Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Soconusco Formative Project

在Richard Burger博士的指导下，Robert Rosenswig先生将为他的博士论文收集数据。他将继续在位于墨西哥恰帕斯州南太平洋海岸的索科努斯科Cuauhtemoc区进行考古定居点调查。该地区特别重要，因为它包括中美洲最早的定居社区，以及大约公元前1550年至公元前650年之间出现的社会复杂性和政治等级的最早证据。索科努斯科人还拥有中美洲与墨西哥湾沿岸奥尔梅克（该地区的第一个文明）直接互动的最佳证据。一项行人调查将系统地覆盖50平方公里，并绘制出整个景观中不断变化的政治组织。这项调查将利用现有的香蕉灌溉沟渠，提供大面积的准确地下信息。通过可靠的地表-地下对应关系，将以区域地表勘测通常不可能达到的置信度记录沉降分布。权力和等级制度可以说是人类学和大多数其他社会科学所解决的最基本的问题。解释几个世纪和几千年来社会政治等级制度的出现是一项非常适合考古学的工作。社会科学家研究当代背景下不平等权力关系的结构和动态。然而，这些学者一般限于几十年的时间宽度，或借助历史文献几个世纪。考古学家在探索渗透到现代生活各个方面的制度化等级制度的起源方面处于独特的地位。Rosenswig先生的研究将追踪Cuauhtemoc调查区近千年来社会政治复杂性的发展，并将有助于确定当地精英与居住在墨西哥湾沿岸的奥尔梅克同行之间关系的性质。索科努斯科的社会政治复杂性是由于与墨西哥湾沿岸的塔巴斯科和韦拉克鲁斯的奥尔梅克接触而结合起来的吗？墨西哥湾沿岸的奥尔梅克人真的入侵了索科努斯科吗？或者，墨西哥湾沿岸的影响是否在中美洲社会形成的模型中被过分强调了？这些相互竞争的假设围绕着“奥尔梅克地平线”的性质，并努力了解早期和中期的形成社会和中美洲遥远地区之间的关系的性质。利用现代灌溉沟渠和缺乏后期占领的优势，拟议的调查将提供可靠的区域规模的人口变化。本研究的结果将进一步加深我们对索科努斯科社会政治复杂性出现过程中地方和区域间过程之间关系的理解。这项研究在跨文化方面也很重要，因为中美洲是世界上少数几个社会政治复杂性独立出现的地区之一，而索科努斯科包含了一些最早出现这种情况的社会。Rosenswig先生的研究将记录初期社会政治复杂性出现的方式，并将有助于培养一名有前途的年轻科学家。

Under the direction of Dr. Richard Burger, Mr. Robert Rosenswig will collect data for his doctoral dissertation. He will continue his archaeological settlement survey in the Cuauhtemoc zone of the Soconusco, located on the southern Pacific coast of Chiapas, Mexico. The region is particularly significant as it includes some of the first sedentary communities in Mesoamerica and the earliest evidence of emergent social complexity and political hierarchy between approximately 1550 and 650 BC. The Soconusco also has the best evidence in Mesoamerica of direct interaction with the Gulf Coast Olmec - the first civilization the region. A pedestrian survey will systematically cover 50 sq km and map changing political organization across the landscape. This survey will take advantage of existing trenches dug for banana irrigation to provide accurate subsurface information over a large area. With reliable surface-subsurface correspondence, the distribution of settlements will be documented with a degree of confidence not often possible with regional surface survey. Power and hierarchy are arguably the most fundamental issues addressed by anthropology and most other social sciences. Explaining the emergence of sociopolitical hierarchy over centuries and millennia is a job ideally suited to archaeology. Social scientists study the structure and dynamics of unequal power relations in contemporary contexts. However, these scholars are generally limited to a temporal breadth of decades, or with the help of historical documents a few centuries. Archaeologists are in a unique position to explore the origins of the institutionalized hierarchy that permeates every aspect of modern life. Mr. Rosenswig's research will track the development of sociopolitical complexity in the Cuauhtemoc survey zone over nearly a millennia and will help to determine the nature of relations between local elites and their Olmec counterparts who resided in Mexico's Gulf Coast. Did sociopolitical complexity in the Soconusco coalesce as a result of contact with the Gulf Coast Olmec of Tabasco and Veracruz? Did the Gulf Coast Olmec actually make incursions into the Soconusco? Alternatively, is the impact of the Gulf Coast over-emphasized in models of Formative Mesoamerican society? These competing hypotheses revolve around the nature of an "Olmec Horizon" and strive to understand Early and Middle Formative society and the nature of relations between distant regions of Mesoamerica.Taking advantage of modern irrigation ditches and lack of later period occupation, the proposed survey will provide reliable demographic changes at a regional scale. The results of this study will further our understanding of the relationship between local and interregional processes during the emergence of sociopolitical complexity in the Soconusco. This research is also significant cross-culturally as Mesoamerica is one of only a handful of areas in the world where sociopolitical complexity emerged independently and the Soconusco contains some of the earliest societies where this occurred. Mr. Rosenswig's research will document the manner in which incipient sociopolitical complexity emerged and will also assist in training a promising young scientist.