and Schiffer 1982; LaMotta and Schiffer 2001), highlighting the interrelationships between
technology and society. While technology is socially constructed, material culture is understood as the medium
through which humans interact with and view the world around them. Humans create and shape artefacts, engage
with objects, and in turn are shaped by these interactions. This notion is very similar to the contemporary concept
of materiality (DeMarrais et al. 2004; Meskell 2005b; Miller 2005a).
In the past, practitioners of behavioural archaeology have been criticized for adopting overly utilitarian, capitalist,
or Western interpretations of society. Nicholas David and Carol Kramer (2001: 141) have written that aspects of
the behavioural (p. 319) framework have set forth an unrealistic and ethnocentric image of artisan as engineer
handyman, and Oliver Gosselain (1998: 81) has suggested that behavioural archaeology tends to ignore the
cultural dimensions of technological behaviour and to rely on unicausal explanations of technological change.
Meanwhile, Randall McGuire (1995: 162) has asserted that behavioural archaeology has created a false opposition
between cognitive and materialist views of human society, which has resulted in a failure to explore the dialectical
relationship between consciousness or systems of meaning and the material conditions of life (McGuire 1995:
167).
In some instances, these criticisms ring true. A heavy reliance on experimental archaeology and case studies
drawn from the past 300 years of Western society has resulted in publications that may seem overly utilitarian or
Western. However, behavioural archaeology is not by necessity restricted to such studies, for the framework can
investigate systems of meaning as they relate to material culture as well as provide tools useful for studying
technology in any society. In the remainder of this chapter we offer insights into a few tools from the kit of
behavioural archaeology that we believe may be generally useful for studies of material culture.
In recent years, behavioural archaeologists have demonstrated the analytical utility of the life history framework as
well as a focus on peopleartefact interactions in activities. From studies of the material dimensions of landscapes
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(Whittlesey 1998, 2003; Zedeo 1997, 2000; Carroll et al. 2004; Heilen 2005) to explorations of the complex roles
of technology in ritual practice (Seymour and Schiffer 1987; Walker 1995a, 1995b, 1998; Walker et al. 2000),
behavioural archaeology has offered a framework for studying mechanical, political, social, and ritual meanings,
and roles of artefacts. For example, recent research in behavioural archaeology has attended to the ways in which
social power is mediated through material culture (Schiffer 2005b; Walker and Schiffer 2006), and examined
material choice and technological change in culture contact situations (Griffitts 2006; Margaris 2006).
There is a growing body of literature containing behavioural toolsgeneralizations and heuristicsfor studying
technology (Schiffer and Skibo 1987, 1997; LaMotta and Schiffer 2001; Schiffer 2001b, 2002, 2005a, 2008a,
2008b, 2008c; Schiffer et al. 2001; Skibo and Schiffer 2008). These varied tools can be used to study invention
and adoption processes, as well as technological change and transfer. Here we concentrate on three concepts:
performance characteristics, the life history approach, and behavioural chains.
Performance characteristics
Performance characteristics are the specific behavioural capabilities of objects that come into play in particular
interactions and activities (Schiffer and Skibo 1997; Schiffer and Miller 1999: 1620; Schiffer 2005b: 287). The
term, performance (p. 320) characteristic, was originally introduced to archaeology by D. Braun (1983), who
used it synonymously with the material properties of artefacts. For behavioural archaeologists, the concept
embodies much more than material or formal properties. The claim that behavioural archaeologists adopt overly
utilitarian interpretations of technology (e.g. Gosselain 1998: 79) fails to acknowledge the flexibility of the concept
of performance characteristic, and overlooks its applications to symbolic and even aesthetic performance.
Behavioural archaeologists are well aware that objects have varied and fluid political, ideological, and social
functions (Schiffer 1976: 4953, 1992; Rathje and Schiffer 1982). Indeed, performance characteristics make
possible the identification of specific utilitarian, social, and symbolic functions of technologies in specific
behavioural contexts. Performance characteristics can relate to mechanical, chemical, and electrical interactions,
or economic variables, such as the costs of acquiring, using, and maintaining a technology. Yet, we also
emphasize that performance characteristics are the basis of aesthetic and symbolic roles of objects (Mills 2007;
Schiffer 2005b; Schiffer and Miller 1999) and are useful for exploring the dialectical relationship between mental
and material realms of technology.
The life history approach
An artefact's life history is the sequence of interactions and activities that it goes through during its existence or
lifetime (LaMotta and Schiffer 2001: 21). For artefacts, this process begins with the procurement of raw materials,
goes through manufacture and use, and ends with deposition in the archaeological record. Life histories also
include practices of maintenance and reuse. The most general processes of an artefact's life history, often
modelled in a flow chart (e.g. Schiffer 1976), include procurement, manufacture, use, maintenance, reuse,
recycling, discard, and postdepositional formation processes (Schiffer 1972). An alternative theoretical approach
to objects' life histories in archaeology, which deals mainly with procurement, manufacture, and, more recently,
use, comes from the French school of techniques et culture or technologie culturelle, which has developed
especially from the work of Pierre Lemonnier (1986, 1993; see also David and Kramer 2001: 140; Stark 1998a). A
central concept in this approach is the chane opratoire (operational sequence), introduced by Andr Leroi
Gourhan, which represents a series of operations which brings a primary material from its natural state to a
fabricated state (Cresswell 1976: 6, cited by Lemonnier 1986: 181). While the idea of the chane opratoire has
been helpful in examining the interplay of natural constraints and technological choice in the design and
production of technology, the life history approach differs in its broader applicability and its inclusion of post
manufacture behaviours such as use, maintenance, reuse, and deposition, and in its concern with design and
learning frameworks.
(p. 321) Behavioural chains
The behavioural chain is a heuristic tool applicable to an individual artefact or kind of artefact (LaMotta and
Schiffer 2001: 2124; Schiffer 1995a: 5566). It describes the entire sequence of interactions and activities that
took place during the life history of an object or place, emphasizing types of interactions, social group, frequency,
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location, archaeological outputs, and conjoined elements or associated artefacts (LaMotta and Schiffer 2001: 24).
Evidence for constructing a behavioural chain may include historical documents and ethnographies as well as
archaeological materials. Complete behavioural chains are almost impossible to create (LaMotta and Schiffer 2001:
21), and so chain segments pertaining to manufacture, use, or other major processes are developed. Because of
their focus on relevant aspects of each activity, behavioural chains are useful for reconstructing particular
technologies, and have been employed, for example, to study floral remains such as maize (Schiffer 1976), cotton
(Magers 1975), and yucca (Stier 1975).
The Life History of Technologies
The life history concept helps us conceptualize and study material practices in relation to objects and
technologies. At this point, it is helpful to develop a somewhat different concept for the life histories of technologies,
one that does not focus solely on material objects. A technology has a multifaceted life history involving a specific
environment with contexts of development and use, and relevant communities of practice and interaction whose
members have their own systems of meaning and ways of transferring knowledge. The construction of technology
specific narratives that fully account for historical contingency and social uniqueness offers significant insights for
all disciplines that study material culture. However, adopting a generalist perspective designed to understand
commonalities among different technologies is also useful. Therefore, the life history approach can be used as an
analytical tool for examining the complexities of technologies over time.
For present purposes, a technology's life history can be understood to involve six stages or processes: invention
and innovation, experimentation and development, adoption by producers, production, consumption by
consumers, and senescence. These processes do not occur in a linear fashion. Rather, they can occur coevally
or iteratively with complex overlaps and interrelationships between the different processes and communities of
practice that engage with each. By defining and discussing each process, we hope to generate useful heuristic
tools for studying technology in relation to material life.
(p. 322) Invention and innovation
Invention is the creation of a new technology through thought and practice. The new technology must possess
performance characteristics that differ from those of other technologies in a specific society or area. Invention
results in unique artefacts or prototypes, practices, or sets of knowledge. More often than not these fail, and are
not adopted by a larger community.
Innovation thus represents the process of bringing new methods, ideas, or practices to an existing technology,
which substantially modifies an existing technology in a given society, such as the shift to wheelthrown pottery
production from traditional handbuilding. Pottery is not a new technology in this case. Nevertheless, a new
production technique may represent a change of broader social significance, accompanied by changes in the
location of the practice, social organization of production, or changes in associated ritual practices, stories, or
beliefs. Innovation is usually based on the recognition and weighting of alternative performance characteristics,
which can be ideological, mechanical, political, or economic. Invention is the creation of something new, whereas
innovation is the modification of an existing object, practice, or knowledge set that creates something distinct from
its immediate predecessor. The process of innovation may result in the proliferation of new varieties, thus leading
to technological differentiation (Schiffer 2002).
Experimentation and development
Experimentation takes place when one or more artisans explore specific qualities of the technology (e.g. raw
materials, forming techniques, locations of practice, social dynamics, economic variables) to learn which
performance characteristics are most desirable for specific applications or activities. It is a process characterized
by a high degree of variability in objects, practices, and knowledge. During experimentation (and development),
the future success or failure of an invention or innovation may be envisioned. How a technology is judged (i.e.
whether its performance characteristics are suitable for specific activities) depends on a society's systems of
meaningincluding political, economic, social, and ritual systems (Bijker 1995: 79)as well as on environmental
and mechanical variables. This process is characterized by producers and users experimenting with a technology.
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Development differs from experimentation in that it is usually goal driven and follows the identification of a
technology's desired performance characteristics. In striving to achieve these performance characteristics,
development involves problem solving to refine the design. Development can occur through trialanderror (p.
323) experiments, in the context of some kind of intentionality, where communities of practice or an individual
seeks to meet specific performance requirements of anticipated activities by applying accumulated knowledge and
experience (Schiffer and Skibo 1997). Many would argue that development is a more modern or Western
phenomenon, but it need not be limited to these contexts.
Adoption by producers
Differing from previous behavioural conceptions (Schiffer 1996, 2001a, 2008c), adoption is defined here as a
process of acceptance and replication of a technology by craftspersons or producers. An example would include
the adoption of pottery and pottery production in areas where there had previously been none except through
trade with neighbouring regions. Adoption occurs once individuals from a community invest time and energy into
acquiring the appropriate knowledge, skills, and materials to replicate the technology. Whether a society has an
open or closed system of learning (i.e. learning frameworks) affects the amount of technological variability that
occurs at this stage (WallaertPtre 2001: 482485). Open systems respond to unstable situations, are highly
adaptable, and correspond to trialanderror training of apprentices (WallaertPtre 2001: 482). Closed systems are
shaped by stable situations, include standardized answers to problems, and are associated with observation
imitation types of learning (WallaertPtre 2001: 482).
Production
Production (also called reproduction or replication) has received the greatest attention in archaeology and
anthropology, and is often documented in contemporary social contexts. In archaeology, the techniques et culture
school, with its chane opratoire framework, attends mainly to production processes.
Production occurs once a community of producers has adopted a new technology. The production sequence
includes the procurement and processing of raw materials, construction or forming, and finishing of the product or
artefact. At this point in the technology's life history, there is an established knowledge and code of practice for
how, where, when, and why a technology is to be made. An established learning framework with novices and
experts, and accompanying sets of practices, characterizes the production stage, which facilitate the transfer of
knowledge and practice. This stage also includes associated meanings, rituals, and functions, which are integral
parts of the social context.
(p. 324) Consumption and use
In consumption and use, consumersindividuals and groupshave the opportunity to acquire and use the
technology. Consumers, who may also be the producers in some societies, are usually the final arbiters of a
technology's success. How and why a community of users determines whether a technology is successful
depends on how consumers evaluate its activityrelevant performance characteristics. A technology may be
mechanically or economically sound, but if a group determines that it lacks relevant political, social, or ritual
performance characteristics, the technology may not be consumed. An alternative scenario is one in which a
technology is not mechanically or economically sound by Western standards, yet appears to have enjoyed
widespread use and importance in a community because of its acceptable performance in social, ritual, or political
activities.
Senescence
Senescence refers to the ageing, replacement, or death of a technology, which we define as the decline and
eventual cessation of production. Use, of course, may continue long after production ends. There are many
causes of senescence, such as lack of access to raw materials, warfare, epidemic disease, loss of knowledge, or
the judgement that a technology no longer serves a community's utilitarian, social, political, or ritual purposes.
Thus, a technology entering a period of senescence is characterized by performance characteristics that do not
meet the requirements of a society's activities. During this phase, technologies are usually replaced with
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alternative technological systemsor they just seem to disappear. It is possible for an ageing technology to
persist in a society; it may not, however, retain its original functions or meanings, as for example with vinyl records
in contemporary culture. Records were originally developed for home consumption and music broadcasting on
radio. With the invention of tapes, and later compact discs, records fell out of favour in mainstream society. A
subculture of alternative collectors and users who used vinyl in performances or in alternative forms of social
signalling soon developed (Plasketes 1992). Today, vinyl records signify participation in nonmainstream society.
This example demonstrates a trend in processes of senescence where a technology persists with different social
meanings and uses and with significantly altered and diminished production and consumption patterns.
Senescence can also be characterized as the stage in which individuals in a society give up the adoption or
consumption of the technology so that its frequency within the community declines. For example, consumers may
choose to replace a technology with a new one. Senescence can also occur as a result of unforeseen events, (p.
325) where individuals are forced to give up a technology because of adverse circumstances (e.g. culture
contact, warfare, epidemic disease) that cause loss of access to certain resources needed for the technology's
production or consumption (e.g. raw materials, craft specialists, or ritual specialists).
Case studies
In order to explore some of the processes discussed above and to demonstrate their usefulness as thought
provoking tools we now provide two case studies. The first explores consumption patterns of the electric car as
they relate to gender and socioeconomic class in early twentiethcentury American society and ties these to the
replacement of this technology with gasoline automobiles. This case study demonstrates the utility of using
performance characteristics in looking at consumption and senescence stages of a technology's life history. The
second explores processes of senescence of ceramic technology in MandanHidatsa society in the eighteenth
and nineteenthcentury Northern Plains in the United States. The persistent use of pottery after the introduction of
European trade goods was an enigma to archaeologists who did not recognize the social and ideological
significance of this traditional technology. The slow decline of pottery production in MandanHidatsa society,
however, resulted from outbreaks of epidemic disease and the gradual deterioration of learning frameworks.
What happened to the early electric car?

In the United States, electric automobiles were brought to market by dozens of manufacturers during the period
18941920 (Figures 13.1 and 13.2). After 1900, however, these vehicles rapidly lost market share to gasoline cars.
As a result of diminished consumption, electric car manufacturers went out of business, merged with each other, or
began making other products.
Until recently, automobile historians did not regard the neartotal demise of the early electric car industry as a
problem needing serious attention. For these scholars, the explanation was obvious: the electric car was a
technology defective in critical performance characteristics, such as top speed and range on one charge of the
battery, and so could not compete effectively against the everimproving gasoline car. However, in Taking Charge:
the electric automobile in America, Michael Schiffer, Tamara Butts, and Kimberly Grimm combined elements of
behavioural archaeology and the social construction of technology to demonstrate that the received explanation
was simplistic (Schiffer et al. 1994a; see Schiffer 1995b, 2000). This example allows us to illustrate an integrated
approach to explaining consumption patterns and, finally, the senescence of the early electric car.
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Click to view larger

13.1 An advertisement promising to liberate the woman driver of a Columbus Electric Automobile (The
Outlook 27 March 1909).
Gasoline cars and electric cars did have different performance characteristics, which facilitated different activities.
Differences in the activityrelated performance characteristics of the two car technologies can be shown in a
performance matrix, (p. 326) a tool used by behaviouralists to study adoption processes, particularly among
competing technologies (Table 13.1). It is apparent that electric cars were ideal for running errands and travelling
to social functions in town. Most of them were allweather, enclosed vehicles that, after about 1910, could cruise
the streets all day long on one charge of the battery (given speed limits of 812 mph, geared to the horse). On the
other hand, the openair gasoline car, with its high top speed and essentially unlimited range (gasoline was
available in many country stores), was best suited for the activity of touring, which at the time involved travelling
long distances in the country. Touring was for the adventurous because gasoline cars broke down frequently and
suffered blowouts. Nonetheless, in the first decades of the twentieth century, touring became the sine qua non of
automobilism (Table 13.1).

13.2 The Detroit Electric's Aristocratic Roadster: a roadster style that did not perform like a roadster (The
Literary Digest 15 June 1912).
Once the activities are identified along with each car's performance characteristics, one can introduce social
factors. Indeed, these two sets of activitiestouring and travel in townwere highly gendered. Men tended to be
tourists and preferred gasoline cars, whereas women drove around town and preferred electric cars. If a family
bought only one car, then the activities of either men or women would be (p. 327) (p. 328)
Table 13.1 A threshold performance matrix for gasoline and electric automobiles, c.1912.
Activity Performance Characteristic Gasoline Electric
Touring Range of 100+ miles (T) +
Top speed of 4060 mph (T,S) +
Ease of fuelling, recharging (T) +
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Ease of fuelling, recharging (T) +
Ruggedness (T) +
Economy of operation and maintenance (T)
Repairability in country (T) +
Can indicate owner's membership in the group tourists +

(S)
Can indicate owner's wealth (S) + +
Running errands in Range of 50100 miles (T) + +

town
Speed of 1220 mph (T) + +
Ease of starting (T) +
East of driving (T) +
All-weather capability (T) +
Reliability (T) +
Ease of fuelling, recharging (T) + +
Can indicate owner's social position (S) + +
Travelling to social Range of 50-100 miles (T) + +
functions in town Speed of 1220 mph (T) + +
Ease of starting (T) +
East of driving (T) +
All-weather capability (T) +
Reliability (T) +
Ease of fuelling, recharging (T) + +
Cleanliness of operation (T) +
Quietness of operation (T,S) +
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Quietness of operation (T,S) +
Can indicate owner's membership in the horsey set (S) +
Can indicate owner's affinity for high culture (I) +
Entries represent an approximation of how these performance characteristics were judged. A Plus (+) indicates
that the car exceeded the threshold value of that performance characteristics; a minus () indicates that the
car fell short of the threshold value. T=techno-function; S=socio-function; I=ideo-function.
severely compromised because of the almost mutually exclusive sets of performance characteristics.
Although all cars at that time were expensive to purchase and maintain, only members of the elite could afford to
buy both gasoline and electric cars. Thus, in the teens, Thomas and Mina Edison had electric cars that Mina drove
in town, (p. 329) along with gasoline touring cars that Thomas beat up during summer excursions. Likewise,
Henry and Clara Ford had his and hers automobiles, gasoline and electric, respectively.
Middleclass families that could afford to acquire only one car almost uniformly purchased gasoline cars. This
seems like a curious choice in view of the gasoline car's limited utilitarian function. However, the gasoline car had a
transcendent social function: ownership of a touring car had become a social necessity for middleclass men.
Exhibiting their cars to friends, relatives, and acquaintances, or at least talking knowledgeably about them, these
men could demonstrate their social competence. Clearly, only in relation to the touring activities of men was the
electric car an inferior technology.
The purchase of a gasoline car by middleclass families decisively favoured the leisure activities of men over
women's activities. One possible explanation for this consumption pattern is that in the patriarchal middleclass
American family, the husband could prevail because he was the breadwinner, thus entitled to dictate such a
major purchase. Had such families been wealthier or had middleclass women enjoyed greater economic
independencemarried middleclass women did not work outside the home during those decadesthe electric car
might have found a market of millions. By combining the elements of behavioural archaeologyactivities, artefact
functions, and performance characteristicswith elements of the social construction of technologygender, social
class, etc.one can construct explanations that take advantage of the insights developed by the practitioners of
both programmes. By explicitly exploring the consumption stage of this technology's life history, we are able to
better explain the electric car's senescence.
Smallpox and MandanHidatsa pottery making

Our second example is drawn from published archaeological and historical accounts of culture contact in the
Northern Plains of North America. The senescence of North American indigenous technologies was commonplace
after contact with EuroAmericans. This process often resulted from trade, epidemic disease, increased warfare, or
most likely, a combination of these factors (Krause 1972). Technological change in ceramics among the Mandan
and Hidatsa, two groups of semisedentary village horticulturalists from the Missouri River area in North Dakota
(Bowers 1992, 2004), provides an interesting case study for exploring the latter stages of a technology's life
history. Thanks to detailed accounts of Mandan and Hidatsa society and craft production practices (Wilson 1977;
Weitzner 1979; Bowers 1992), the documented impact of eighteenthcentury through early twentiethcentury
smallpox epidemics on demography (Trimble 1985, 1993; Ramenofsky 1987; Chardon 1997 [1932]), and detailed
archaeological studies of pre and postepidemic villages (Lehmer et al. 1978; Ahler 1993; Ahler and Swenson
1993), we can begin to reconstruct the processes of indigenous technological senescence and the relative roles
of the adoption of new trade items.
(p. 330) It has been commonly believed that indigenous ceramic production and use ceased at contact in favour
of consumption of metal containers. This hypothesis was based on the assumption that European containers (e.g.
metal) were functionally superior to those of clay in utilitarian activities. However, this scenario neglects the non
utilitarian performance characteristics of indigenous ceramics related to ritual and social activities. Previous studies
have revealed that the Mandan and Hidatsa did not favour European ceramics (Ramenofsky 1998) and indigenous
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groups attempted to maintain an indigenous production system because of its importance in processes of
socialization and ritual practice. In the end, ceramic production ceased because of a loss of craftspersons and
their associated knowledge and practices, not because of altered consumption patterns in the society.

13.3 Two ceramic vessels from North Dakota, USA. (a) An example of a preepidemic vessel from Alderin
Creek (32ME4); (b) an example of a postepidemic vessel from Amahami (32ME8) (photos courtesy of the
Archaeology and Historic Preservation Division, State Historical Society of North Dakota).
To understand technological senescence in the face of epidemic disease, one must be acquainted with social
mores concerning illness. In Mandan and Hidatsa society, when a person becomes ill, he or she returns to his or
her mother's lodge. Given that smallpox affects the very old and the very young (e.g. craft experts and novices)
this would drastically impact upon craft production if knowledge of the practice was transferred within families.
Archaeological evidence indicates significant qualitative differences in pre and postepidemic pottery from the
Northern Plains, including changes in design and quality of pottery (Figure 13.3), which are probably attributable
to epidemic disease and colonization and not simply the availability of new technologies (Krause 1972; Lehmer et
al. 1978). Smallpox (p. 331) resulted in the elimination of entire technological lineages. When sick potters
returned to their mothers' lodges they infected or exposed all of the elders who had instructed them in specific
kinds of craft practices, as well as the youth they might teach. For the villages, this created a technological
bottleneck in material culture, practice, and knowledge.
From ethnohistorical texts, social aspects of Hidatsa pottery production have been reconstructed (Wilson 1977;
Weitzner 1979; Bowers 1992). First, the symbolic performance characteristics of ceramic vessels have been
documented through their association with sacred bundles and important rituals (Lehmer et al. 1978: 182184;
Bowers 1992). Additionally, ceramics played an important role in the maintenance of learning frameworks and
processes of socialization. In Mandan and Hidatsa society, older women tend to produce ceramic vessels (Bowers
1992). Women purchase knowledge of pottery production along with the right to practice from older women (e.g.
female relatives such as mothers or grandmothers). Pottery manufacture was a restricted activity (e.g. Wallaert
Ptre's (2001) closed learning framework). Women secluded themselves in their earth lodges when making
vessels, which would have restricted most people from participating in, and possessing knowledge of, production
techniques. This seclusion made existing mechanisms for the transfer of related knowledge important and imbued
the process with sacredness. The teaching and practice of ceramic manufacture was a key part of maintaining
Mandan and Hidatsa identity and culture. The technology of ceramic production did not cease when new objects
became available. Rather, Mandan and Hidatsa individuals attempted to maintain this tradition in an altered form in
the face of catastrophe and chaos.
In this case study, the eventual senescence of ceramic technology after contact was the result of the
overwhelming stress of disease, warfare, and colonization, not changes in consumption patterns (as in the electric
car case study). These two cases have briefly discussed different processes responsible for senescencethe
final stage of a technology's life history.
Conclusions
The simultaneous growth of interest in studying material culture in sociocultural anthropology, archaeology, and
other disciplines since the 1980s furnishes an exciting opportunity for these disciplines to work together. By
combining elements from varied theoretical frameworks, such as behavioural archaeology and the social
construction of technology, anthropologists in both subdisciplines can pursue new understandings about the
Page 12 of 13
material world we create and that, in turn, creates us. (p. 332) The barebones framework presented in this
chapter, which includes life histories, activities, performance characteristics, and relevant social actors, explicitly
recognizes that human life is a material life. Embedded in systems of meaning and in social networks during its
entire cultural existence, material culture is irreducibly material.
To promote a synthesis of material culture studies, we elaborated a sixstage model of the processes in a
technology's life history: invention and innovation, experimentation and development, adoption by producers,
production, consumption and use, and senescence. Grounded in concrete activities, as favoured by behavioural
archaeologists, this approach also directs attention to social contexts, as stressed by social constructivists. By
framing research questions in relation to one or more of the six stages, we can seek the specific processes and
contingent factors (social, cultural, environmental, etc.) responsible for any technological change.
In the case studiesone on early electric automobiles, the other Mandan and Hidatsa pottery makingwe
investigated senescence, an oftneglected stage. The causes of senescence were different in each case, but both
contradict simplistic explanations based exclusively on the supposed technical superiority of new technologies.
The case studies also suggest that different theoretical frameworksbehavioural archaeology and social
construction of technologyoffer complementary not contradictory formulations for handling both the cultural and
the material. It remains to further develop these theoretical synergies and apply them to a wider range of case
studies.
Notes:
We are grateful to the late Stanley Ahler, Elgin Crowsbreast, Calvin Grinnell, Richard Krause, Paul Picha, and Fern
Swenson for their guidance and insights on MandanHidatsa archaeology. Furthermore, we also thank Dana Drake
Rosenstein, Brandon Gabler, Robert Jones, David Killick, Katie MacFarland, Elizabeth May, Brian McKee, Caitlin
O'Grady, Victoria Phaneuf, William Reitze, and Mara Nieves Zedeo for reading drafts of this chapter, offering
comments, and being generally supportive. Lastly, we would like to acknowledge Christoper I. Roos and Annette
Schiffer for always going above and beyond in their support.
Kacy L. Hollenback
Kacy L. Hollenback is a Ph.D. student in Anthropology at the University of Arizona.
Michael Brian Schiffer

Michael Brian Schiffer is Professor of Anthropology at the University of Arizona.
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Technology and Material Life

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Technology and Material Life*

Abstract and Keywords

Archaeological Studies of Technology

Behavioural Archaeology and the Study of Technology

The life history approach

(p. 321) Behavioural chains

The Life History of Technologies

(p. 322) Invention and innovation

Experimentation and development

(p. 324) Consumption and use

What happened to the early electric car?

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Activity Performance Characteristic Gasoline Electric

Touring Range of 100+ miles (T) +

Top speed of 4060 mph (T,S) +

Ease of fuelling, recharging (T) +

Ease of fuelling, recharging (T) +

Economy of operation and maintenance (T)

Repairability in country (T) +

Can indicate owner's membership in the group tourists +

Can indicate owner's wealth (S) + +

Running errands in Range of 50100 miles (T) + +

Speed of 1220 mph (T) + +

Ease of starting (T) +

East of driving (T) +

All-weather capability (T) +

Economy of operation and maintenance (T)

Ease of fuelling, recharging (T) + +

Can indicate owner's wealth (S) + +

Can indicate owner's social position (S) + +

Travelling to social Range of 50-100 miles (T) + +

functions in town Speed of 1220 mph (T) + +

Ease of starting (T) +

East of driving (T) +

All-weather capability (T) +

Economy of operation and maintenance (T)

Ease of fuelling, recharging (T) + +

Cleanliness of operation (T) +

Quietness of operation (T,S) +

Quietness of operation (T,S) +

Can indicate owner's membership in the horsey set (S) +

Can indicate owner's wealth (S) + +

Can indicate owner's affinity for high culture (I) +

Smallpox and MandanHidatsa pottery making

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Michael Brian Schiffer

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