Alcohol: Anthropological/Archaeological Perspectives

Abstract

Alcohol is a special form of embodied material culture and the most widely used psychoactive agent in the world. It has been a fundamentally important social, economic, political, and religious artifact for millennia. This review assesses trends in the anthropological engagement with alcohol during the past two decades since the Annual Review last covered this subject. It highlights the growing archaeological contributions to the field, as well as recent developments by sociocultural anthropologists and social historians. Increasing historicization has been a useful corrective to the earlier functionalist emphasis on the socially integrative role of drinking. Recent studies tend to employ a more strategic/agentive analytical framework and treat drinking through the lens of practice, politics, and gender. Moreover, alcohol has come to be seen as an important component of the political economy and a commodity centrally implicated in strategies of colonialism and postcolonial struggles over state power and household relations of authority.

Ritual drinks in the pre-Hispanic US Southwest and Mexican Northwest

“…Exchange in the ingredients to make caffeinated drinks created ongoing social and economic relationships between southwestern populations and distant populations. With the ingredients in hand, southwestern populations could create a variety of drinks and serve them in a variety of ways (25,26). Preparing and serving the drinks provided opportunities for forging relationships and obligations, because the drinks served as tools of social inclusion and exclusion (26).…”

The influence of groups and alcohol consumption on individual risk-taking

“…Indeed, evidence suggests social drinking dating back to the Neolithic era, where alcohol seems to have been consumed in commemoration of the dead (Dietler, 2006). Advertisements have also historically portrayed consumption of their alcoholic products in social contexts (see Figure 1.1).…”

“…Such decrease was only evident in those aged 16-44. 2 Alcohol-related hospital omission in 2015/2016 were 3% higher than those in 2014/2015 and 22% higher than /2006(Health and Social Care Information Centre, 2017 admissions in England between [2015][2016], that were at least partially attributable to alcohol, cancer (over a quarter) and unintentional injuries (22%) were the top two diagnoses. The type of alcohol consumption behaviour relating to these outcomes are likely to differ somewhat.…”

One More Drink: Archaebotanical analysis of beer consumption in the South Shetland (Antarctica)

“…No trabalho realizado anteriormente havíamos ressaltado as diferenças que marcam os sentidos associados ao uso social das bebidas fermentadas (como cerveja e vinho, por exemplo) e bebidas destiladas (como whisky, ginebra e rum, entre outros); as quais se caracterizam pelo entendimento dos primeiros como uma classe especial de comida, enquanto os segundos são classificados enquanto spirits, ou seja, bebidas alcoólicas, fortes e embriagantes (DIETLER, 2006;.…”