| NSF Org: |
BCS Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences |
| Recipient: |
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| Initial Amendment Date: | December 21, 2020 |
| Latest Amendment Date: | May 21, 2021 |
| Award Number: | 2102817 |
| Award Instrument: | Standard Grant |
| Program Manager: |
John Yellen
jyellen@nsf.gov (703)292-8759 BCS Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences SBE Directorate for Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences |
| Start Date: | January 1, 2021 |
| End Date: | June 30, 2023 (Estimated) |
| Total Intended Award Amount: | $30,300.00 |
| Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $30,300.00 |
| Funds Obligated to Date: |
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| History of Investigator: |
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| Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
1 UNIVERSITY OF NEW MEXICO ALBUQUERQUE NM US 87131-0001 (505)277-4186 |
| Sponsor Congressional District: |
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| Primary Place of Performance: |
1700 Lomas Blvd. NE, Suite 2200 Albuquerque NM US 87131-0001 |
| Primary Place of
Performance Congressional District: |
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| Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): |
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| Parent UEI: |
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| NSF Program(s): | Archaeology DDRI |
| Primary Program Source: |
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| Program Reference Code(s): |
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| Program Element Code(s): |
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| Award Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Fund Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Assistance Listing Number(s): | 47.075 |
ABSTRACT
This doctoral dissertation research project examines how societies living on the edges of more complexly organized groups engage with the material culture of these groups and, by extension, with the groups themselves. Around the globe, the expansion of complex societies into adjacent peripheral areas has resulted in substantial, long-term impacts through processes such as colonization and globalization. Previous research has examined these processes through a focus on how cultural cores engage with adjacent areas. Yet, choices by inhabitants within these peripheral areas on how to interact with one or more cultural cores may provide key insights into identity formation in borderland regions. By understanding how past borderland groups engaged materially with cultural cores, this project contributes to ongoing discussions of the relationship between social identity and cultural heritage in borderland regions. In addition to training a doctoral student, the project will improve the display of archaeological materials at several institutions along in the borderlands in the Southwest and will contribute to the education of contemporary inhabitants and culturally affiliated Indigenous communities in the area. This project will generate data of interest to archaeologists, museums, and local communities and will also provide innovative comparative methods and improve existing theoretical approaches to understanding edge regions.
The research investigates the processes of cross-cultural interaction in a peripheral intermediate society by focusing on how settlements in the periphery engaged with several cultural cores. The data for this project comes from ten excavated village sites and additional surveyed sites in a borderland region. Using physical and geochemical analysis of ceramic artifacts, radiocarbon dating, and settlement-based architectural and mortuary analyses, the researchers will evaluate four different models of edge regions and assess changes over time in the study area. They will also employ Bayesian statistical modeling to improve the radiocarbon dates and establish a robust chronology for individual sites in the area to understand how local communities responded to the establishment of a socio-politically complex polity.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT
Disclaimer
This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.
This project strove to investigate how individuals living between the edges of an expansionist, hierarchically organized society and a dynamic socioreligious movement engaged with both, yet retained autonomy to continue existing lifeways. As part of this, the investigators analyzed ca. 80,000 ceramic artifacts from a dozen archaeological sites in far southeastern Arizona, southwestern New Mexico, northeastern Sonora, and northwestern Chihuahua and submitted nearly 500 of them for geochemical analysis to determine the production locations of vessels, accessed archival documents from excavation and survey projects to develop a comparative database of architecture and mortuary traits, and compared to each other. Results demonstrate that the expansion of the Casas Grandes regional system in the late thirteenth through early fourteenth centuries impacted the inhabitants of individual settlements differently. For instance, individuals in southeastern Arizona and and northeastern Sonora tended to relate to numerous groups in the area, while also retaining local traditions. Contrastingly, in southwestern New Mexico, several sites demonstrate abnormally strong ties to the area surrounding the Casas Grandes center, potentially indicating direct migration of individuals from northwestern Chihuahua to these settlements. The implications of this study are significant in that they provide a strong case of a borderland in the archaeological record and offer an opportunity to integrate contemporary historical approaches to borderlands and frontiers to the archaeological record. Second, they allow future researchers to address new questions and improve narratives by developing a transborder history of the area, something sorely absent in many regional narratives. Finally, the junior investigator of the project presented the results of this study to numerous interest groups in the borderlands zone and was able to collaborate with archaeologists in Mexico, furthering the communal impact of the project.
Last Modified: 09/05/2023
Modified by: Thatcher A Rogers
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