Transportation Innovation and Social Complexity among Maritime Hooter-Gatherer Societies

Advanced watercraft were in use at historic contact among a number of the most complex hunting-gathering societies of western North America, including the Chumash and the Nootkans. Though anthropologists often relegate technological innovations to very minor roles as stimuli toward social evolution and power inequities, archaeological analyses of long-term cultural change cannot afford to ignore the many social, symbolic, and practical implications of major innovations in transportation. Analysis of the linkages between watercraft and political, ideological, and economic systems reveals a strong association between social complexity and transportation of high capacity and range among maritime peoples.