ARCHAEOLOGICAL APPROACHES TO THE ORGANIZATION OF DOMESTIC LABOR: Household Practice and Domestic Relations

Abstract

▪ Abstract  The household has emerged as a focus of archaeological inquiry over the past decade. This review summarizes issues raised by economic and feminist anthropologists about the meaning of the terms household and domestic and then considers research on household archaeology, craft specialization, and gender relevant to the study of the organization of domestic labor. It is argued that the common functional definition of the household as an adaptive mechanism reacting to environmental and social conditions underconceptualizes the household and renders its study unlikely to contribute to our understanding of economic and social processes in past societies. Studies of craft specialization and women's economic production that emphasize what members of the domestic group do and how that action is valued are more successful in demonstrating the dynamic interaction between household and society.