ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the performative elements of one class of material culture and its circulation in the Egyptian community of Deir el Medina. Using the mechanisms of material resistance, specific individuals mobilized a precocious satire of social hierarchy and launched interventions that instantiated serious social critique. Ostraca are both representational and physical objects that could also be seen as magic doubles that encapsulated images of individuals and scenarios. The lifeworld is the transcendental site where speaker and hearer meet and where they can criticize and confirm validity claims, settle disputes and arrive at agreement. In this manner it provides a potential framework for change or modification in belief or attitude about the world. It is that process of sharing and viewing the material culture of resistance and subversion that reshapes the lifeworld of a community like Deir el Medina.
