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Pathways to Power

New Perspectives on the Emergence of Social Inequality

  • Textbook
  • © 2010

Overview

Editors:
  1. T. Douglas Price

    1. Department of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, USA

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    You can also search for this editor in PubMed   Google Scholar

  2. Gary M. Feinman

    1. Department of Anthropology, Field Museum, Chicago, USA

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    You can also search for this editor in PubMed   Google Scholar

  • Follow up to the very popular Foundations in Social Inequality, with brand new research and case studies
  • Authors are all well-known experts in archaeology, and particularly in the development of social hierarchies
  • Case studies have implications for understanding the development of social inequalities throughout different time periods and geographic regions, including the present day
  • Includes supplementary material: sn.pub/extras

Part of the book series: Fundamental Issues in Archaeology (FIAR)

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Table of contents (9 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-ix
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  2. Social Inequality and the Evolution of Human Social Organization

    • T. Douglas Price, Gary M. Feinman
    Pages 1-14

  3. On the Evolution of the Human Capacity for Inequality and/or Egalitarianism

    • Kenneth M. Ames
    Pages 15-44

  4. Degrees and Kinds of Inequality

    • Robert D. Drennan, Christian E. Peterson, Jake R. Fox
    Pages 45-76

  5. Gimme That Old Time Religion: Rethinking the Role of Religion in the Emergence of Social Inequality

    • Mark Aldenderfer
    Pages 77-94

  6. Who Benefits from Complexity? A View from Futuna

    • Brian Hayden, Suzanne Villeneuve
    Pages 95-145

  7. Traces of Inequality at the Origins of Agriculture in the Ancient Near East

    • T. Douglas Price, Ofer Bar-Yosef
    Pages 147-168

  8. Decentralized Complexity: The Case of Bronze Age Northern Europe

    • Kristian Kristiansen
    Pages 169-192

  9. Bitter Arrows and Generous Gifts: WhatWas a ‘King’ in the European Iron Age?

    • Tina L. Thurston
    Pages 193-254

  10. A Dual-Processual Perspective on the Power and Inequality in the Contemporary United States: Framing Political Economy for the Present and the Past

    • Gary M. Feinman
    Pages 255-288

  11. Back Matter

    Pages 289-298
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Keywords

About this book

There are few questions more central to understanding the prehistory of our species than those regarding the institutionalization of social inequality. Social inequality is manifested in unequal access to goods, information, decision-making, and power. This structure is essential to higher orders of social organization and basic to the operation of more complex societies. An understanding of the transformation from relatively egalitarian societies to a hierarchical organization and socioeconomic stratification is fundamental to our knowledge about the human condition.  In a follow-up to their 1995 book Foundations of Social Inequality, the Editors of this volume have compiled a new and comprehensive group of studies concerning these central questions. When and where does hierarchy appear in human society, and how does it operate? With numerous case studies from the Old and New World, spanning foraging societies to agricultural groups, and complex states, Pathways to Power provides key historical insights into current social and cultural questions.

Reviews

"While most archaeologists are interested in origins, only a few wish to investigate the "big picture". Most authors are well known from their publications and conference presentations, and their contributions are thoughtful, but I preferred Pathways."

Thomas N. Huffman

South African Archaeological Bulletin

Editors and Affiliations

  • Department of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, USA

    T. Douglas Price

  • Department of Anthropology, Field Museum, Chicago, USA

    Gary M. Feinman

About the editors

T. Douglas Price is the Director of the Laboratory for Archaeological Chemistry at University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Gary M. Feinman is Curator, Mesoamerican and Central American Anthropology, The Field Museum, Chicago, IL.

Bibliographic Information

  • Book Title: Pathways to Power

  • Book Subtitle: New Perspectives on the Emergence of Social Inequality

  • Editors: T. Douglas Price, Gary M. Feinman

  • Series Title: Fundamental Issues in Archaeology

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-6300-0

  • Publisher: Springer New York, NY

  • eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and Law, Social Sciences (R0)

  • Copyright Information: Springer-Verlag New York 2010

  • Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-4419-6299-7Published: 02 September 2010

  • Softcover ISBN: 978-1-4614-3303-3Published: 12 March 2012

  • eBook ISBN: 978-1-4419-6300-0Published: 20 August 2010

  • Series ISSN: 1567-8040

  • Edition Number: 1

  • Number of Pages: IX, 298

  • Number of Illustrations: 46 b/w illustrations

  • Topics: Social Structure, Social Inequality, Archaeology, History, general

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