Book

A study of prehistoric social change: the development of complex societies in the Hawaiian Islands

Academic Press • New York • Published In 1981 • Pages: xii, 275

By: Cordy, Ross H..

AbstractBrief abstract written by HRAF anthropologists who have done the subject indexing for the document
Cordy used Hawaiian oral traditions and Polynesian ethnographic data to form hypotheses about the development of complex societies in prehistoric Hawaii. Cordy believes 'the nature of a change should be adequately established before attempts at explanation are made,' so one third of the book is spent on hypothesis formation. The hypotheses were evaluated with archaeological data mostly from the island of Hawaii. He looked at settlement patterns, territorial size, households, burials, and compared labor expenditures involved in the above to determine when social echelons and when two- and three-district societies arose in Hawaii.
SubjectsDocument-level OCM identifiers given by the anthropology subject indexers at HRAF
Theoretical orientation in research and its results
Archaeological excavation methods
Dating methods in archaeology
Dwellings
Settlement patterns
Classes
Districts
Chief executive
Chronologies and culture sequences
traditionCulture name from the Outline of World Cultures (OWC)
Hawaiian
RegionThe area the document pertains to
Oceania
Sub RegionThe more specific area the document pertains to, which is located within the Region
Polynesia
Document TypeMay include journal articles, essays, collections of essays, monographs, or chapters/parts of monographs
Book
Evaluation
Creator TypeThe type of person writing the document, e.g. Ethnographer, Missionary, Archaeologist, Folklorist, Linguist, Indigenous Person, and so on.
Archaeologist
Document Rating A ranking done by HRAF anthropologists based on the strength of the source material on a scale of 1 to 5, as follows: 1 - poor; 2 - fair; 3 - good, useful data, but not uniformly excellent; 4 - excellent secondary data; 5 - excellent primary data.
4: Excellent Secondary Data
5: Excellent Primary Data
NotesAdditional notes
Ross H. Cordy
Based on the author's thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Hawaii
Includes bibliographic references (p. 253-267) and index
LCCNLibrary of Congress Control Number
81010825
LCSHLibrary of Congress Subject Headings
Hawaii--Antiquities