Revision of the author's thesis (Ph. D.)--Arizona State University.

Sedentism and mobility in horticultural and agricultural societies -- Anthropological perspectives on sedentism and mobility -- Sedentism and mobility in the Mesa Verde region -- Measuring household residential mobility -- Household residential movement in the Sand Canyon locality -- Community persistence in the Sand Canyon locality -- The social landscape in the Mesa Verde region -- Mobile households and persistent communities.

Open Access Unrestricted online access star

Varien's research clearly demonstrates the need to view agriculturalists from a perspective that differs from the hunter-gatherer model. This innovative study shows why current explanations for site abandonment cannot by themselves account for residential mobility and offers valuable insights into the archaeology of small-scale agriculture.

Research on hunting and gathering peoples has given anthropologists a long-standing conceptual framework of sedentism and mobility based on seasonality and ecological constraints. This work challenges that position by arguing that mobility is a socially negotiated activity and neither mobility nor sedentism can be understood outside of its social context. Drawing on research in the Mesa Verde region that focuses on communities and households, Mark Varien expands the social, spatial, and temporal scales of archaeological analysis to propose a new model for population movement.

Description based on print version record.