Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Resource Stress and Settlement Pattern Change in the Eastern Mimbres Area

玛格丽特纳尔逊博士的监督下，卡伦Schollmeyer，将研究史前气候变化，人类对环境的影响，并在考古定居模式的变化之间的关系在东部明布雷斯地区西南部新墨西哥州。 大约在公元1130年，该地区长期被占领的大村庄人口减少，人们搬进了较小的分散的村庄。 这种戏剧性的定居点重组和伴随的物质文化变化的解释与资源压力和社会变化有关。资源压力，特别是食物压力与人类行为变化之间的关系，几十年来一直是人类学的一个关键研究问题。资源紧张往往被认为是造成社会和文化变化的原因，包括定居模式的变化。这个项目审查粮食紧张在大村庄人口减少中的作用。目前理解这一变化的方法表明，人类对野生资源的影响，一段时间的降水量减少，社会压力可能都有助于决定从聚集的村庄迁移到分散的村庄。然而，这些变化对人类所经历的资源紧张程度的影响尚未得到明确证明。在解释该地区的文化变迁时，对长期人口资源不平衡的环境解释可能被过分强调了。这种变化可能更好地解释的因素，如在较短的时间尺度上的相对变化的资源可用性，更直接地感知人类，从而更有可能影响行为的变化。为了理解这些变化，从人类行为生态学的理论观点来产生的预期如何变化的资源可用性会影响人类的行为，如果明布雷斯定居点的重组在某种程度上是一种尽量减少粮食紧张风险的战略，那么，就必须考虑到粮食紧张的概念和适当的应对措施。关于定居模式、植物遗骸和动物群的考古数据被用来评估资源利用的时间变化在多大程度上表明了理论预测的对食物压力的反应。两个数学模型告知考古数据的解释。一个离散时间动态模型的偶蹄动物种群变化的人类狩猎压力估计每年的大型游戏从公元1000年至1230年。第二个数学模型的生产性农业用地的降雨量和人类土地利用的功能评估的变化，生产性农业领域的基础上，集水分析，土壤水分特征，并考虑到人类对土壤的影响。这些分析的结果将表明如何在时间和空间的变化水平和频率的食物压力有助于人类的决定，改变定居和土地利用strategies. This研究建立在最近的考古实地考察，并结合了各种分析方法。 调查结果将有助于目前关于影响明布雷斯定居点重组因素的辩论。 这里研究的定居点重组与西南部其他地区众所周知的区域放弃之间的鲜明对比也可能阐明与应对环境变化的灵活，有弹性的策略有关的人类行为模式。 这个博士论文研究将提供教育机会Schollmeyer，并涉及在科学研究的本科助理。

Karen Schollmeyer, under the supervision of Dr. Margaret Nelson, will examine relationships between prehistoric climatic variability, human impacts on the environment, and changes in archaeological settlement patterns in the eastern Mimbres area of southwestern New Mexico. Around A.D. 1130 large, long-occupied villages in the area were depopulated as people moved into smaller, dispersed hamlets. Explanations for this dramatic settlement reorganization and accompanying changes in material culture are linked to both resource stress and social changes. The relationship between resource stress, particularly food stress, and changes in human behavior has been a key research issue in anthropology for decades. Resource stress is often cited as contributing to social and cultural changes, including shifts in settlement patterns. This project examines the role of food stress in the depopulation of large villages. Current approaches to understanding this change suggest human impacts on wild resources, a period of decreased precipitation, and social pressures may all have contributed to decisions to move from aggregated villages to dispersed hamlets. However, the effects of these changes on the levels of resource stress experienced by human populations have not been clearly demonstrated. Environmental explanations focused on long term population-resource imbalances may have been overemphasized in accounting for cultural changes in the area. Such changes may be better explained by factors-such as relative changes in resource availability at shorter time scales-more directly perceptible by humans and thus more likely to influence behavioral changes.In order to understand these changes, theoretical perspectives from human behavioral ecology are used to generate expectations about how variation in resource availability would have influenced human behavior, including perceptions of food stress and appropriate responses, if the Mimbres settlement reorganization was in part a strategy for minimizing risks of food stress. Archaeological data on settlement patterns, plant remains, and faunal assemblages are used to assess the degree to which temporal changes in resource use suggest responses to food stress as predicted by theory. Two mathematical models inform the interpretation of the archaeological data. A discrete time dynamic model of artiodactyl population change in response to human hunting pressure estimates annual large game availability from A.D. 1000 to 1230. A second mathematical model of productive agricultural land as a function of rainfall and human land use assesses changes in the availability of productive agricultural field areas based on water catchment analysis, soil moisture characteristics, and considerations of human impact on soils. The results of these analyses will indicate how temporal and spatial variability in levels and frequencies of food stress contributed to human decisions to change settlement and land use strategies.This research builds on recent archaeological fieldwork and combines a variety of analytical methods. The results will contribute to the current debate on factors influencing the Mimbres settlement reorganization. The striking contrast between the settlement reorganization examined here and well-known regional abandonments in other areas of the Southwest may also illuminate patterns in human behavior related to flexible, resilient strategies for dealing with environmental change. This PhD dissertation research will provide educational opportunities for Schollmeyer, and involve an undergraduate assistant in scientific research.