Adria LaViolette


Adria LaViolette Associate Professor Ph.D. Washington University 1987
My primary research interests are in later African archaeology, particularly that of medium-range and large-scale societies in Eastern Africa, and the interface between archaeology, ethnology, and history. Throughout the last 2,000 years, the Eastern African coast and its hinterland has been a mosaic of hunting/gathering, pastoralist, mixed farming and urban societies. These societies interacted in the context of migrations, long-distance trade, technological transformations, religious conversions, alliances and hostility, internationalism, and colonialism. The variety of middle-range (or 'chiefdom'-level) societies and urban forms in Africa has become central to later African archaeological research, and it is urbanism on the Swahili coast where my current research lies. I also have research experience in West Africa, particularly in Mali. My research focuses on the development of Swahili regional systems, focusing on political economy in the context of African urban traditions. This research is located on Pemba Island, Tanzania. Pemba was a central area within Swahili civilization at the height of its economic prosperity, home to numerous urban regional systems immediately prior to the onset of European and Arab colonialism. Events on Pemba echoed those elsewhere on the Eastern African coast, where from the 10th-14th centuries some coastal villages became economic and political centers, growing in scale and expanding long-distance trade relationships with polities in the African interior and along much of the Indian Ocean rim. These centers, called stonetowns, have long formed the basis of reconstructions of Swahili society. My current project targets the more hidden aspects of Swahili life, exemplified by the majority of Swahili living in towns and villages, who were an integral and dynamic component of Swahili society but were not engaged in long-distance trade. The project's goals are to reconstruct the local and regional economy-subsistence, manufacturing, provision of services, movement of domestic goods-and how it interfaced with the international economy represented primarily by the enormous Indian Ocean trading system of the first and second millennia A.D. Combined with my earlier research at Pujini, a 15th-16th-century fortified elite Swahili settlement, my ongoing study of Pemba Island societies is designed to provide new insights into the nature of urbanism, political economy, and daily life in this intensely settled Swahili zone. I have an active interest in African urbanisms generally. I am committed to working closely with colleagues and students in Tanzania on issues of representation of Swahili culture. I engage in public-minded archaeology in Tanzania through the production of interpretive museum displays and teaching materials, making presentations in municipal and local forums, and maintaining a lively dialogue with the Swahili communities in which I conduct research. I am also committed to working with graduate students, and have a cohort of students working on topics in later African archaeology. Specializations African archaeology, African Iron Age, Islamic societies, Swahili coast, urbanism, middle-range and large-scale societies, regional systems, household archaeology, political economy, craft specialization, colonialism. Courses Archaeology of Africa, Peoples and Cultures of Africa, Archaeology of Colonial Expansions, Introduction to Archaeology, Archaeology of Europe, Advanced Topics in African Archaeology, Second-Year Graduate Paper and Presentation, Introduction to African and African-American Studies. Selected Publications In prep. - A Millennium of Swahili Modernity in Africa and the Indian Ocean World. In "The Earth of the Modern: Parallel Modernities and Colonial Subjectivities," special edition of Archaeologies, eds. Charles Cobb and Diana Loren. In press - The Changing Power of Swahili Houses, Fourteenth to Nineteenth Centuries A.D. In The Durable House: House Society Models in Archaeology, ed. Robin A. Beck, Jr. Occasional Paper No. 35, Center for Archaeological Investigations, Southern Illinois University (with J. Fleisher). In press - Eastern African Coast, History of (Early to 1600). In New Encyclopedia of Africa, ed. J. Middleton and J. C. Miller. Charles Scribner's Sons. In press - Geographic Overviews, Africa, East: Swahili Coast. In Encyclopedia of Archaeology, ed. D. M. Pearsall. Elsevier. 2005 - Encountering Archaeology in Tanzania: Experience in Teaching at the University of Dar es Salaam. In Salvaging Tanzania's Cultural Heritage, eds. B. B. B. Mapunda and P. Msemwa, Ch. 4, pp. 36-54. Dar es Salaam University Press. 2005 - The Archaeology of Sub-Saharan Urbanism: Cities and their Countrysides. In African Archaeology: A Critical Introduction, ed. A. B. Stahl, pp. 327-352. London: Blackwell (with J. Fleisher). 2004 - Swahili Archaeology and History on Pemba, Tanzania: A Critique and Case Study of the Use of Written and Oral Sources in Archaeology. In African Historical Archaeologies, eds. A. M. Reid and P. J. Lane, pp. 125-62. Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers. 2002 - Encountering Archaeology in Tanzania: Education, Development, and Dialogue at the University of Dar es Salaam. Anthropological Quarterly 75(2):355-74. 2000 - Ethno-archaeology in Jenné, Mali: Craft and Status among Smiths, Potters and Masons. Oxford: Cambridge Monographs in African Archaeology 49, British Archaeological Reports International Series. 1999 - The Recovery of Swahili Settlements in the Absence of Stone Architecture: Two Preliminary Surveys from Pemba Island, Tanzania. Nyame Akuma 52:64-73 (with J. Fleisher). 1996 - Report on Excavations at the Swahili site of Pujini, Pemba Island, Tanzania. Nyame Akuma 46:72-83. 1995 - Reconnaissance of Sites Bearing Triangular Incised (Tana Tradition) Ware on Pemba Island, Tanzania. Nyame Akuma 44:59-65 (with J. Fleisher). 1995 - Women Craft Specialists in Jenne: The Manipulation of Mande Social Categories. In Status and Identity in West Africa: Nyamakalaw of Mande. D. C. Conrad and B. E. Frank, eds. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 1994 - Masons of Mali: A Millennium of Design and Technology in Earthen Materials. In Society, Culture, and Technology in Africa, S. Terry Childs (ed). Philadelphia: MASCA Research Papers in Science and Archaeology, Supplement to Vol. 11, pp. 86-97. 1990 - Iron Age Settlement around Mkiu, South-eastern Tanzania. Azania 25:19-26 (with W. B. Fawcett).

Associate Professor
Ph.D. Washington University 1987

My primary research interests are in later African archaeology, particularly that of medium-range and large-scale societies in Eastern Africa, and the interface between archaeology, ethnology, and history. Throughout the last 2,000 years, the Eastern African coast and its hinterland has been a mosaic of hunting/gathering, pastoralist, mixed farming and urban societies. These societies interacted in the context of migrations, long-distance trade, technological transformations, religious conversions, alliances and hostility, internationalism, and colonialism. The variety of middle-range (or 'chiefdom'-level) societies and urban forms in Africa has become central to later African archaeological research, and it is urbanism on the Swahili coast where my current research lies. I also have research experience in West Africa, particularly in Mali.

My research focuses on the development of Swahili regional systems, focusing on political economy in the context of African urban traditions. This research is located on Pemba Island, Tanzania. Pemba was a central area within Swahili civilization at the height of its economic prosperity, home to numerous urban regional systems immediately prior to the onset of European and Arab colonialism. Events on Pemba echoed those elsewhere on the Eastern African coast, where from the 10th-14th centuries some coastal villages became economic and political centers, growing in scale and expanding long-distance trade relationships with polities in the African interior and along much of the Indian Ocean rim. These centers, called stonetowns, have long formed the basis of reconstructions of Swahili society. My current project targets the more hidden aspects of Swahili life, exemplified by the majority of Swahili living in towns and villages, who were an integral and dynamic component of Swahili society but were not engaged in long-distance trade. The project's goals are to reconstruct the local and regional economy-subsistence, manufacturing, provision of services, movement of domestic goods-and how it interfaced with the international economy represented primarily by the enormous Indian Ocean trading system of the first and second millennia A.D. Combined with my earlier research at Pujini, a 15th-16th-century fortified elite Swahili settlement, my ongoing study of Pemba Island societies is designed to provide new insights into the nature of urbanism, political economy, and daily life in this intensely settled Swahili zone.

I have an active interest in African urbanisms generally. I am committed to working closely with colleagues and students in Tanzania on issues of representation of Swahili culture. I engage in public-minded archaeology in Tanzania through the production of interpretive museum displays and teaching materials, making presentations in municipal and local forums, and maintaining a lively dialogue with the Swahili communities in which I conduct research. I am also committed to working with graduate students, and have a cohort of students working on topics in later African archaeology.

Specializations

African archaeology, African Iron Age, Islamic societies, Swahili coast, urbanism, middle-range and large-scale societies, regional systems, household archaeology, political economy, craft specialization, colonialism.

Courses

Archaeology of Africa, Peoples and Cultures of Africa, Archaeology of Colonial Expansions, Introduction to Archaeology, Archaeology of Europe, Advanced Topics in African Archaeology, Second-Year Graduate Paper and Presentation, Introduction to African and African-American Studies.

Selected Publications

In prep. - A Millennium of Swahili Modernity in Africa and the Indian Ocean World. In "The Earth of the Modern: Parallel Modernities and Colonial Subjectivities," special edition of Archaeologies, eds. Charles Cobb and Diana Loren.
In press - The Changing Power of Swahili Houses, Fourteenth to Nineteenth Centuries A.D. In The Durable House: House Society Models in Archaeology, ed. Robin A. Beck, Jr. Occasional Paper No. 35, Center for Archaeological Investigations, Southern Illinois University (with J. Fleisher).
In press - Eastern African Coast, History of (Early to 1600). In New Encyclopedia of Africa, ed. J. Middleton and J. C. Miller. Charles Scribner's Sons.
In press - Geographic Overviews, Africa, East: Swahili Coast. In Encyclopedia of Archaeology, ed. D. M. Pearsall. Elsevier.
2005 - Encountering Archaeology in Tanzania: Experience in Teaching at the University of Dar es Salaam. In Salvaging Tanzania's Cultural Heritage, eds. B. B. B. Mapunda and P. Msemwa, Ch. 4, pp. 36-54. Dar es Salaam University Press.
2005 - The Archaeology of Sub-Saharan Urbanism: Cities and their Countrysides. In African Archaeology: A Critical Introduction, ed. A. B. Stahl, pp. 327-352. London: Blackwell (with J. Fleisher).
2004 - Swahili Archaeology and History on Pemba, Tanzania: A Critique and Case Study of the Use of Written and Oral Sources in Archaeology. In African Historical Archaeologies, eds. A. M. Reid and P. J. Lane, pp. 125-62. Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers.
2002 - Encountering Archaeology in Tanzania: Education, Development, and Dialogue at the University of Dar es Salaam. Anthropological Quarterly 75(2):355-74.
2000 - Ethno-archaeology in Jenné, Mali: Craft and Status among Smiths, Potters and Masons. Oxford: Cambridge Monographs in African Archaeology 49, British Archaeological Reports International Series.
1999 - The Recovery of Swahili Settlements in the Absence of Stone Architecture: Two Preliminary Surveys from Pemba Island, Tanzania. Nyame Akuma 52:64-73 (with J. Fleisher).
1996 - Report on Excavations at the Swahili site of Pujini, Pemba Island, Tanzania. Nyame Akuma 46:72-83.
1995 - Reconnaissance of Sites Bearing Triangular Incised (Tana Tradition) Ware on Pemba Island, Tanzania. Nyame Akuma 44:59-65 (with J. Fleisher).
1995 - Women Craft Specialists in Jenne: The Manipulation of Mande Social Categories. In Status and Identity in West Africa: Nyamakalaw of Mande. D. C. Conrad and B. E. Frank, eds. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
1994 - Masons of Mali: A Millennium of Design and Technology in Earthen Materials. In Society, Culture, and Technology in Africa, S. Terry Childs (ed). Philadelphia: MASCA Research Papers in Science and Archaeology, Supplement to Vol. 11, pp. 86-97.
1990 - Iron Age Settlement around Mkiu, South-eastern Tanzania. Azania 25:19-26 (with W. B. Fawcett).