Archaeological Papers of The American - 2008 - Pankonien - 8 She Sells Seashells Women and Mollusks in Huatulco Oaxaca

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8
She Sells Seashells: Women and Mollusks in
Huatulco, Oaxaca, Mexico
Dawn Pankonien
Northwestern University
ABSTRACT
In this chapter, I examine seashells recovered from a 1985 archaeological study of Bahias de Huatulco, Mexico.
I focus on both the primary and the secondary functions of the shells, describing their use as food, construction
material, and an important dye source. I begin by discussing the shells in their local context and then later outline
arguments both for and against shell trade inland. I ask, why are the shells here, and then, why these specific shells?
In answering these questions, I investigate how these shells were used, the industries that they imply, and, finally,
how women are necessarily implicated in processes of collection and production.
Keywords: gender, mollusks, shellfishing, Huatulco, Mexico
I n Huatulco, Mexico, today no one claims that gender rela-

tions are static. In the past 23 years, Mexican government
yses of front- versus back-hall employment, see Portes and
Stepick 1994). Women are also primary laborers in the in-
officials have converted the beachfront Zapotec pueblo at formal economy, and they waitress in the lowest-paying of
Santa Cruz Bay, Oaxaca, to an urban, elite tourist desti- Huatulco restaurants. Generally, men lead tours—by boat,
nation that still grows by eight percent per year (Ramon bus, bike, or by four-wheeler—and they assume the better-
Sinovas, Director of FONATUR, personal communication, paying positions in hotels and restaurants. However, in the
September 2007). Huts of palm frond and sheet metal that trendiest of Huatulco’s bars and clubs today, punk twenty-
once sheltered residents have been replaced by government- somethings, looking to escape to the beach after receiving
constructed, concrete apartment complexes, four stories tall college educations in urban Mexico, now assume front-hall
and located inland so as not to detract from the vistas of positions regardless of their gender identities. Youth, educa-
hotel windows. The introduction of piped water, electric- tion or international experience, and the ability to perform
ity, and sewage systems has altered labor practices within identities as varied as punk and fresa (yuppie) now privi-
the home, while paved roads, affordable internet, and migra- lege a new group of Huatulco migrant laborers and trans-
tion patterns now alter communication and social interaction late to social capital that today trumps gender in the local
outside of the home. These changes reconfigure residents’ economy.
domestic and economic networks and transform gender Despite this contemporary reality, a singular discourse,
relations. reiterated by countless ethnographers, describes Huatulco’s
New employment opportunities, within a service sec- past. In this discourse, gender relations are rigid and un-
tor that provides temporary and low-wage work, now dif- questioned, women are without agency, and gender is all-
ferently prompt men and women to give unique form to defining: “Santa Cruz was a fisherman’s village. Tio José was
their social and economic conditions. Predictably, women a fisherman, as were his father and brothers. They learned
dominate back-hall positions—those less visible to con- to fish, he says, from an old man from Xadani who fished
sumers, such as kitchen work and housecleaning (for anal- in the Copalita river” (González 2002:42). The story is not
ARCHEOLOGICAL PAPERS OF THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION, Vol. 18, Issue 1, pp. 102–114, ISSN 1551-823X,
online ISSN 1551-8248.
C 2008 by the American Anthropological Association. All rights reserved. DOI: 10.1111/j.1551-8248.2008.00008.x.
15518248, 2008, 1, Downloaded from https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1551-8248.2008.00008.x by Cochrane Mexico, Wiley Online Library on [07/03/2023]. See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons License
Women and Mollusks in Huatulco, Oaxaca, Mexico 103
always of Tio José, but its meaning is the same: Huatulco sive and male to active. Watson and Kennedy employ these
was a Zapotec fishing village, they say. It was quaint or simplistic gender stereotypes to argue that if women were
primitive, depending on the objectives of the storyteller, but home cooking while men were off hunting then women—
in either case, it was a place of weathered men who spent in the absence of males—must have been the active agents
their days in small boats offshore and who, at the end of each in the development of agriculture. While decades of fem-
day, returned to the wives raising their children (Call 2001; inist thinkers have effectively undermined the conflations
González 2002; Vigil 2001).1 of female with passive and domestic, these continue to
The timeless images of Huatulco’s fishing traditions limit ethnographers’ descriptions of Huatulco’s past, just as
evoked by ethnographers serve as forlorn reminders of the Watson and Kennedy found in eastern North America. I ar-
consequences of today’s tourist takeover and of the ex- gue that the shells recovered in the 1985 excavation imply
pansion of modern global capitalism. These images chal- a varied array of productive activities that would have in-
lenge those who still hail tourism as an “industry without corporated men and women into complex labor processes.
smokestacks,” as “a costless generator of wealth and well An analysis of the shells, therefore, will refute the simplistic
being” (for further critique, see Barkin 2002). But from this though often applied model of men off fishing with passive
discourse, women are unjustifiably absent. The few sociocul- wives at home.
tural anthropologists in this region have been concerned pri-
marily with land ownership and production. They have con-
structed household histories by talking to residents who are An Overview of the Project Report
almost solely male and by summarizing the male-authored
official documents maintained by the municipality (Duke In 1985, the National Institute of Anthropology and
1990; González 2002; Madsen Camacho 1996). History in Mexico (INAH), in association with Mexico’s
Here, I complicate the descriptions of Huatulco’s past National Tourism Development Agency (FONATUR), ini-
that are based on such data by turning to the archaeological tiated a project titled Bahias de Huatulco Salvage Archae-
record. The findings of archaeologists Enrique Fernández ology (Figure 8.1). This occurred one year after the gov-
Dávila and Susana Gómez Serafı́n (1988) not only sug- ernment began expropriating 32 kilometers of shoreline in
gest a diversity of industries in Huatulco but also hint at the area and coincided with the first stages in the rapid
a once-booming dye industry requiring especially complex development of an upscale tourism industry now located
work processes. I use as my data set a list of shells that there. While the government agencies that funded the exca-
were collected from a single site in the excavation at Bahias vation are recognized in the project report, Huatulco native
de Huatulco in 1985 (Fernández and Gómez 1988). I then Patricio Martı́nez recalls pressures placed on these agen-
complement this with ethnographic data to create a thicker cies by locals concerned that they would lose their past to
description of Huatulco, one in which both men and women the redevelopment efforts.2 Archaeologists Fernández and
were active participants in an economy that was never Gómez (1988:9), therefore, conducted their analysis both as
static. an initial study of social organization during pre-Hispanic
In this chapter, I am inspired by the works of Margaret times in the Bahias de Huatulco region and as an attempt
Conkey, Joan Gero, and Rosemary Joyce (Conkey and Gero to record pre-Hispanic artifacts before the tourism to come
1997; Gero 1985; Gero and Conkey 1991; Joyce 2000, destroyed such evidence.
2001), who repeatedly undermine androcentric works in Because of ongoing development and FONATUR’s and
which present-day gender stereotypes are naturalized and investors’ concerns that the archaeological project would
then read back into the past unproblematically. I am in- interfere with tourists’ visits, the archaeological study was
debted to Cheryl Claassen (1991:276), who argues that necessarily limited in scope. Approximately two hundred
shellfishing “provides an excellent starting point for a fem- square kilometers in the area were photographed and 84
inist perspective on culture” and who has produced several sites were identified for possible excavation; these were
works to re-gender shellfishing as female and not gender sites that would not threaten the tourism infrastructure. Sixty
neutral (Claassen 1991, 1998, 2005). Like Claassen, I chal- percent of these were eventually examined on the surface,
lenge assumptions that gender roles are rigid and women and sites that suggested the highest levels of social interac-
have little agency. Finally, I am emboldened by Patty Jo tion were dug to the bedrock in units of one square meter
Watson and Mary Kennedy (1991), who take as their point following natural stratigraphy (Fernández and Gómez
of departure in “The Development of Horticulture in the 1988:9–10). The dense vegetation and rocky shores that
Eastern Woodlands of North America: Women’s Role” the once made living in much of the coastal region difficult
logical inconsistencies of analogies linking female to pas- made excavation especially so.
104 Dawn Pankonien
Figure 8.1. Bahias de Huatulco and surroundings.
Fernández and Gómez (1988) use historical records, cated elsewhere. Alicia González (2002:20) has argued
past literature, and their preliminary examination of the re- that Huatulqueños once paid tribute to the Mixtecs and
gion to suggest that initial settlement in Huatulco dates to later, in the century before Spanish arrival, were conquered
Early to Late Postclassic times, between approximately 1000 by the Aztecs. Fernández and Gómez (1988:13) suggest
C.E. and 1525 C.E. However, artifacts gathered in more recent that though Aztec pressure forced the contraction of the
studies—part of an ongoing search for the ruins that could Mixtec empire in the region, the Mixtecs remained in con-
lure ever more tourists to Huatulco—suggest, instead, occu- trol of the area into colonial times. Decades earlier, Peter
pation of the region during the Formative era, as early as 400 Gerhard (1960:32–35) wrote that the Chontales may have
or 500 B.C.E. and perhaps earlier (Raul Matadamas, personal been the predominant group in the region in pre-Hispanic
communication, July 2006). These earliest residents of Hu- times, noting that the Nahua settled to the west while a small
atulco may have descended from an inland community in Zapotecan state was located to the northeast; both of these,
the Sierra Madre mountains of Oaxaca, but more probably Gerhard argued, paid tribute to the Mixtec king, Tututepec.
this initial population would have been a colony from one To make sense out of such varied conjectures, the present
of the urban centers in the Rio Verde Valley or Tehuantepec, head of Huatulco archaeology, Raul Matadamas (personal
both of which had been settled since Early Preclassic times communication, July 2006), argues that the Spanish who
and were under the rule of powerful leaders (Fernández and first arrived in Huatulco found a settlement of migrants,
Gómez 1988:7). containing a mixture of people and of languages.
In either case, it appears that the Postclassic resi- Whatever the origins and identities of Huatulco’s pre-
dents of Huatulco were dominated by regional powers lo- Hispanic residents, I am concerned with what the residents
Figure 8.2. Map of Site 69. From Enrique Fernández Dávila and Susana Gómez Serafı́n,
1988. Arqueologı́a de Huatulco, Oaxaca: Memoria de la Primera Temporada de Campo
del Proyecto Arqueológico Bahı́as de Huatulco. Roma, México: INAH.
might have been doing during Postclassic times, as indicated Shells at Site 69 are notable both for their bulk and
by Fernández and Gómez’s archaeological data. I take par- for their apparent use in the construction of foundations
ticular interest in a single site from the project report, Site for living quarters. On top of these shells there is evidence
69, which is located on the highest point of the peninsula that five rooms were constructed, covering an area of 40
that separates Bahia de Santa Cruz, Huatulco, from Bahia meters by 30 meters. The surface materials collected at this
de Chahué (Fernández and Gómez 1988:131) (Figure 8.2). site were present in light to moderate concentrations and
Here the land was rocky and had been leveled with a large include four of the five metates recovered in the project,
quantity of mollusk shells: over 21 thousand were recov- four of the 13 machacadores (each of the others was found
ered from the 19 excavation units. Fernández and Gómez individually across the various sites), and a single pulidor,
(1988:105–120) identify these shells by species and count. one of six recovered.3 Given these artifacts, Fernández and
Evidence of craft-working or other modification is not doc- Gómez (1988:132–133) suggest that the site served as a
umented in the site report, and the shells have not been local center. I now describe the shells recovered in the project
dated, nor have the levels at which they were found been before returning to examine this suggestion along with other
documented (Fernández and Gómez 1988). plausible shell functions.
Of interest, though, is that while Donald Brockington
and Robert Long (1974:19) described the slopes of
Huatulco’s primary port, Bahia Santa Cruz, as “covered Huatulco Shells and the Labor of Collection
with tremendous quantities of clam shells, all native to the
beaches” in an earlier project along Oaxaca’s coast and while With a single exception, noted below, the ratios of shell
Fernández and Gómez (1988:11) write that gathering and types in the various pits at Site 69 do not appear to be
consuming mollusks was one of the two most important significantly different; thus I have chosen to focus here on
economic activities in the region, Site 69 is, in fact, the only overall shell counts at the site. I will discuss those shells that
site in the 1988 project report at which shells were recorded. were most common in addition to those with unique prop-
Undoubtedly, the pervasiveness of shell in the coastal region erties that seem to suggest economic or symbolic value,
favors a tendency to take for granted the presence of shell rather than focusing on each of the 24 genera of pelecypods
in many of the excavated sites. The inclusion of shells into and gastropods that were identified.4 Most common, mak-
descriptions of Site 69, therefore, suggests at the very least ing up 90.5 percent of all shells recovered at Site 69, is the
their uniqueness in this particular context. species Codakia orbicularis, also called Pacific Tiger. This
106 Dawn Pankonien
clam is common to the coasts of Oaxaca, as it is through- in the site report of the Bahias de Huatulco excavation, it
out the world, in shallow waters and is found burrowed in may be noteworthy that densities of the Nerita and Conch
sand and sometimes mud, where it can be dug out with a in Huatulco are inversely proportionate to those same shell
stick or other tool at low tide (Abbott 1961:154–155; Dance densities in Ejutla. Though the existence of trade routes in-
1971:62; Keen 1958:98; Morris 1951:58). The shell of this land from Huatulco in the Postclassic is debated today, if
clam is approximately three inches long, white with a pinkish there was a demand for Conch shells inland, we might ex-
border on its inside margins. Large, solid, and only slightly pect to find, as we in fact do, fewer of these shells in their
inflated, it is perhaps better suited to creating a foundation native habitat. A lack of demand for the Nerita, similarly,
upon which to build than smaller pelecypods and the airier might explain greater quantities of the shell in indigenous
gastropods. In addition, this clam has served, historically, as contexts.
an important source of food in the region. Another mollusk type that is present both at Huatulco
The second most common genus, though making up Site 69 and in Ejutla is Thais. The authors of field guides and
only two percent of total shells found at the site, is Ostrea. conchology books sometimes conflate Thais with another
This oyster, not defined any more specifically in the site re- genus found at Site 69, Murex, and with a third, Púrpura,
port, is today a part of local diets. It is found in water from placing them in the single category “dye shellfish.” These
the shoreline to 35 meters deep, cemented to hard substrates, authors have argued that different genus names have been
and is easily collected by being plucked by hand from shal- applied to the same shellfish at varying times so that the
low water or when the tide is out (Keen 1958:64–65; Morris construction of a single category is necessary; meanwhile
1951:21). It is noteworthy that, at Site 69, the Ostrea was the ethnographers and locals continue to use the label Caracol
only shell that did not appear randomly dispersed across the Púrpura to describe the dye shellfish in almost all cases. To
pits examined; over 50 percent of these shells were found in avoid the complications that arise from these inconsisten-
a single pit. This suggests that the shellfish were repeatedly cies, I also use the label Caracol Púrpura in a discussion
used and discarded in a single location, such as a kitchen, that is relevant to both the Thais and the Murex genera. To
which then might support the common assumption that distinguish these two, I note only that the Murex occurs five
Ostrea was used as food in the Postclassic period just as times more frequently than the Thais at Site 69, according
it is today. to the project report.
The third most common shell recovered from Site 69 Caracol Púrpura is found at the shoreline clinging to
is Megapitaria aurantiaca. Similar to Codakia orbicularis, rocks (Keen 1958:370, 376–377). While these shells make
this is a clam, up to four inches in diameter, that burrows up .4 percent of the shells retrieved at Site 69, this is, perhaps,
into sand and mud. It is found at extremely low water levels due to extraction methods that do not create shell refuse,
and is dug out with a stick or tool in the same manner that and thus I use the presence of this mollusk—minor though
the Codakia is (Keen 1958:134). The shell of this mollusk is notable—to initiate discussion of a dye industry, dependent
large and thick and is also conducive to filling in the rocky on the shellfish, that once dominated the coasts of Oaxaca.
terrain to create a foundation on which to build. Field guides There are two reasons to believe that this mollusk would have
suggest that while Megapitaria is common to the Oaxaca been especially common in Huatulco during the Postclassic
region, it is less common than the Codakia; this alone may period. First, many field guides state that where there is a
explain its relatively infrequent use. rock there is a Púrpura, and Huatulco is especially notable
The small gastropod Nerita peloronta, the fourth most for its rocky coastline. Second, these mollusks are prominent
common shell recovered from the excavation units, and in both ethnohistoric and ethnographic records from the
Strombus (or Conch), very poorly represented, are two of region: scholars document women of the past and present
three mollusk genera from Site 69 that are mentioned in who migrated to Huatulco annually, remaining for two-week
Gary Feinman and Linda Nicholas’s (1995) work on shell periods to collect these shellfish from the shores (González
production in Ejutla. Both of these gastropods are found 2002; Nuttall 1909; Turok 1988).
intertidally on rocks and are common on the shores of The six shell types described above account for 94.4
Huatulco (Abbott 1961:66; Dance 1971:106–107; González percent of all the shells collected from Site 69. They are
2002; Keen 1958:265, 336). In Ejutla, Nerita was present each plucked by hand from sand and rocks, or sticks and
in low quantities and was “generally perforated and strung other tools are used to extract the mollusks one by one.
whole” (Feinman and Nicholas 1995:20) in craft production. In addition, they are each found intertidally—not in a wa-
The Conch, far more common in Ejutla than at Site 69, was ter zone where fishermen would be canoeing and pursuing
cut and shaped to make ornaments at the craft production fish. This means the shellfishing that was done in the re-
center. While there is no evidence of shell craft production gion was labor intensive and could not have been conducted
alongside deeper sea fishing. It would have demanded its cal populations, though only the oysters seem to have been
own laborers or that laborers split time between shallow- traded as a food and highly valued. The mollusks would
and deep-water regions. If we assume rigid gender relations not have been used as the primary source of food; such a
and the now commodified tales that depict men as fisher- diet is too high in protein and would lead to human illness
men who spent their days in boats away at sea, then only (Claassen 1998:183), but as each mollusk is a source of
the women—and perhaps, too, children—would have been protein, carbohydrates, fat, and essential minerals, it seems
present in shallow-water regions to carry out the labor of probable that these animals, obtained at the cost of relatively
shellfishing. While such an argument is simplistic, an exam- little human energy, would have been a part of the diet.
ination of the primary and secondary functions of the shells While Cheryl Claassen has challenged assumptions that
described here and discussion of the industries they imply shellfish are used solely for food, claiming that “in fishing
only further implicate women in processes of shell collec- societies . . . there is an important place for shellfish as
tion and production. In what follows, I describe the use of bait” (Claassen 1991:276), there is little evidence of such
shells as food, bait, construction material, and an important a function in Huatulco. Today fishermen rely on shrimp
dye source. I hypothesize various purposes for the structures and crab when fishing for bottom feeders, and they use
that were built on top of the shells and recount the debate a small fish, balyhoo, for other types of fishing (Patricio
over trade from the region, all the while locating women at Martı́nez). And while Fernández and Gómez (1988) note
the center of my discussion. that shells are frequently used to construct pins or needles,
punches, fishhooks, and lures—all of which might suggest a
method of fishing that mandated bait—there is no evidence
Shell Function of such tools at Site 69. Though the spears and harpoons
that might confirm a fishing method without bait are also
Thirty-five-year-old Huatulco native Patricio Martı́nez lacking, local residents continue to imagine their fishermen
is quick to suggest that the site would have been a garbage ancestors as hunting fish with such weapons. Given these
dump of sorts. “You know what they found?” he asks rhetor- arguments together, it seems most probable that the primary
ically, “All kinds of clam shells,” and with his hands he function of mollusks represented at Site 69 was food.
demonstrates the size of the Codakia orbicularis. Then he If this is so, even the androcentrics might argue that this
describes the process of salting clams, just as one would salt implicates women in work processes. Yes, women still use
other meats, to preserve them. mollusks in their cooking, explains Patricio, who maintains
Sisters Dalila, Raquel, and Francisca, who now staff a an all-female cooking staff at his Playa Maguey restaurant.
restaurant-bar just off of Huatulco’s main square and whose “It’s called ceviche,” he says with a smile; it is a dish partic-
family is from the small community of Ciruelos, Pochutla, ularly popular among Huatulco tourists today. And if there
25 minutes away, turn rapidly in our conversation to note were a permanent settlement at Site 69, yes, probably the
the clams’ value as a food. These young women are in their women would have been cooking, Patricio confirms, though
late teens and early twenties and especially matter-of-fact: he goes on to say that if the settlement were temporary or
“They’re for selling and to eat—they’re edible,” they tell me perhaps seasonal, no doubt men, women, and children would
together when I ask what you do with them. Vendedores am- all have been required to complete collection and extraction
bulantes, walking venders or peddlers, today sell almeja up more rapidly.5
and down the beaches to tourists seated in oceanfront restau- Both Patricio and another Huatulco native, Arcenio
rants, making selling clams as a food now more important Basa, recall a time, 20 to 30 years ago, when Santa Cruz
than eating them for a number of Huatulco residents. Never- Bay, the shallowest of the Huatulco bays, was still filled
theless, more recent Huatulco resident Ana Hernández lists with mollusks that were easily obtained by those willing to
ways to prepare them: “You put them in a paella with rice— wade out into the tides and to dig them out with their foot or
you put chicken and pork and salchicha and shrimp . . . or a small stick. This is not the case today. “My brother goes
you put them in sopa de mariscos, seafood cocktail, caldo out nadando, swimming, for all types of mollusks now,”
de amejas.” Arcenio tells me, because there are none in the shallow
No doubt the residents of early Huatulco were collecting waters anymore. He says this is because too many were col-
clams, bringing them to shore to be preserved, and then mov- lected in the earlier days, and there was no protection for
ing inland with the meat while the shells were left behind. them. Patricio adds that construction of the cruise ship port
Field guides suggest that at least the Codakia (clam), Ostrea at Santa Cruz, completed in 2003, is probably also partly to
(oyster), and Megapitaria (clam), the three most common blame. Regardless of cause—and despite the continued abil-
shells recovered from Site 69, were used as food by lo- ity of many local women to cite multiple recipes containing
108 Dawn Pankonien
shellfish—mollusks are no longer a major part of local diets. points and which would have been especially important to
Nevertheless, it seems probable they once were. communities as heavily dependent on marine products as
“Santa Cruz and Organo were two of the only beaches those on the coasts of Oaxaca appear to have been.
where you could find clams,” Patricio informs me, giving Adding weight to arguments that such a site would have
even greater strength to his argument that Site 69 is the refuse served as a spiritual center is the extensive scholarship on
site for a community extracting clams for food. The use of the symbolic value of shells, which have been associated
shells as landfill that is proposed by Fernández and Gómez with fertility, eternal life, capital and vision in the afterlife,
(1988) in their analysis of the site is, therefore, most likely and prowess in battle (Sheets 1974:222). My three sister
a secondary function. This is especially probable given that informants from the restaurant, Dalila, Raquel, and Fran-
the shells were recovered disarticulated. Claassen (2005) has cisca, laughed often while explaining to me that many people
found, elsewhere, piled shells still articulated and has argued in Huatulco—though men in particular—use the clams we
that these shells were intentionally deposited as they were were discussing as an aphrodisiac. Other scholars suggest
recovered. Here I contend that the meat of the clam was that shells are connected with royalty, protection from evil,
extracted as food and then the remaining shell was piled at and religion (Gerhard 1960:32–35, 1993:123–126; Naegel
Site 69. The shore was rocky, the people wanted to build, 2004). Nevertheless, there is little else to suggest a relation-
and they filled the gaps among the rocks with leftover shells, ship between shells and spirituality at the Huatulco site. The
as Fernández and Gómez seem to suggest. five foundations uncovered over a space of 40 meters by
The Codakia, the most frequently occurring genus at the 30 meters do not provide evidence of any obvious spiri-
site, and the Megapitaria, third most frequently occurring, tual function. Also, Huatulco residents quickly dismiss such
are large and sturdy clam shells, well suited to filling in the a suggestion. Without detailed knowledge of the spiritual
rocky peninsula. Their use as food would have motivated value of shellfish, it is difficult to understand what role
their collection, but also their shell size would have meant women may have played in such ritual matters. I merely
that fewer needed to be used in construction, while their note that this may be worth exploring in the future.
shell strength would have made a solid foundation on which As a second possibility, perhaps these shells were de-
to build. While the collection and cleaning of shellfish is not posited on a peninsula at its highest point to stabilize struc-
particularly labor intensive, hauling the shells to the point tures that were used as watchtowers. From such a vantage
where Site 69 is located may have intensified the workload point, residents would have been able to oversee both fish-
enough either to implicate both genders in this process or to ing and shellfishing activities in the two bays. They would
have rearranged relationships between gender and work. In have been able to observe oncoming storms and other en-
either case, this merits further investigation. couraging or prohibitive weather patterns and to coordinate
Locating this pile on the peninsula alongside Santa the activities that were occurring in both bays and along
Cruz Bay makes sense if in the Postclassic, as in the 1970s their shores. In addition, the white color of the most com-
and 1980s, Santa Cruz was one of two bays where mol- monly used seashells could reflect the sun or moon and
lusks were particularly common. But this does not yet ex- perhaps provided a guide for fishermen out at sea and return-
plain why the shells were recovered from the highest point ing home. Matadamas (personal communication, July 2006)
on the peninsula, one of the highest points in all of the made a similar argument for the function of the flat stone
Bahias de Huatulco area. Tourists now take taxis to the that stands at the top of the La Bocana site. Might such nat-
top, to where Site 69 once sat, which is today called Punta ural constructions stand as predecessors to the lighthouse
Santa Cruz, for one of the best vistas of Huatulco: a view now at the punta del faro? If so, who maintained these sites?
overlooking the still fairly new cruise ship port. Imagining The many accounts of Huatulco’s past—in which the men
Huatulqueños hiking the hill to deposit their refuse is diffi- are depicted as always at sea, always off fishing—make it
cult at best. easy to suggest that the women, and perhaps children, would
But if the site is not a refuse dump, what other purpose have been the only ones ashore to keep an eye on weather
might it have fulfilled? Perhaps the shells were deposited at patterns or to coordinate activities from this visible point.
the highest point to construct a spiritual center of sorts (Orr Matadamas (personal communication, July 2006) also
1996). Matadamas (personal communication, July 2006) de- describes the use of shell mixed with water and sand to create
scribes the ritual importance of such locations from the high- a concrete of sorts, one he has found stuccoing walls at the
est point of the archaeological site at La Bocana, four bays nearby La Bocana site. Perhaps the shells were amassed to be
down the coast, overlooking the sea, and situated much the used as building materials when construction projects were
same as Site 69 in Santa Cruz once was. He imagines sacri- under way. An androcentric might contend that the heavy
fices to the sea that could have been made easily from such lifting of wood and stone would have precluded women
from some processes of construction—this, of course, ig- the Postclassic times. The modern-day migration of women
nores a reality in which women worked with metates of four from surrounding communities to Huatulco specifically, as
kilograms or more for extensive periods and conducted other opposed to other neighboring areas, supports a hypothe-
strength-demanding labor both within and beyond the house- sis that Huatulco is not only well suited but also, perhaps,
hold. However, even the androcentric would have to agree best suited to this industry. And thus, it seems probable
that it would have been economically rational for women to that the community in Postclassic Huatulco would have in-
perform duties that complemented the heavy lifting, such vested resources in this industry. This, in turn, may have had
as hauling loads of shell, creating the stuccolike epoxy for important consequences regarding women’s activity in the
which they were used, and slathering the buildings after the region.
walls had been stacked. Anthropologists documenting the women who collect
the shells today conclude with phrases such as: “Mixtec
women from the north and Chontales from farther south
Púrpura Dye Industry have valued this dye for hundreds, and probably thousands,
of years” (González 2002:51), creating a sense of timeless-
If, in the Postclassic era, Huatulco was a community ness and arguing that the craft existed in the New World
of fishermen and fisherwomen collecting and processing long before the arrival of the Spanish. These scholars cite
not only the fish recalled in modern discourse but also the pre-Columbian textiles with bluish stripes recovered in Peru
mollusks evinced at Site 69—their meat to be used as food (Nuttall 1909:377; Turok 1988:22), or they argue that if the
and their shells to be used, perhaps, in construction—there Spanish had introduced the Púrpura dye craft, that introduc-
are many reasons to believe that in this same period Huatulco tion would have been on the rocky islands and coasts of the
was also an important center of mollusk dye production. The Caribbean Sea not on the Pacific coasts of Oaxaca (Nuttall
Caracol Púrpura found at Site 69 secretes a chemical stain 1909:376). After extensive research into the industry, Marta
ranging from dull red to violet (Sheets 1974:221) that has Turok (1988:21–22) concludes that not only did the Púrpura
been used as a dye since at least 1600 B.C.E. in Europe. This dye industry exist before the arrival of the Spanish but also,
dye industry has long played a significant role in Mexican in fact, the New World Púrpura dye industry expanded in-
coastal economies, especially in what is today the state of dependent of and long before Old World demand.
Oaxaca (Hamnett 1971), and Huatulco, in particular, might Nevertheless, several passages in conchology books
have been especially active in this púrpura dye industry, continue to suggest that the activity of extracting dye from
given both its rocky coastline and a series of ethnographic the mollusks was brought to the New World by the Span-
accounts that describe the importance of such industry in ish and that Spanish ships traveled along coasts looking
the region in more recent times. for rocky shores where they could find an abundance of
In 1974, Elva Sheets wrote, “No matter where in the the Púrpura (Sheets 1974:221–222). Conchologist Ludwig
world I have searched, it seemed that although nothing else Naegel (2004:212), noting written evidence of the use of
could be found, if there was a rock anywhere in sight for shellfish purple from Central America dating to the 17th
it to cling to, the Thais [Púrpura] and its family would be and 18th centuries, argues that evidence before this time
waiting to greet me” (Sheets 1974:158). Sheets suggests that is scarce and unconvincing. Textiles do not preserve well
rocky shores, including those of Huatulco, are overrun with in the subtropical climate, and the fact that the dye can be
these mollusks (see also Keen 1958:370). Indeed, a 1909 harvested from live shellfish that are then returned to the wa-
report on Púrpura shellfish stated that in the Huamelula area ter means that shell middens are not necessarily a by-product
the shellfish had become so scarce that “fishermen were of the craft (Naegel 2004:212).
often obliged to proceed as far north as Huatulco [100 miles Also complicating my discussion of the use of mollusks
away] to fill their orders and dye the thread entrusted to as a purple dye is the use of the cochineal bug as a purple
them” (Nuttall 1909:370). dye in this same region. Ronald Spores (1984:128) describes
Additionally, Mixtec and Zapotec women from the cochineal as pre-Hispanic Mesoamerica’s most valued dye,
towns surrounding Huatulco, as well as others from the long used by the Mixtecs but produced at drastically greater
highlands, continue to migrate to the region to spend several rates after a boom in European demand in the 16th cen-
weeks in the dry season each year extracting these snails tury. Throughout this colonial period, the “royal purple” dye
from the cliffs when the tides are out (González 2002:51, and dyed clothes that were made, by law, from the Púrpura
55–57; Naegel 2004; Nuttall 1909:368; Turok 1988). Given mollusk were also being exported from Huatulco to South
these observations, it seems highly likely that the Púrpura America and ultimately to Europe and Asia, where mar-
existed in abundance along the coasts of Huatulco during ket demand sustained exorbitant prices for this, the “true”
110 Dawn Pankonien
royal purple (Cole 1686:8; Nuttall 1909:372, 376; Sheets rules for who could (or should) produce would have shaped
1974:144). This coincidence of the two purple dye indus- social networks and community interaction. A newly boom-
tries has resulted in these two distinct industries’ conflation ing industry might also have attracted migrant laborers to
into a single “purple dye industry” that boomed in Mexico further diversify the already multicultural region. And even
in the 17th and 18th centuries. children might have been implicated in work processes as
Although the two dyes produce similar outcomes, the production expanded.
two dye crafts are very different. The process of obtaining We need to ask not only, “What is being given up or
mollusk-derived dye is even more labor intensive than that replaced by those who engage in the dye craft?” but also,
of obtaining dye from the cochineal. The mollusks, once “How has this craft altered through time?” in order to un-
collected, would have been crushed, boiled, or “tickled”— derstand the significance of the Púrpura dye industry. As
an alternative means of provoking the mollusks to secrete cloth was commodified, dyeing practices may have become
their dye—and this dye would then have to be applied to the more mundane, or dyes might have been used to infuse
textiles, usually directly (Cole 1686:2–4; Keen 1958:376; certain cloth with status that was no longer inherent in its
Naegel 2004; Nuttall 1909:369).6 Twelve thousand mollusks weaving. Brumfiel (2006) notes that embroidery and other
secrete approximately 1.4 grams of pigment, which would techniques were adopted by the elite class to elaborate ever
color only a few yards of cotton cloth (Naegel 2004; Nuttall more common cloth. Labor processes and the gendered or
1909:374)—this was never a supplemental or secondary classed division of labor in Huatulco would have changed,
craft; it commands much time and effort. And that the craft just as they were changing at the centers of cloth production
was not eliminated by the more efficient cochineal dye craft described by Brumfiel.
suggests, then, that the outcomes of the two dye processes
are not equivalent (González 2002:51, 55–57).
Púrpura dye production was not likely a stable industry. Trading in Huatulco
It would have been especially susceptible to environmen-
tal and climatic conditions that determined the availabil- Hypothesized expansion of production in an industry as
ity of the mollusks as well as to local and nonlocal de- specialized as the Púrpura dye industry necessitates further
mand that would have determined the opportunity costs of hypothesis of a booming trading industry, one that would
production—or of nonproduction. Textile supply, too, would disseminate the dyes along with other coastal goods.7 The
have affected dye production. Elizabeth Brumfiel (2006) has raw materials, food products, and artifacts from the Pacific
described the expansion of cloth production in Postclassic coast found at pre-Hispanic sites in the Valley of Oaxaca
Mesoamerica, suggested by an increase in spindle whorls and elsewhere in the regions’ highlands suggest trade and
especially in the homes of commoners, following changes exchange routes dating back to the Early Formative pe-
in social rules for who was allowed to weave. In explaining riod (Feinman and Nicholas 1993). While these exchanges
the shift in production, Brumfiel writes: were once thought to precede settlement in Huatulco dur-
ing the Classic or Postclassic period (Brockington and Long
As commercial activity increased, cloth was transformed
1974:17–19; Fernández and Gómez 1988) so that the urban
from an inalienable good into a commodity. In the
anonymity of the market system, cloth produced by com- centers of Tehuantepec or the lower Rio Verde Valley would
moners could be passed off as the same product as cloth have been the likely sources of highland shell, this is no
produced by elites. Market exchange would have encour- longer clear.
aged commoner women to engage in cloth production to Many scholars continue to argue that there is little rea-
support themselves and their families through spinning
son to believe that shell products found inland originated in
and weaving, as they did on the eve of Spanish conquest.
[Brumfiel 2006:863] Huatulco specifically. A major port was located at Huatulco
in the Postclassic period, a port that continued in promi-
Imagining, then, that there was a dye industry in nence after the Spanish arrived and until a roadway from
Huatulco, it seems likely that such expansion in the textile Mexico City to Acapulco allowed the Acapulco port to sur-
industry would have increased production of dye and dyed pass that at Huatulco in importance (Hassig 1985:168). Yet
cloth. And if men were off fishing, as so many ethnographers this port was used for the transport of goods north and south
assume, it seems probable that such changes would have re- along the coastline, linking Peru to North America, and does
configured women’s roles most drastically. Industry growth not necessarily imply a flow of goods inland. Feinman and
would have mandated far greater commitment from these Nicholas (1993, 1995, 2000, 2004a, 2004b), who have done
women dyers, undoubtedly altering their positions within extensive work on shell use in household craft and orna-
and relationships to the household, while the new social ment manufacture in central Oaxaca, suggest only that the
shells being worked in the Ejutla Valley are from the Pacific Conclusion
coast of Oaxaca. In Huatulco—separated from the rest of
Mexico by the formidable Sierra Madre del Sur mountain I come to this project as a feminist ethnographer looking
range and composed of rocky shorelines that made commu- to diversify my training and also to uncover the androcen-
nication among regions even within Huatulco problematic— trism within my own research. In this chapter I am intrigued
both coordinating shell collection and craft and transporting by many archaeological questions that remain unanswered,
products through the mountain range would have been es- and I have felt it necessary to include several of them. But,
pecially difficult. Feinman and Nicholas (1993, 1995, 2000) ultimately, I have turned my attention to what we can know.
and Zeitlin and Joyce (1999; see also Joyce 1991 and Zeitlin As we begin to ask about the past industries of Huatulco, we
1990) suggest, instead, that coastal sites to the north and must ask how each of our findings might create new roles
south of Huatulco may have been the primary sources of the for the women in Huatulco, beyond that of fisherman’s wife.
coastal goods at inland settlements. Given the diversity of industries and of the work processes
Nevertheless, several scholars argue adamantly that within each industry, it seems as unlikely that men were al-
Huatulco did in fact play a role in these early exchanges ways off fishing, always at sea, as it does that women were
and their position is strengthened by the new evidence of uninvolved in local economic activities. If Site 69 was a
Formative settlement at the La Bocana site (Matadamas, ritual center or a watchtower, might this mean that women
personal communication, July 2006). Cultural anthropolo- were conducting ceremonies or overseeing fishing activi-
gist Alicia González suggests that Huatulco shells “were ties from above? If mollusks were food or produced dye,
traded with inlanders who used them as inlay, for trade, in might women be the primary laborers in these industries?
their architecture, and in many other ways. They were used And how would inland trade alter women’s movements or
as vessels, as hachas (axes), made into spoons and imple- responsibilities?
ments for fishing, used for ornamentation, for beading, and I rely on the archaeological findings of Fernández and
for a host of other things” (González 2002:51). Fernández Gómez (1988) to pose such questions, in an attempt to locate
and Gómez (1988:7) contend that the presence of nonlocal women within the historic political economy of Huatulco,
basalt and obsidian indicates exchange, while conjecturing Oaxaca, Mexico. My bottom line is that it seems improb-
that residents were processing salt (from the sea) and dye able that women were hanging out in their huts of palm
(from the Púrpura) for export, perhaps as tribute. Matadamas on the beaches while the men were fishing, clamming, per-
(personal communication, July 2006) has hiked the Copalita forming rituals, overseeing water activities, extracting dye,
River inland on repeated 30-day treks, and he is convinced dyeing, trading, and so on and so forth. And if men were
that there is evidence of communities—house structures and fishing from boats offshore as so many ethnographers have
other buildings—along the route, which not only suggests assumed, it seems highly likely that the women would be do-
trade but also suggests that the river passage inland was a ing the shellfishing closer to land—and perhaps performing
major trade route. rituals, overseeing water activities, extracting dye, dyeing,
If such trade was occurring, it would have had a sig- and trading as well. In so many ethnographies, the men are
nificant impact on gender relations in the region, just as do depicted as always at sea, always off fishing, because fishing,
international migration flows today. In a study of migration it is assumed, is the only “real” work to be done in Huatulco.
out of Ecuador, Jason Pribilsky (2007) has complicated as- Yet all of the shells from Site 69 that I have discussed above
sumptions that migrated men are absent from their families’ are found intertidally, not in a water zone where fishermen
lives, arguing that the men in his study continue to perform would be canoeing and pursuing fish. Thus, building on the
roles as fathers and husbands through the exchange of gifts works of past ethnographers but recognizing the diversity of
and commodities. Nevertheless, this leaves women conduct- industries in the region, it is easy to suggest that the women
ing the work of daily life and sustaining communities largely must be involved in a complex and changing set of activities.
in the absence of their male partners. Similarly, perhaps, if Predictably, the site I utilize in this chapter is now below
major trade routes existed in Postclassic Huatulco, women a series of elite houses, villas, and condominiums. Hotels
might have been left largely in charge of sustaining life on a reached full occupancy in the spring 2006 high season for
day-to-day basis in the region, at least at certain times of the the first time in Huatulco’s history and as investment into
year. Or, following Shawn Kanaiaupuni (2000), we might the area appears increasingly risk free, affluent outsiders are
challenge arguments that women are more strongly tied to flooding in once again, bringing new construction and new
kin and place and thus are less likely actors in spheres of hope to an economy that has disappointed many over the
migration or long-distance trade. Perhaps women were also past two decades. Husbands and wives in the region are, to-
trekking inland to engage in trade. day, running businesses together—cafes, restaurants, bars,
112 Dawn Pankonien
hotels—because “that’s how it is here,” Patricio explains. bus gigas, Strombus granulatas, Strombus sp., Conus sp.,
And yet, rates of divorce and separation are up, above those Tonicella lineata, Thais haemastoma, and Dentalium sp.
at the national level, and single motherhood is common- (Fernández and Gómez 1988:119).
place, so that women are often working to support families 5. I mean not to read the present back onto the past by
independent of husbands or other male family members. using contemporary ethnography but rather to take seriously
Housework, today, can be outsourced: to laundries that are the interpretations of archaeological sites posed by those
more affordable than washing machines, to food stands that who hail from the region.
vend tacos and tamales below market rates. And while this 6. The crushing of shells or tickling of mollusks that
has not yet brought gender equity to Huatulco, I now work are then replaced to be harvested another year might explain
alongside a team of male waiters and a barman intent on the lack of Murex shells at Site 69 although they are in the
proving to me that they are not machos, that in fact they met region.
their wives while working in restaurants alongside of them 7. Ultimately, the only reliable method to determine the
and that they do not feel bad when their wives sometimes origin of inland shells is to conduct a thorough study of the
earn more than they do. coasts of Oaxaca, documenting which mollusks are found
Gender relations in Huatulco continue to shift, as they where in what seasons (Gary Feinman, personal commu-
always have, shaped by industries that vary and economies nication, February 2006). Comparative study between the
that evolve. A past of rigid gender roles and passive women shells recovered in Ejutla and those from Huatulco should
is easily commodified in the tourism venture that has over- also be pursued, and relationships among shell densities in
taken Huatulco, and there are many who will leave with the regions should be explored in an attempt to expose the
photographs of weathered old men in boats offshore just as market forces that may have existed. For example, might de-
the ethnographers describe—though today these men are far mand for the Conch in craft production inland make its use
more likely to be taking tourists out for tours of the bays than as a foundation material along the coast far less likely? Find-
they are to be fishing. This depiction persists because it is of ing consistencies and disparities in the use of shell within
an imagined past, yet one that makes little sense given the these neighboring sites would shed light not only on the
diversity of industry and the complexity of work processes movement of shell between groups but also on the groups
in Huatulco that must have shifted through time. One needs themselves, their cultural preferences, and their opportunity-
only a pile of shells to begin to unravel such history. cost evaluations. But until such projects have been carried
out, we must rely on field guides that offer rough estimates
Notes of the global regions in which certain mollusk species may
be found (Dance 1990; Keen 1958; Keen and Coan 1974;
1. See also the endless array of tour and hotel propa- Sheets 1974). Often a field guide’s “region” spans 60 degrees
ganda turned up by any internet search of Huatulco. of latitude or more; California through Peru boast the same
2. Patricio Martı́nez was one of my key informants dur- mollusks. These rough estimates are of little use to an ar-
ing fieldwork that took place in Huatulco, Oaxaca, Mexico, chaeologist who needs to determine whether shells are from
from July through September 2006. The information pre- point A or from point B, 161 kilometers down the coast.
sented in this chapter was garnered through face-to-face Thus, here I merely describe both sides of the argument over
conversations with Patricio during this time. trade in Huatulco.
Arcenio Basa, who appears later in this chapter, was
another informant from that fieldwork. My encounters with References
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Archaeological Papers of The American - 2008 - Pankonien - 8 She Sells Seashells Women and Mollusks in Huatulco Oaxaca

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I n Huatulco, Mexico, today no one claims that gender rela-

Figure 8.1. Bahias de Huatulco and surroundings.

Brumfiel, Elizabeth M. Oaxaca. In Cultural Evolution: Contemporary

Dance, S. Peter Gero, Joan M.

Joyce, Arthur tion for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Stud-

Joyce, Rosemary A. Portes, Alejandro, and Alex Stepick

Keen, A. Myra, and Eugene Coan Turok, Marta

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