ABSTRACT
In anthropology questions of identity are not simply restricted to cultural or psychological structures in the present or the ethnographic past, but also extend to physical identity in the present and in prehistory. For the earlier periods of hominid evolution we are accustomed to constructing genealogical trees and anthropological-biological theories to account for the physical and material changes we observe in the archaeological and palaeoanthropological record. Modern history presents us with physical and material changes which are different from, but perhaps parallel to, the changes observed by palaeoanthropologists. Indigenous peoples of North America are assumed to have a specific physiology and material culture. However, when we discuss modern descendants of precontact and colonial aboriginal populations, we are surprised to find changes in both material and physical identity. Some aspects of change and identity in physical and material culture are explored in this chapter, with reference to the eastern USA in general and Virginia in particular.
