> archaeologists of a traditional bent tend to have a particular thought structure called essentialism, which means that they do everything they can to come up with a coherent story according to a progressive view of social change. They keep looking for and exaggerate specific evidence to fit that progressive model. Southeast Asia is different. It offers an outstanding example of bottom-up social change, of community-level decision making. It’s a chance to study prehistoric societies in a more granular way, and it’s a fundamental shift for archaeologists. We’re still early on in trying to promote this different point of view and in using metals as a vehicle to gain this perspective.

Summary seems to be that testing the metals of different regions showed evidence of community trading not facilitated by ruling elites?