Social Differentiation and Leadership Development in Early Pithouse Villages in the Mogollon Region of the American Southwest

Abstract

This paper examines the development of social differentiation and simple decision-making organizations in the Mogollan region of the prehistoric American Southwest. We suggest that intensifying managerial problems associated with the transition to sedentism may have selected for suprahousehold sociopolitical organizations. Based on cross-cultural data, a set of theoretical expectations concerning social differentiation and leadership development is formulated which focuses on regularities in the regional settlement pattern and intrasettlement distribution of architectural features and material goods. These expectations are then used to generate a set of propositions which are evaluated archaeologically using data from early pithouse villages. On the basis of a test of these propositions it appears that simple suprahousehold decision-making organizations were present in the American Southwest by A.D. 600. The implications of this interpretation for understanding subsequent developments in Southwestern prehistoric sociopolitical organization are then discussed.