Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Award: Community Organization And Sport Relationships

博士论文改进奖：社区组织和体育关系

• 批准号: 1519653
• 负责人: Takeshi Inomata
• 金额: $ 1.9万
• 依托单位: University of Arizona
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-04-01 至 2016-03-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1519653&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Improvement; Award; Community

Under the supervision of Dr. Takeshi Inomata, Marijke Stoll will explore the intersections between formalized competitive interaction, sociopolitical conflict, and public architecture among Prehispanic societies in southeastern Mexico. Such interaction through for example sporting events can serve valuable social functions which extend well beyond viewer entertainment. They provide a forum to consolidate and strengthen cultural affiliation and integrate broad and often diverse groups of individuals within a regional or national framework. Such regional based competition was integral to community and regional politics among ancient societies. Archaeology as a discipline is well-placed to investigate the social role of sports in the distant past. The Prehispanic ballgame was an important ritualized sport and shared cultural tradition that was played throughout much of ancient Mexico. It was played in large masonry ballcourts, unique structures that were constructed for this single purpose. As a special category of public architecture, ballcourts would have distinguished communities from each other. How ballcourts were distributed across the social landscape was significant - where a ballcourt was emplaced within public space would express the importance of the ballgame to political and daily life. By measuring the centrality of the ballcourt and how accessible it was, it is possible to infer their sociopolitical function at the local and regional levels. The research assesses the degree to which the ballgame was interwoven with local community politics in the Nejapa region of Oaxaca, Mexico. During the dynamic Postclassic (AD 1000 - 1521), a time of internal population expansion, settlement reorganization, and outside pressure from expanding imperial armies, several communities in Nejapa constructed multiple ballcourts. This suggests that residents of Nejapa may have used the ballgame to integrate different social strata, highlight social differences, and resolve or heighten intra- and intercommunity conflicts. The research will test the hypothesis that the ballgame was a key tool used by both local elites and different communities in Nejapa through site reconnaissance, topographical mapping, and geospatial analysis of ballcourt placement and distribution. Specifically, the project focuses on two broad questions. First, how central was the ballcourt to community social organization and who would have been the intended audience for ballgames and other ritual activities performed in and around the court? Second, does the distribution of ballcourts overlap with the distribution of complex civic centers in Nejapa? Systematic study of the ballcourts in Nejapa at the local and regional scales enhances understanding of how a competitive sport became an important sociopolitical institution in Mesoamerica. As the first in-depth study of the ballcourts in Nejapa, this project will be conducted in collaboration with area communities with the goal of documenting, recording and preserving the local cultural heritage for future generations to come. Study results will be disseminated through publications and presentations at scholarly venues, official reports for the Mexican government, and a project website targeted at broader audiences. Data from Nejapa will be added to a much larger geodatabase on ballcourts in Oaxaca that will improve the availability of information as well as permit further statistical and geospatial analyses for future research.

在 Takeshi Inomata 博士的指导下，Marijke Stoll 将探索墨西哥东南部前西班牙社会中正式的竞争互动、社会政治冲突和公共建筑之间的交叉点。通过体育赛事等进行的这种互动可以提供有价值的社交功能，其远远超出了观众的娱乐范围。它们提供了一个论坛，以巩固和加强文化联系，并将广泛且往往不同的个人群体纳入区域或国家框架内。这种基于区域的竞争是古代社会社区和区域政治不可或缺的一部分。考古学作为一门学科非常适合研究体育在遥远的过去的社会作用。前西班牙时期的球赛是一项重要的仪式化运动，具有共同的文化传统，在古代墨西哥的大部分地区都有进行。它是在大型砖石球场中进行的，这些球场是专门为此目的而建造的独特结构。作为公共建筑的一个特殊类别，球场将社区区分开来。球场在社会景观中的分布方式非常重要——球场在公共空间中的位置将表达球赛对政治和日常生活的重要性。通过衡量球场的中心地位及其可达性，可以推断其在地方和区域层面的社会政治功能。该研究评估了墨西哥瓦哈卡州内哈帕地区球赛与当地社区政治交织的程度。在充满活力的后古典时期（公元 1000 年 - 1521 年），内部人口扩张、定居点重组以及帝国军队扩张带来的外部压力，内哈帕的几个社区建造了多个球场。这表明内贾帕的居民可能利用球赛来整合不同的社会阶层，凸显社会差异，解决或加剧社区内部和社区间的冲突。该研究将通过现场勘察、地形测绘以及球场布局和分布的地理空间分析来检验球赛是内哈帕当地精英和不同社区使用的关键工具的假设。具体来说，该项目重点关注两个广泛的问题。首先，球场对于社区社会组织有多重要？谁是球场内及其周围进行的球赛和其他仪式活动的目标受众？其次，球场的分布是否与内哈帕复杂的市政中心的分布重叠？在地方和区域范围内对内哈帕球场进行系统研究可以增强人们对竞技运动如何成为中美洲重要的社会政治机构的理解。作为对内哈帕球场的首次深入研究，该项目将与地区社区合作进行，旨在为子孙后代记录、记录和保护当地文化遗产。研究结果将通过学术场所的出版物和演示、墨西哥政府的官方报告以及针对更广泛受众的项目网站进行传播。来自 Nejapa 的数据将被添加到一个更大的瓦哈卡球场地理数据库中，这将提高信息的可用性，并为未来的研究提供进一步的统计和地理空间分析。