Archaeologies of Company Towns and Their Landscapes of Power

Publication Date

1-1-2024

Document Type

Article

Publication Title

International Journal of Historical Archaeology

DOI

10.1007/s10761-024-00767-1

Abstract

Urban design and the built environment of company towns in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries embodied capitalist power and structured workers’ participation in the capitalist program or creative means of resistance. This study examines six company towns to consider social relations in these settings, and identify how built environments and historical archaeological records reflect power-laden design, panoptic control or other spatial disciplining, and community-reinforcing behaviors. The three goals of the study are to identify (1) the conditions under which capitalists engage in paternalism, (2) the ways that paternalistic and social reform goals were mobilized by capitalists to optimize production, and (3) ways that workers resisted and supported the collective interest or negotiated their place in the corporate hierarchy.

Keywords

Collective action, Labor, Power, Resistance, Working class

Department

Anthropology

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