Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Religion and Social Relations: A case study of Quaker Ideology and the Practice of Caribbean Slavery

在Laurie Wilkie博士的指导下，John Chenoweth先生将为他的博士论文收集数据。宗教是一种文化现象，通过它，社会认同的其他方面可以被表达、谈判、争论和明确。如果日常生活像大多数考古学家所说的那样对文化变化和民族起源产生影响，那么宗教意识形态影响日常生活的程度是一个重要的变量。该项目将通过对18世纪加勒比海一个种植园的研究，评估宗教作为社会关系结构原则的力量，该种植园是白人土地所有者家庭、贵格会宗教团体成员和至少7名被奴役的非洲人的家园。研究地点现在是英属维尔京群岛托尔托拉附近的一个155英亩的无人居住的岛屿，其中10英亩被确定为包含大量18世纪的居住环境，保存良好。这项研究假设，贵格会教派的宗教意识形态将改变社会关系，在没有这种意识形态的地方产生明显的物质差异，即使是以牺牲经济理性为代价。由于贵格会意识形态和奴隶制实践之间的矛盾，可以预测，在贵格会所有者和他们所奴役的非洲人之间的关系中，宗教将是考古学上最明显的认同。该项目将对奴隶主和奴隶主的住所进行地面勘测和重点挖掘，以解决这一问题。这项研究将作为Chenoweth先生学术培训和发展他作为研究人员的专门知识的一个组成部分。

Under the direction of Dr. Laurie Wilkie, Mr. John Chenoweth will collect data for his doctoral dissertation thesis. Religion is a cultural phenomenon through which other aspects of social identity can be articulated, are negotiated, contested, and made explicit.If daily life has an effect on cultural change and ethnogenesis, as most archaeologists would argue, then the degree to which religious ideology affected daily life is an important variable. This project will evaluate the strength of religion as a structuring principle in social relations through the study of an 18th century Caribbean plantation which was home to the white landowning family, members of the Quaker religious group, and at least 7 enslaved Africans. The study site is a now uninhabited, 155 acre island near Tortola, in the British Virgin Island, ten acres of which have been identified as containing heavy 18th century habitation with excellent preservation. The study hypothesizes that religious ideology of Quakerism will alter social relations, producing observable material differences from sites where that ideology is absent, even at the expense of economic rationality. Because of the contradictions between Quaker ideology and the practice of slavery, it is predicted that religion will be most clearly identifiable archaeologically in the relationship between the Quaker owners and the enslaved Africans they held. The project will employ surface survey and focused excavations of the homes of the enslaved and the owners in order to address this question.The research will serve as an integral part of Mr. Chenoweth's academic training and to the development of his expertise as a researcher.