Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Archaeology of the Colonial Period Gulf of Fonseca, El Salvador

在罗斯玛丽·a·乔伊斯博士的指导下，埃斯特班·戈麦斯将分析他在萨尔瓦多丰塞卡湾孔查瓜岛的一个土著村庄遗址孔查瓜Vieja的考古发掘中收集的数据。根据民族历史研究，在1524年与西班牙接触时，Conchagua Vieja居住着说伦卡语的人。在Conchagua Vieja的挖掘将研究家庭级组织和外部关系的变化性质，以应对西班牙接触和殖民管理引发的社会、政治和经济重组的压力。文化接触的时刻、殖民主义和传教往往破坏获得资源的机会，影响家庭经济生产的性质和组织，并改变维持社区内社会凝聚力的社会习俗。为了从考古学上考察这些变化，将在家庭一级对活动区域进行详细研究，以揭示过去的生存做法、生产和加工、交换以及与更广泛的区域和区域间领域的联系。由于食品加工和消费包括人们预期会在居民区发生的许多活动，因此确定与生存有关的活动和活动领域是至关重要的。为了评估活动区域的组织，该项目将重点关注建筑、便携式文物和职业碎片，以及检查植物和动物的微残留物，以及活动区域的化学特征。目标是观察人们在行动中的基本组织原则。档案文件和民族历史记录将被纳入其中，以提供单独的证据，特别是评价孔查瓜别哈的文化变化和连续性，并确定构成居民日常生活的经济和政治结构的变化。从挖掘、实验室分析和历史文献中收集的数据将构成多尺度方法的基础，以检查不同层次的社会互动：社区一级的家庭一体化；丰塞卡湾区域内的经济网络；以及与其他地区社区的经济联系。解释高级流程必须从理解当地社区和国内组织模式开始。在孔查瓜别哈进行的研究将对丰塞卡湾经济网络的考古知识作出重大贡献。丰塞卡湾是一个研究不足的区域，对殖民前和殖民期间的区域间交流至关重要，对该区域参与太平洋沿岸和中美洲其他区域更广泛的交流和通讯网络也至关重要。除了社会科学家感兴趣的研究问题之外，该项目还将通过提高当地公众对科学的理解水平而产生更广泛的影响。在丰塞卡湾，与该项目相关的公共宣传将集中在现代城镇孔查吉塔和萨尔瓦多拉乌尼翁省拉乌尼翁文化之家。“文化之家”计划是由联邦政府发起的一项倡议，旨在向公众介绍萨尔瓦多的地区历史。外联工作包括学校访问和关于考古研究的讲座。在孔查瓜Vieja的研究还将为圣萨尔瓦多技术大学的本科生提供实地和实验室培训，并将在美国研究人员和萨尔瓦多机构之间建立一个合作研究环境。

Under the supervision of Dr. Rosemary A. Joyce, Esteban Gomez will analyze data gathered during his archaeological excavation of Conchagua Vieja, an indigenous village site on the island of Conchaguita, in the Gulf of Fonseca, El Salvador. Based on ethnohistorical research, Conchagua Vieja was inhabited by Lenca-speaking peoples at the time of Spanish contact in 1524. Excavations at Conchagua Vieja will examine the changing nature of household level organization and external relations in response to the stress of social, political, and economic reorganization initiated by Spanish contact and colonial administration. Moments of culture contact, colonialism and missionization often disrupt access to resources, affect the nature and organization of household economic production, and alter the social practices that maintain intra-community social cohesion. To examine these changes archaeologically, detailed studies of activity areas at the household level will be undertaken to reveal past subsistence practices, production and processing, exchange, and links to wider regional and interregional spheres. Since food processing and consumption encompass so many of the activities one would expect to occur in residential areas, the determination of subsistence-related activities and activity areas is critical. To evaluate the organization of activity areas, this project will focus on architecture, portable artifacts and occupational debris, as well as examine micro-residues of plants and animals, and chemical signatures of activity areas. The goal is to observe the basic organizational principles of people in action.Archival documents and ethnohistoric accounts will be incorporated to provide a separate line of evidence to evaluate culture change and continuity at Conchagua Vieja, in particular, and to define the changes in economic and political structures that structured the residents' daily lives. Data gathered from excavations, laboratory analyses, and historical documentation will form the basis for a multi-scalar approach to examine social interaction at various levels: integration of households at the community level; economic networks within the Gulf of Fonseca region; and economic linkages with communities in other regions. Explaining higher order processes must begin with an understanding of local communities and patterns of domestic organization.Research at Conchagua Vieja will make a significant contribution to archaeological knowledge of economic networks in the Gulf of Fonseca, an under-studied region that was critical to inter-regional exchange both before and during colonization, and to the region's participation in broader networks of exchange and communication along the Pacific Coast and other regions of Central America. Beyond research questions of interest to social scientists, the project will have a broader impact by enhancing the level of public understanding of science at the local scale. In the Gulf of Fonseca, public outreach associated with the project will focus on the modern town of Conchaguita, and the Casa de Cultura of La Union, Department of La Union, El Salvador. The Casa de Cultura program is a federally sponsored initiative that aims to inform the general public of El Salvador's regional histories. Outreach efforts consist of school visits and lectures on archaeological research. Research at Conchagua Vieja will also provide field and laboratory training for undergraduate students at the Universidad Tecnologica of San Salvador, and will develop a collaborative research environment between U.S. researchers and Salvadoran institutions.