ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author take a forward-looking perspective, considering where Preceramic archaeology is heading based on the research presented here and suggesting some directions it should take if the people are to achieve better understandings of the deep history of Mesoamerica. Despite these issues, in this concluding chapter, the author would like to take a glass half-full approach and focus on the challenges and opportunities presented by Preceramic archaeology. The discovery at Yuzanu of the earliest known example of a bell-shaped pit in Mesoamerica demonstrates the Archaic-period origins of a storage technology that would become prominent in the Formative period. More broadly in Mesoamerica, and even within the greater Soconusco region, there seems to be considerable variability in the timing and order of the emergence of ceramic technologies, sedentism, agriculture, and initial social inequality. Preceramic archaeology in Mesoamerica has reached another period of accelerated research.
