L. Antonio Curet- Assistant Curator of Circum-Caribbean Archaeology, has been working on the development of institutionalized stratification in the Caribbean, specifically in Puerto Rico. Along with Lee Newsom, Associate Professor for Penn State University, he has been studying the site of the Tibes site in southern Puerto Rico. Tibes is so far the earliest ceremonial center in the Caribbean, and possibly, one of the clearest evidence of early social hierarchization. Between A.D. 600 and 900 Puerto Rico showed major social, cultural, political, and economic changes that are reflected in the archaeological record in the form of shifts in mortuary patterns and household composition and size. In Tibes these changes included also a shift from a village community pattern to a ceremonial center where more than 10 monumental structures in the form of ball courts and plazas were built. The focus of the project is to study the processes involved in these changes at the level of households and the community by comparing domestic remains through space and time. So, far the project has concentrated on discovering the domestic areas by using shovel pits, test units, and geophysical techniques (i.e., magnetometry, resistivity, and ground penetrating radar). Working and cooking areas have already been discovered and subsequent research seasons will concentrate on defining, characterizing, and analyzing these areas in more detail. Other Anthropology Department Research: Africa | Asia | Cultural Understanding | Caribbean | Mesoamerica | North America | Oceania | South America