Recasting mobility and movement in Eastern North America

This chapter seeks to transcend the negative socio-economic undertones cast upon mobile populations and to frame historic mobility in Eastern North America as a normative practice with underlying adaptive advantage. Case studies from the early modern fishery are used to revisit archaeological notions of marginality, landlessness and poverty and to highlight people’s creative responses to challenging social, economic and environmental conditions. A mobile lifestyle can be precarious but also practical and strategic. The archaeological manifestations of frequent movement can reveal the dynamism of past populations, redefine spatiotemporal perceptions of peripheral spaces and acknowledge the importance of interconnectedness between places.