Learning Patterns, Potter Interaction and Ceramic Style among the Luo of Kenya

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Periodical article

Title:	Learning Patterns, Potter Interaction and Ceramic Style among the Luo of Kenya
Author:	Herbich, Ingrid
Year:	1987
Periodical:	African Archaeological Review
Volume:	5
Pages:	193-204
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Kenya
Subjects:	Luo archaeology pottery Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) Architecture and the Arts Anthropology and Archaeology
External link:	https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01117093
Abstract:	One aspect of an ethnoarchaeological study of the pottery system of the Luo people of Kenya is examined. It was discovered that ceramic 'microstyles', distinctive combinations of decorative, formal and technological features characteristic of the different potter communities in a 3000 square km region of western Kenya, are the product of local traditions of manufacture perpetuated by women potters recruited from outside the communities as a result of a patrilocal postmarital residence system. An analysis of the interplay of a mother-in-law/daughter-in-law learning pattern, strong pressures for postmarital re-socialization, and processes of potter interaction in the generation of ceramic styles is undertaken and some implications for archaeological attempts to use ceramic patterning to uncover prehistoric social organization are discussed. Bibliogr., sum. also in French.