Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Award: Ceramic Production and Distribution in the U.S. Southwest

在帕特里夏·克朗博士的指导下，瓦莱丽·金女士将为她的博士论文收集数据。她将分析一种特定类型的陶器，Chuskan greatlings，它大量存在于位于新墨西哥州的查科峡谷的史前遗址。峡谷在美国西南部是独一无二的，因为它的发展规模。从公元900年代开始，到本世纪末达到顶峰，峡谷内的一些遗址的特点是存在纪念性建筑，存在从长距离获得的稀有异国情调的物品，以及似乎是一个广泛的道路网络。在偏远的社区，一系列的“大房子”展示了查科建筑技术的特点，从而暗示了一个广泛的文化体系的存在。从20世纪初到现在，查科峡谷的发展、荧光和衰落的性质一直是激烈研究和考古辩论的焦点。研究人员不确定社会复杂性达到的水平，也不能就其影响的地理范围达成一致。一些考古学家认为，查科是一个广泛的再分配系统的中心，另一些人认为它的功能主要是仪式性的，还有一些人认为它实际上是一个农业生产中心。有些人认为，这是最低限度的占用了大部分的一年，人们聚集在那里只为特殊事件。金女士将通过陶器分析来阐述遗址的功能。她想确定在边远地区生产的丘斯坎灰陶是否是在严格的集中控制下生产的。如果是这样的话，这将表明，查科事实上对一大片地区行使了相当大的政治和经济控制，并处于高度集权的等级制度的核心。根据人种学和考古学的类比，这种专业生产和分层的社会组织之间存在着很强的相关性。为了实现她的目标，金女士将检查一个大系列的绿色陶瓷，并确定在形式，装饰和制造方法的标准化程度。除了记录宏观特性外，她还将进行岩相学和微量元素分析。从不同时间点抽取的样本将提供必要的比较基础，以评估随着时间的推移不断变化的复杂性。这项工作之所以重要，有几个原因。它将为许多考古学家提供感兴趣的数据。它将为重要的史前美国文化提供新的视角，并有助于培养一位有前途的年轻科学家。

Under the Direction of Dr. Patricia Crown, MS Valerie King will collect data for her doctoral dissertation. She will analyze a specific type of pottery, Chuskan greyware which is present in large numbers at the prehistoric site of Chaco Canyon located in New Mexico. The canyon is unique in the US Southwest because of its scale of development. Beginning in the 900s AD and reaching an apex in the late 1000s a few sites within the canyon were characterized by the presence of monumental architecture, the presence of rare exotic items which were obtained from long distances and what appear to be an extensive network of constructed roads. In outlying communities a series of "great houses" exhibit the characteristics of Chacoan construction techniques, thus implying the existence of an areally extensive cultural system. The nature of Chaco Canyon's development, fluorescence and decline has been the focus of intense research and archaeological debate from the early 1900s to the present day. Researchers are uncertain of the level of societal complexity attained and can not agree on the geographic extent of its influence. Some archaeologists argue that Chaco served a center for a broad redistribution system, others that its function was largely ceremonial and yet others that it was in fact a center of agricultural production. Some believe that it was minimally occupied for most of the year and that people aggregated there only for special events. MS King will address the site's function through pottery analysis. She wishes to determine whether Chuskan greyware pottery which was produced in an outlying region was manufactured under tight centralized control. If such were the case this would suggest that Chaco in fact exercised considerable political and economic control over a large region and lay at the core of a centralized highly stratified system. Based on ethnographic and archaeological analogies, a strong correlation exists between such specialist production and stratified social organization. To accomplish her goal MS King will examine a large series of greyware ceramics and determine the extent of standardization in form, decoration and method of manufacture. In addition to recording macroscopic properties she will conduct both petrographic and trace element analysis. Samples drawn from different chronological points will provide the comparative basis necessary to assess changing complexity over time. This work is important for several reasons. It will provide data of interest to many archaeologists. It will shed new light into an important prehistoric US culture and assist in training a promising young scientist.