Can birdstones sing? Rethinking material-semiotic approaches in contemporary archaeological theory

Abstract

ABSTRACT Birdstones are an enigmatic and diverse group of objects found across eastern North America with concentrations around the Great Lakes region. Via speculative interpretations of form, analogical comparison with other regions, and consideration of basic contextual information, archaeologists think of birdstones as parts of canoes, flutes, unspecified ceremonial assemblages, and, most frequently, atlatls. Discourse and debate about birdstones largely neglects issues of material vibrancy and semiotic process, including the processes by which archaeologists and others began to name and typify these objects in the late nineteenth century. This paper rethinks birdstones through a ‘more than representational’ approach that combines assemblage theory with Peircean semiotics. Although both lines of thought align with relational ontologies, non-representational critiques, and post-anthropocentrism, archaeologists rarely consider the two together. This approach helps us chart how birdstones emerged and evolved through a complicated set of human-nonhuman interactions that continue into the present.