We examine the ways that textile production, exchange, and consumption were integrated into the political economy of the Gulf lowlands, Mexico, over the course of two millennia. Archaeological, botanical, and historical data concerning cotton textile production reveal that changes in the industry resulted from alterations in the cotton plant, shifts in the local political economy, and changes in the relationship of the Gulf lowlands to other key regions of Mesoamerica. Initially, textiles did not figure prominently in social displays, and there is little archaeological evidence for spinning of cotton thread. Subsequently, textile production may have been stimulated by elite substitution of locally crafted items for increasingly scarce exotic imports toward the end of Olmec times in the Preclassic period. The political and cultural stature of the Gulf lowlands increased during the Classic period in conjunction with a greater emphasis on cotton processing and use of textiles. During the Postclassic period, ruralization of once-key localities and possible conversion of the western lower Papaloapan Basin to a tributary status correlated with changes in the attributes of whorls and in representations of textiles.

A long-running debate in archaeology is the analytical priority given to local vs. interregional-scale factors in the origins of complex societies. These alternate approaches have often pitted local-scale, environmentally determined models against the large-scale, sociopolitical demands of ancient cities and states. In the archaeology of Oaxaca, Mexico, these distinctions are apparent in efforts to model the impact of Monte Albán on the development of complexity outside the Valley of Oaxaca. Huamelulpan, located in the western Mixteca Alta, Oaxaca, was one of Mesoamerica's first urban centers. But despite several decades of intermittent work, the site had never been surveyed, and nearly nothing was known of the surrounding region. A systematic archaeological survey of Huamelulpan and its environs studied the urban transition from a regional perspective. Huamelulpan's urbanization was strongly correlated with the formation of a state-level polity. Interaction with Monte Albán occasioned these developments, albeit in ways more indirect than colonization or conquest. An approach to culture change is outlined that uses archaeological survey data to shift the scale of analysis between local, regional, and interregional levels to interpret the transition to city and state in Oaxaca's Huamelulpan Valley.

Recent archaeological study of the architecture at the Wari site of Pikillacta provides information concerning the function of one of three basic Wari architectural forms. These buildings, called Type II niched halls, occur at both Pikillacta and Viracochapampa, the two largest known Wari provincial sites. Their function can be deduced from a variety of evidence: data from excavations and associated artifacts, analogy with earlier, contemporary, and later Andean ritual/ceremonial buildings, and representations of buildings in Wari art. Based on this analysis, the niched halls apparently served as lineage halls where both real and fictive kin came to formally worship their ancestors. It is suggested that co-option of conquered elites by adoption, and thereby establishing a set of reciprocal obligations, may have been a strategy practiced by the Wari as a principal feature of their statecraft.