Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Settlement Ecology on California's Channel Islands

在道格拉斯·肯内特博士的指导下，克里斯托弗·贾兹瓦将在加利福尼亚州的北海峡群岛上开发和测试过去人类居住模式的模型。北海峡群岛是加利福尼亚州圣巴巴拉海岸外的一系列四个岛屿和相关小岛，从1.3万年前一直被占领，直到最后的居民在19世纪20年代被西班牙人带到大陆传教。该项目将使用环境变量来预测岛屿上永久安置点的最佳位置。通过对新的考古遗址进行调查，对高、中、低等级地点的遗址进行有针对性的挖掘，通过广泛的放射性碳测年建立占领年表，以及对加州贻贝贝壳进行氧同位素分析以重建遗址的占领季节，该项目将测试人们如何通过定居点扩张来应对人口增长和环境条件的变化。这直接适用于当前美国的人口结构。通过了解过去人们是如何通过改善环境、开发新技术或寻找新的定居地点来适应过度拥挤和环境退化的，人们就可以更好地理解今天可用的选择，并从过去做出的决定中学习。加利福尼亚州的北海峡群岛为研究这一问题提供了一个有效的实验室，因为它们空间有限，资源有限，相对容易理解，作为海峡群岛国家公园的一部分保存完好，具有悠久的考古研究历史和漫长的人类历史深度。在这个项目中，Kennett和Jazwa将使用理想自由分布(IFD)模型来模拟定居决策，以应对环境和人口条件的变化。IFD是借鉴和修改自种群生态学的模型。IFD是理解人类住区的有效模型，因为它可以纳入不同的环境变量组，并且可以用考古数据进行检验。该项目将是对考古文献的宝贵贡献，因为它将是第一个使用实地收集的数据明确测试该模型的项目。Kennett和Jazwa将使用各种数据集来实现这一点。对遗址的调查将建立对整个景观中人口分布的更好了解，挖掘将用于了解随着时间的推移而发生的变化。这些变化将通过广泛的放射性碳测年按时间顺序固定下来。季节性研究将用来确定定居点是常年占用的，还是更大的定居点系统的一部分。这项研究的结果将发表在同行评议的期刊上，并以论文和海报的形式在专业会议上分享。这个项目也将是Jazwa职业发展的重要组成部分，并将导致他的博士论文。出土材料的实验室处理将在宾夕法尼亚州立大学本科生的帮助下完成，以帮助他们作为考古学家的教育和发展。最后，该项目的调查和数据收集将在一定程度上满足海峡群岛国家公园清点我国宝贵文化资源的目标。

Under the guidance of Dr. Douglas Kennett, Christopher Jazwa will develop and test a model of past human settlement patterns on California's Northern Channel Islands. The Northern Channel Islands are a series of four islands and associated islets off the coast of Santa Barbara, California, that were occupied continuously from 13,000 years ago until the last inhabitants were brought to mainland missions by the Spanish in the 1820s. This project will use environmental variables to predict the optimal locations for permanent settlement sites on the islands. Through a program of surveying for new archaeological sites, targeted excavation of sites in high-, middle-, and low-ranked locations, extensive radiocarbon dating to establish a chronology for occupation, and oxygen isotopic analyses of California mussel shells to reconstruct season of occupation for sites, this project will test how people responded to population increase and changing environmental conditions through settlement expansion. This has direct applications for population structure in the current United States. By understanding how people in the past adapted to overcrowding and environmental degradation by modifying their environment, developing new technologies, or seeking new locations to settle, one can better understand the options available today and learn from decisions that were made in the past. California's Northern Channel Islands provide an effective laboratory to study this because they are spatially bounded, have a limited and relatively well-understood set of resources, are well-preserved as part of Channel Islands National Park, have a long history of archaeological research, and have a long time depth of human history.For this project, Kennett and Jazwa will model the settlement decisions in response to changing environmental and demographic conditions using the Ideal Free Distribution (IFD), a model borrowed and adapted from population ecology. The IFD is an effective model for understanding human settlement because it can incorporate different groups of environmental variables and it is testable with archaeological data. This project will be a valuable contribution to the archaeological literature because it will be the first to explicitly test the model using data collected in the field. Kennett and Jazwa will use a variety of data sets to do this. Survey for sites will establish a better understanding of the distribution of populations across the landscape and excavation will be used to understand changes over time. These changes will be anchored chronologically with extensive radiocarbon dating. Seasonality studies will be used to determine whether settlements were occupied year-round or were part of larger settlement systems. The results of this study will be published in peer-reviewed journals and shared at professional conferences in the form of presented papers and posters. This project will also be an important part of Jazwa's professional development and will result in his Ph.D. dissertation. Laboratory processing of excavated materials will be done with the assistance of undergraduate students at Pennsylvania State University, aiding in their education and development as archaeologists. Finally, survey and data collection from this project will be done in part to satisfy the goals of Channel Islands National Park to inventory our nation's valuable cultural resources.