Kristin De Lucia

AB Brown University, MA Arizona State University, PhD Northwestern University

Research and Teaching Interests:
Aztecs, Mesoamerica, household archaeology, political economy, complex societies, gender and identity, ceramics, food production, microanalysis, soil chemistry, childhood, ethnicity, social inequality, historical archaeology, colonialism, bioarchaeology

Current Research:
Dr. De Lucia is an anthropological archaeologist whose field research is based in Xaltocan, Mexico, where she studies households and how the daily practices of commoners influence the development of broader political economies and social systems. Her research interests include households, complex societies, the Aztecs, the development of inequality, colonialism, and the archaeology of identity (including gender, childhood, and ethnicity). She integrates various analytical methods into her research including micro-archaeology, soil chemistry, bioarchaeology, and pottery analyses. Dr. De Lucia is currently co-directing the Xaltocan Archaeological Project in the Xaltocan Church and her recent research has focused on ritual and religion in colonial and pre-colonial Mexico. This research was recently featured in The Colgate Scene and the Mexican newspaper, La Crónica de Hoy. Read more about her current research. 

Books:

2015 Surplus: The Politics of Production and the Strategies of Everyday Life. Morehart, Christopher T. and K. De Lucia, eds. Boulder: University Press of Colorado.

Peer Review Articles and Book Chapters:

2024 Considering Reciprocity and Gratitude in Postclassic Basin of Mexico Economies. In Realizing Value in Mesoamerica: The Dynamics of Desire and Demand in Ancient Economies, Scott R. Hutson and Charles Golden, eds. Palgrave Macmillan, Pp. 51-78. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-44168-4

2021 De Lucia, K., & Scott Cummings, L. Residue Analysis of Cooking Vessels from Early Postclassic Xaltocan, Central Mexico. Latin American Antiquity, 32(4), 800-818. doi:10.1017/laq.2021.32

2021 Household Lake Exploitation and Aquatic Lifeways in Early Postclassic Central Mexico. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 62:101273. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaa.2021.101273.

2020 (with M. Boulanger and M. Glascock) Small-Scale Household Ceramic Production: Neutron Activation Analysis of Plain and Decorated Ceramics from Early Postclassic Xaltocan. Ancient Mesoamerica, 32(2), 316-334.  https://doi.org/10.1017/S0956536120000036

2018 Style, Memory, and the Production of History: Aztec Pottery and the Materialization of a Toltec Legacy. Current Anthropology, Vol 59 (6). https://doi.org/10.1086/700916

2017 Households in the Aztec Empire. In Oxford Handbook of the Aztecs. D.L. Nichols and E. Rodríguez-Alegría, eds. Oxford University Press. Pp. 247- 260.

2017 The Living House: Vernacular Architecture of Early Postclassic Xaltocan, Mexico. In Vernacular Architecture of the Pre-Columbian Americas. C. Halperin and L. Schwartz, eds. Routledge. 

2016 (with L. Overholtzer) A Multiscalar approach to Migration and Social Change at Middle Postclassic Xaltocan. D.L. Nichols and E. Rodríguez-Alegría, eds. Ancient Mesoamerica, Vol 27, Issue 1, pp.163-182. 

2015 (with C.T. Morehart) Surplus and Social Change: The Production of Household and Field in Pre-Aztec Central Mexico. In Surplus: The Politics of Production and the Strategies of Everyday Life. C.T. Morehart and K. De Lucia, eds. Boulder: University Press of Colorado. 

2015 (with C.T. Morehart) Introduction: The Politics of Production and Strategies of Everyday Life. In Surplus: The Politics of Production and the Strategies of Everyday Life. C.T. Morehart and K. De Lucia, eds. Boulder: University Press of Colorado. 

2014 Everyday Practice and Ritual Space: The Organization of Central Mexican Domestic Ritual before the Aztecs. Cambridge Archaeological Journal, Vol. 24, Issue 3, pp. 1-25.

2014 (with L. Overholtzer) Everyday Action and the Rise and Decline of Ancient Polities: Household Strategy and Political Change in Postclassic Mexico. Ancient Mesoamerica, Vol. 25, Issue 2, pp. 441-458. 

2013 Domestic Economies and Regional Transition: Household Multicrafting and Lake Exploitation in Pre-Aztec Central Mexico. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology, Vol. 32, pp. 353-367. 

2010 A Child’s House: Social Memory, Identity, and the Construction of Childhood in Early Postclassic Mexican Households. American Anthropologist, Vol. 112, Number 4, pp. 607-624.

2008 Looking Beyond Gender Hierarchy: Rethinking Gender at Teotihuacan, Mexico. In Archaeological Papers of the American Anthropological Association, Vol. 18, Issue 1, pp.17-36.

Other Publications

2021 Studying the Past to Understand the Present: Elizabeth Brumfiel Making Archaeology Interesting with Gender, Class, and Faction. In Genealogies for the Feminist Present: Lineages and Connections in Feminist Anthropology, edited by A. Lynn Bolles and Mary H. Moran. American Ethnologist Website, May 24, 2021. https://americanethnologist.org/features/collections/legacies-and-genealogies-in-feminist-anthropology

2019 (C. Morehart, E. Rodríguez-Alegría, K. De Lucia, eds.) Xaltocan: arqueología, historia y comunidad, Self-published book distributed to the community of Xaltocan.

2016 Review of Material Relations: The Marriage Figurines of Prehispanic Honduras, by Julia A. Hendon, Rosemary A. Joyce and Jeanne Lopiparo (2014). Cambridge Archaeological Journal, FirstView Article, May 2016, pp 1-2.

ANTH 102 Introduction to Cultural Anthropology
ANTH 103 Introduction to Archaeology
ANTH 228 Women and Gender in Prehistory
ANTH 242 Archaeology of Race and Ethnicity

ANTH 253 Field Methods and Interpretation in Archaeology

ANTH 341: Archaeology of Death and Burial
ANTH 355 The Aztecs

Core 171C Mexico