Saxe–Goldstein hypothesis

In archaeology, the Saxe–Goldstein hypothesis is a prediction about the relationship between a society's funerary practices and its social organization. It predicts a correlation between two phenomena: the use of specific areas to dispose of the dead, and the legitimation of control over restricted resources through claims of descent from dead ancestors. The hypothesis was first formulated by the American anthropologist Arthur Saxe in 1970, as the last in a series of eight, and was refined by Lynne Goldstein later in the 1970s. In reference to its origin, it is sometimes known as Hypothesis Eight.

Saxe's work drew on the ethnographic work of Mervyn Meggitt and the role theory developed by Ward Goodenough. He predicted that, if a society contained groups of people with a shared identity (known as "corporate groups") that legitimized their claims to important, restricted resources by claiming ties to ancestors, that society would be more likely to use formal areas, such as cemeteries, for the disposal of the dead. Conversely, societies using such areas would be more likely to contain such corporate groups. His work coincided with that of Lewis Binford, who argued that funerary practices provided useful evidence for social organization and for the status of the deceased in life. Studying the treatment of the dead to investigate these areas came to be known as the Saxe–Binford program. Lynne Goldstein modified the hypothesis to stipulate that formal disposal areas were only one possible means of claiming ties to ancestors, and therefore that the lack of such areas need not imply the lack of corporate groups using those ties to compete over resources.