Shannon,
 
I thought I would run with Shannon Dawdy's thought and suggest that the token
she found which were pierced without a doubt certainly carried the meaning of
re-interpretation.  Think of pierced coins which were thus taken out of
circulation for the sake of personal and spiritiual identity.  They served to
distinguish their wearers from the dominant culture through their enmeshment
in an alternative and subversive system of symbols and meanings.  Tokens,
produced and distributed by the practice of debt-peonage, made material the
practice itself in a way that the subjects of the practice could hold and
manipulate into their own cultural system.  This is fun thinking and I
appreciate Dawdy's thoughts and hope for more.