A Social Archaeology of Households in Neolithic Greece: An Anthropological Approach

The study of households and everyday life is increasingly recognized as fundamental in social archeological analysis. This volume is the first to address the household as a process and as a conceptual and analytical means through which we can interpret social organization from the bottom up. Using detailed case studies from Neolithic Greece, Stella Souvatzi examines how the household is defined socially, culturally, and historically; she discusses household and community, variability, production and reproduction, individual and collective agency, identity, change, complexity, and integration. Her study is enriched by an in-depth discussion of the framework for the household in the social sciences and the synthesis of many anthropological, historical, and sociological examples. It reverses the view of the household as passive, ahistorical, and stable, showing it instead to be active, dynamic, and continually shifting.

Stella G. Souvatzi teaches in the School of Humanities, Greek Culture Studies, Hellenic Open University.