Lisa DeLance is a lecturer in anthropology at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, and the project archivist for the Belize Valley Archaeological Reconnaissance (BVAR) Project. Her research focuses on social complexity, state formation processes, negotiations of power, gender, and kinship.  Gary M. Feinman is the MacArthur Curator of Anthropology at The Field Museum, Chicago. He is the founding and contact coeditor for the Journal of Archaeological Research and has published more than 15 books and 200 scholarly articles, reviews, and chapters. His research interests include comparative studies of leadership, cooperation, and inequality; preindustrial economics; urbanism; and the complex relations between humans and environments over time.

“An innovative and up-to-date synthesis of artifactual, iconographic, and settlement pattern data that examines how diverse groups negotiated new social environments and economic interactions during Mesoamerica’s Formative period.”—Jessica L. Munson, Lycoming College"An excellent set of chapters provides new data and updated interpretations of pathways to complexity at a range of important sites from across the region. Anyone interested in the origins of social complexity in Mesoamerica or elsewhere should read this book." —American Anthropology“An important leap forward in the investigations into the origins of ancient Maya civilization.”—Journal of Anthropological Research

Lisa DeLance is a lecturer in anthropology at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, and the project archivist for the Belize Valley Archaeological Reconnaissance (BVAR) Project. Her research focuses on social complexity, state formation processes, negotiations of power, gender, and kinship.  Gary M. Feinman is the MacArthur Curator of Anthropology at The Field Museum, Chicago. He is the founding and contact coeditor for the Journal of Archaeological Research and has published more than 15 books and 200 scholarly articles, reviews, and chapters. His research interests include comparative studies of leadership, cooperation, and inequality; preindustrial economics; urbanism; and the complex relations between humans and environments over time.

“An innovative and up-to-date synthesis of artifactual, iconographic, and settlement pattern data that examines how diverse groups negotiated new social environments and economic interactions during Mesoamerica’s Formative period.”—Jessica L. Munson, Lycoming College"An excellent set of chapters provides new data and updated interpretations of pathways to complexity at a range of important sites from across the region. Anyone interested in the origins of social complexity in Mesoamerica or elsewhere should read this book." —American Anthropology“An important leap forward in the investigations into the origins of ancient Maya civilization.”—Journal of Anthropological Research

Lisa DeLance is a lecturer in anthropology at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, and the project archivist for the Belize Valley Archaeological Reconnaissance (BVAR) Project. Her research focuses on social complexity, state formation processes, negotiations of power, gender, and kinship.  Gary M. Feinman is the MacArthur Curator of Anthropology at The Field Museum, Chicago. He is the founding and contact coeditor for the Journal of Archaeological Research and has published more than 15 books and 200 scholarly articles, reviews, and chapters. His research interests include comparative studies of leadership, cooperation, and inequality; preindustrial economics; urbanism; and the complex relations between humans and environments over time.

“An innovative and up-to-date synthesis of artifactual, iconographic, and settlement pattern data that examines how diverse groups negotiated new social environments and economic interactions during Mesoamerica’s Formative period.”—Jessica L. Munson, Lycoming College"An excellent set of chapters provides new data and updated interpretations of pathways to complexity at a range of important sites from across the region. Anyone interested in the origins of social complexity in Mesoamerica or elsewhere should read this book." —American Anthropology“An important leap forward in the investigations into the origins of ancient Maya civilization.”—Journal of Anthropological Research