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

在不同的空间尺度上分析社会网络，无论是平等主义的还是等级主义的，都有助于理解过去和现在的社会组织。考古学的学科非常适合研究几千年来的社会变化，并识别人类生活方式的重大变化。耶鲁大学的安德鲁·沃马克和他在中国的同事们将研究新石器时代晚期和青铜时代早期(公元前2600-1900年)在中国西北部甘肃省形成的不同网络，该地区具有巨大的潜力，可以揭示一种与过去在中国和其他地方研究得很好的以东地区不同的社会组织形式。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，人们抵制以财富为基础的社会等级制度。甘肃被认为是与欧亚大陆以西民族互动的十字路口。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确定不同类型的社交网络，这些社交网络是在甘肃省南部的陶河流域通过手工制作和殡葬仪式等活动创建的。正如其他人类学研究已经确立的那样，殡仪品可以成为衡量社交网络地位和性质的关键指标。该团队将确定在不同空间尺度上从特定陶瓷生产方法中识别出的互动模式，并推断社会网络如何通过在重要个人的葬礼上合并而随着时间的推移而扩展。它还将调查为什么在公元前2000年左右，该地区放弃了精心设计的葬礼。该小组还将使用有效的方法来识别船只上使用的特定标志，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。这些数据将被用来通过陶器的生产、流通和消费来推断社交网络的特征，以及它们是如何随着时间的推移而变化的。

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.