Dissertation Research: Human Environmental Interaction in anAmazonian Ecosystem

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This project involves the dissertation research of an anthropology student from the University of Georgia, studying how Brazilian Amazon subsistence farmers adapt to ecological changes. Fieldwork in a `blackwater` (ecologically impoverished) area will show how local farmers exploit different soil types (floodplain and non-flood zones and a particularly rich soil known as `black earth`) to accomplish their goals of sustainability. The student will study four communities along a river, two on `black earth` and two on non-`black earth` soils. The researcher will conduct soil analyses and fertility experiments, record crop regimes and labor inputs as well as in-depth analyses of the cognitive models farmers use to work the land. Botanical collections will also be made to document land use. This research is important because the tropics represent a zone of enormous potential agricultural productivity, and this research will advance our understanding of how humans have learned to exploit the potential of different soil types. The study will contribute to our understanding of human adaptive potential by analyzing the variation in agricultural exploitation in this important zone.