Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Tool Production And Exchange In A Traditional Society

社会科学家继续探索原材料和工艺品在复杂的政治经济交换网络中移动的过程。交换网络的演变强调了了解人们如何通过消费构建身份的必要性。因此，考古学对探索古代国家前资本主义市场交换的存在越来越感兴趣，并质疑这些制度是如何构建物质价值、消费者群体、城市和国家的。在这一更广泛的背景下，该项目将调查中美洲伯利兹前哥伦布时期城市景观中区域贸易、国家交流和家庭身份如何随着市场的出现而变化的过程。通过分析黑曜石（火山玻璃）文物——一种耐用且经济上至关重要的石材——本研究将(1)重建并追踪它们从遥远的原材料来源进入主要城市中心的交换网络的运动；(2)确定如何通过管制或不管制的政治控制将黑曜石分配给人口；(3)探索黑曜石的制作和交换如何帮助构建和具体化持续了几个世纪的共同的地方身份。随着精心制作的材料的流通，它们暴露了提供给消费者的政治/经济/社会机制（例如，市场和/或礼物交换）。考古学有一个独特的历史化的视角来研究某些物品和材料在不同文化群体中的文化和社会经济价值，因为它们是远距离交换的。所产生的数据将使对材料的研究揭示不同社会动态的全面图景得以出现。这项研究还鼓励加强合作，通过开放分享研究方法和数据，作为材料分析人员的考古学家可以扩大技术学生的培训。在Steven Brandt博士（佛罗里达大学）、Diane Chase博士和Arlen Chase博士（佛罗里达中部大学）的指导下，Lucas Martindale Johnson将调查古玛雅地区的黑曜石交换、工艺生产、仪式和日常活动，以及在伯利兹Caracol的古玛雅遗址进行这些活动的社区。对这个古代玛雅城邦的研究提供了一个理想的环境，可以展示黑曜石研究如何探索与现代墨西哥、危地马拉和洪都拉斯高地上黑曜石丰富地区的区域联系，以及为普通人口提供的经济机制。通过在化学上独特的地质位置采购黑曜石，该项目将发现材料在到达工艺生产现场之前所经过的距离和不同的社会和物理途径。通过使用便携式x射线荧光机进行来源分析，确定元素组成，该项目将确定贸易路线和区域联系。后来，在卡拉科尔市，当地的家庭消费者获得了黑曜石工艺品，作为休闲工具和/或仪式性材料。Caracol的工艺和内部交换机制将通过绘制分布在近170平方公里（65平方英里）的200多个古玛雅家庭的人工制品分布图来研究。通过绘制文物分布，本研究将探索手工艺和工艺交换如何可能或可能不被政治和经济强国所控制，以及如何通过黑曜石文物的生产和使用来研究身份是如何产生的。

Social scientists continue to explore the processes by which raw materials and crafted objects move about in complex webs of political economic exchange. The evolution of exchange networks underscores the need to know how people construct their identity through consumption. Therefore, there is an increasing interest within archaeology to explore the presence of pre-capitalist market exchange in ancient states, and to question how these institutions structured material value, consumer communities, cities, and states. Situated within this broader context, the project will investigate the processes of how regional trade, state exchange, and household identity changed with the advent of marketplaces within a pre-Columbian urban cityscape in Belize, Central America. Through analyses of obsidian (volcanic glass) artifacts - a durable and economically vital stone material - this research will (1) reconstruct and trace their movement from distant raw material sources into the exchange network of a major urban center; (2) determine how obsidian was distributed to the population through regulated or unregulated political controls; and (3) explore how the crafting and exchange of obsidian helped to construct and concretize a shared local identity that endured for centuries. As crafted materials circulate, they expose political/economic/social mechanisms that provision consumers (e.g., market and/or gift exchange). Archaeology has a unique historicized perspective to study the cultural and socioeconomic value of certain objects and materials within different cultural groups as they were exchanged over vast distances. The data generated will enable the emergence of a comprehensive picture in which a study of materials exposes different societal dynamics. The research also encourages an increased collaboration whereby archaeologists as material analysts can expand technical student training through the open sharing of research methods and data. Under the guidance of Dr. Steven Brandt (University of Florida), Dr. Diane Chase, and Dr. Arlen Chase (University of Central Florida), Lucas Martindale Johnson will investigate ancient Maya regional obsidian exchange, craft production, ritual and daily events, and the communities that carried out such actions at the ancient Maya site of Caracol, Belize. Research at this ancient Maya city-state provides an ideal setting to demonstrate how a study of obsidian explores regional connections to distant obsidian-rich locations in the highlands of modern day Mexico, Guatemala, and Honduras and the economic mechanisms by which the general population were provisioned. By sourcing obsidian to chemically unique geological locations, the project will discover the distance and the different social and physical pathways materials traveled before arriving at a craft production site. By conducting a sourcing analysis in which elemental composition is ascertained through the use of a portable X-ray fluorescence machine, this project will determine trade routes and regional connections. At a later date within the city of Caracol, local household consumers obtained obsidian crafts to for use as casual tools and/or ritualized materials. Caracol's crafting and internal exchange mechanisms will be studied by mapping artifact distributions at more than 200 ancient Maya households spread over nearly 170 square kilometers (65 square miles). Through mapping artifact distributions, this research will explore how crafting and craft exchange may or may not have been controlled by the politically and economically powerful, as well as investigate how identities are produced through the production and use of obsidian artifacts.