Shi Jie Zhu

While foodways analysis has long been recognized in anthropology as a productive framework for understanding social relations, it has yet to be systematically applied to late Neolithic China—a period marked by profound sociopolitical transformations, including processes of urbanization. My project addresses this gap by examining foodways across diverse social contexts to assess shifts in social differentiation within two pivotal regions–the lower Yangtze and Haidai areas. The study incorporates ceramic materials from four sites in the lower Yangtze core and three sites from distinct Haidai microregions. By analyzing ceramics from both domestic and burial contexts to examine variation in their production and consumption over time, I address the central question: did variation in foodways facilitate changes in social differentiation at these sites, and if so, how? I employ a multi-method approach to ceramic analysis to investigate a series of sub-questions regarding potential ways in which specific types of variation in foodways might increase over time in relation to increased degree of either horizontal or vertical social differentiation. Ultimately, my research aims to illuminate how everyday food practices may shape social differentiation in urban contexts over time, offering comparative insights for early societies across the globe.