Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant; Exploring Changing Social Organization In The Emergence Of Complex Societies

分析不同空间尺度上的社会网络，包括平等主义的和等级的，对于理解过去和现在的社会组织是有用的。考古学这门学科非常适合于研究几千年来的社会变迁，并确定人类生活方式的重大变化。耶鲁大学的安德鲁·沃马克（Andrew Womack）和他在中国的同事们将在中国西北部的甘肃省调查新石器时代晚期和青铜时代早期（公元前2600-1900年）形成的不同网络，这个地区与中国东部和其他地方那些研究得很好的地区相比，在揭示过去不同形式的社会组织方面具有巨大的潜力。该项目将调查甘肃早期的人们是否发展了一种不同的组织体系，在这种体系中，人们对基于财富的社会等级制度有抵制。甘肃被认为是与欧亚大陆西部民族交流的十字路口。将采用几种新的数据收集和分析方法，为当地考古学家提供有用的培训。沃马克和他的中国同事将在甘肃省南部的陶河流域，通过手工制作和丧葬仪式等活动，确定不同类型的社会网络。正如其他人类学研究所证实的那样，殡葬用品可以成为社会网络地位和性质的关键指标。研究小组将从不同空间尺度的特定陶瓷生产方法中识别出相互作用的模式，并推断出社会网络是如何随着时间的推移通过重要人物葬礼上人群的融合而扩展的。它还将调查为什么在公元前2000年左右，该地区放弃了精心制作的葬礼。该团队还将使用有效的方法来识别容器上的特定使用标志，识别用于生产的原材料，并推断跨空间和时间的标准化程度。这些数据将通过陶器的生产、流通和消费来推断社会网络的特征，以及它们如何随着时间的推移而变化。

Analysis of social networks at different spatial scales, both egalitarian and hierarchical in nature, is useful for understanding the organization of societies in the past as well as the present. The discipline of archaeology is well suited to investigation of social change over millennia and to identifying significant variation in human lifeways. Andrew Womack of Yale University and his colleagues in China will investigate different networks formed during the late Neolithic and early Bronze Age periods (c. 2600-1900 BC) in Gansu province of northwest China, an area with tremendous potential for revealing a different form of social organization in the past than those known for well-studied areas to the east in China and elsewhere. The project will investigate whether people in early Gansu, thought to be a cross-roads for interaction with peoples to the west in Eurasia, developed a different kind of organizational system in which there was resistance to social hierarchies on the basis of wealth. Several new methods of data collection and analysis will be employed, providing useful training for local archaeologists. Womack and Chinese colleagues will identify different kinds of social networks created through activities such as craft production and mortuary rites in the Tao River valley of southern Gansu Province. As other anthropological research has established, mortuary goods can be a key indicator of both status and the nature of social networks. The team will identify patterns of interaction as identified from specific production methods of ceramics at different spatial scales and infer how social networks expanded over time through coalescence of populations at funerals for important individuals. It also will investigate why, around 2000 BC, elaborate funerals were abandoned in the region. The team also will use effective methods to identify specific signs of use on vessels, to identify raw materials used for production, and to infer degree of standardization across space and time. These data will then be used to infer the character of social networks through the production, circulation, and consumption of pottery vessels and how they changed over time.