“I found my identity because of pottery,” says Amalia, who runs an Indigenous pottery workshop in General Paz, a city in Buenos Aires province, Argentina.

Amalia and her family found archaeological pottery fragments by chance. These findings encouraged them to experiment and learn based on their observations of the techniques and designs of the ancient pottery. The clay pots manufactured by Amalia and her family created links between the present and the past. Over time, they became part of a public sphere through family participation in pottery exhibitions and oral history activities promoted by local institutions. For example, they run workshops at a local museum and different talks in school. At the regional level, they shared their views and experiences in potters and indigenous meetings. Because of their experiences, we can recognize the existence of a complex social network that involves archaeological materials, the river landscape, and contemporary practices.

This network gives microregional pottery a new meaning. Considering these intertwined aspects has encouraged us to assess pottery in terms of processes, relationships, and representations, leading us to a reworked past in the present. Consequently, we study pottery practices as actions that transmit memory, allowing us to register other ways of linking past and present.

Also, we rethink different ways of entanglement with local stakeholders in our archaeological research practices. For example, we included knowledge of local potters in our archaeological studies. This engagement also involves local heritage management that prioritizes ongoing direct interactions and bonds without local governmental institutional mediation. To subvert the inequality in knowledge production, archaeologists should include local perspectives in their studies and practices.

The associated research in Latin American Antiquity – El “otro lado” de la historia: Patrimonio arqueológico y procesos de memoria – is free to read until the end of July 2022.

Image: Archaeological fragments of ancient pottery found at the riverside and conserved in a new vessel manufactured by replicating ancient techniques.

Saberes expertos…:

Documentary featuring archaeologists and potters in the area of study, produced by “Entramando Saberes” teams of the Filosofía y Letras Faculty, Buenos Aires University.