Toward a Situational Approach to Understanding Middle Woodland Societies in the North American Midcontinent

ABSTRACT Elaborate Middle Woodland (ca. cal 200 BC–cal AD 500) mounds and exotic artifacts traded over long distances provide evidence for institutions that helped coordinate the gathering of large communal groups on the ancient midcontinent. However, the material heterogeneity archaeologists have documented for these societies suggests diverse material, historical, and social forces motivated communal gatherings. In this article, we introduce Middle Woodland Ceremonial Situations in the North American Midcontinent, our guest-edited issue of the Midcontinental Journal of Archaeology. Contributions to this issue wrestle with the notion of “situations,” as developed by sociocultural anthropologists, to better understand the archaeological record of the Middle Woodland midcontinent. In doing so, the contributors propose new ways to frame the scalar and temporal diversity of Middle Woodland ceremonialism by focusing on the material evidence for situations where people, earth, and things converged in different ways and times to shape the ceremonial landscape of the midcontinent.