Collaborative Research: Impact And Accommodation Through Cultural Contact

这项研究的意义在于，它记录了文化互动的长期影响，并提供了对指导这一过程及其结果的社会和生物机制的洞察。考古学可以为了解不同文化如何互动提供一个宝贵的窗口，因为它可以采取长期的视角，并遵循这样的过程，通常是在长达一个世纪的时间尺度上。骨骼遗骸形式的生物数据的存在为研究增加了一个额外的层面。在国家科学基金会的支持下，一个由斯图尔特·泰森·史密斯博士和米歇尔·布松博士领导的国际团队将与其他专家、学生和当地社区成员一起进行一项生物考古研究项目，以调查埃及新王国帝国(公元前1500-1050年)对上努比亚尼罗河第三大瀑布的努比亚卡玛文化的影响。这个项目建立在汤博斯之前的挖掘基础上，汤博斯记录了一个由移民埃及人和当地努比亚人组成的多民族殖民社区。挖掘将包括墓地精英金字塔区域的埋葬，以及以前未开发的定居点。此外，还将探索与当地努比亚科尔马文化有关的定居点(Hannk)和墓地(Akkad)，以便比较征服和殖民该地区前后埃及帝国对该地区健康和身份的影响。这项研究超越了传统的单向殖民接触模式，同时考虑了当地和外国群体的行动。该项目的智力价值在于，它对更广泛的考古学和人类学研究问题做出了贡献，这些问题涉及跨文化互动的过程、殖民主义以及由此产生的文化纠葛。基于主导核心和从属外围概念的较旧的文化适应模型已经越来越多地被更微妙的基于互动的模型所取代，如这里提出的模型。这个项目将增加一个来自世界上最早的初级状态之一的重要案例研究，这将对研究不同地点和时期的相似动力学的学者具有相关性。使用多学科的生物考古方法，可以通过使用各种类型的数据，包括物质文化、社会习俗、生物关系、地理起源以及健康和疾病的迹象，对这些问题进行全面检查。汤姆博斯？独特的历史背景为揭示埃及帝国仍在很大程度上未知的地方影响提供了重要的潜力，提供了关于当地人在采纳、适应和拒绝不同文化特征以及努比亚和埃及特征在两个社会中的相互渗透方面发挥作用的重要数据。该项目还有更广泛的影响，包括培训美国和苏丹的学生和研究人员以及促进国际研究合作。挖掘和整理该项目的人类骨骼遗骸将确保重要的考古和生物考古数据和收藏品的安全储存，并确保今后对该材料进行研究的机会。拟议研究产生的数据将被广泛传播，以便为其他研究人员提供机会。最后，该项目将帮助苏丹人民记录由于定居和耕种而迅速消失的古代努比亚生活和文化的证据。拟议中的在汤博斯下游仅10公里处建造一座大坝也将对这些地点产生严重影响，并增加该项目的紧迫性。

The significance of this research rests on the fact that it documents the long term effect of cultural interaction and provides insight into the mechanisms, both social and biological, which guide this process as well as the resultant outcomes. Archaeology can provide a valuable window to understanding how different cultures interact since it can take a long range perspective and follow such processes often over century long time scales. The presence of biological data in the form of skeletal remains adds an additional dimension to the study. Similar interactions are visible today in multiple regions of the world.With the support of the National Science Foundation, an international team, led by Dr. Stuart Tyson Smith and Dr. Michele Buzon, along with other specialists, students, and local community members will conduct a bioarchaeological research project to investigate the impact of the Egypt's New Kingdom Empire (c. 1500-1050 BC) on the Nubian Kerma Culture at the Third Cataract of the Nile River in Upper Nubia. This project builds on previous excavations at Tombos, which have documented a multi-ethnic colonial community of immigrant Egyptians and local Nubians. Excavation will include burials in the elite pyramid field of the cemetery and the previously unexplored settlement. In addition, a settlement (Hannek) and cemetery (Akkad) associated with the local Nubian Kerma culture will be explored in order to allow for a comparison of Egyptian imperial impacts on the health and identity before and after the conquest and colonization of the area. Moving beyond traditional unidirectional models of colonial encounters, this research considers the actions of both the local and foreign groups.The intellectual merit of the project is the contribution to larger archaeological and anthropological research questions regarding the process of inter-cultural interactions, colonialism, and the cultural entanglements that result. Older acculturation models based upon a notion of dominant core and subordinate periphery have increasingly been replaced with more nuanced interaction based models like the one proposed here. This project will add an important case study from one of the world's earliest primary states that will be of relevance to scholars studying similar dynamics in different places and periods. The use of a multi-disciplinary bioarchaeological approach allows for a holistic examination of these issues through use of various types of data including material culture, social practices, biological relationships, geographic origins, and indications of health and disease. Tombos? unique historical context offers significant potential to shed light on the still largely unknown local impacts of the Egyptian empire, providing important data on the local people who played a role in the adoption, adaptation, and rejection of different cultural traits, as well as the interpenetration of Nubian and Egyptian features in both societies. Further broader impacts of this project include the training of American and Sudanese students and researchers as well as promotion of international research collaboration. The excavation and curation of human skeletal remains from the project will provide secure storage of important archaeological and bioarchaeological data and collections as well as ensure the opportunity for future research on the material. The data produced from the proposed research will be widely disseminated in order to provide access for other researchers. Finally, this project will assist the people of Sudan in documenting the rapidly disappearing evidence of ancient Nubian life and culture resulting from settlement and cultivation. The proposed construction of a dam only ten kilometers downstream from Tombos would also heavily impact the sites and adds additional urgency to this project.