2008

Anthropology/Archaeology
The human head has had important political, ritual and symbolic meanings throughout Andean history. Scholars have spoken of captured and trophy heads, curated crania, symbolic flying heads, head imagery on pots and on stone, head-shared vessels, and linguistic references to the head. in this synthesizing work, cultural anthopologist Denise Arnold and archaeologist Christine Hastorf examine the cult of heads in the Andes-past and present-to develop a theory of its place in indigenous cultural practice and its relationship to political systems. Using ethnographic and archaeological fieldwork, highland-lowland comparisons, archival documents, oral histories, and ritual texts, the authors draw from a wide range of theorists and research studies to demonstrate how heads shape and symbolize power, violence, fertility, identity, and economy in South American cultures.
Cultural anthropologist Denise Y. Arnold is Director of the Instituto de lengua y Cultura Aymara in Bolivia. Archaeologist Christine A. Hastorf is Profesor in the Departament of Anthropology, University of California-Berkeley.