Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: The Role of Tradition in Cultural Change

博士论文改进补助金：传统在文化变革中的作用

• 批准号: 1833777
• 负责人: Neil Norman
• 金额: $ 2.35万
• 依托单位: College of William and Mary
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2018-09-01 至 2020-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1833777&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Improvement; Grant; Role

Under the supervision of Dr. Neil Norman of the College of William & Mary, Madeleine Bassett will undertake archaeological research to study the impact of pastoralist political economies on the timing and nature of Islamic Period religious change in the Horn of Africa. The Islamic Period (ca. AD 800-1400) marked a time of transformation in the Horn of Africa: In the span of a few centuries, urban centers emerged along the Somali coast and thousands of ancestral Somali pastoralists converted to Islam. Previous scholarship on religious change has centered on large-scale, sedentary agricultural societies. Africanist scholars, for example, have effectively demonstrated the importance of Islam in the history of eastern Africa and the Indian Ocean World, focusing predominantly on the sedentary societies of the Swahili coast. Through the archaeology of pastoralist settlements in Djibouti, this project focuses instead on seasonally mobile pastoralist societies, and the ways in which their economic networks, political systems, and local ecologies defined the conditions and limits of religious transformation. Ultimately, this research seeks to answer two related questions: How did local actors influence or participate in the process (i.e., timing and nature) of religious change in Djibouti? Specifically, how did local actors shape the creation and use of religious spaces through time? This project is well positioned to address these questions because it utilizes archaeological methodologies that allow the systematic collection and analysis of material evidence related to religious practices across space and time. This project is significant because it will shed new light on the process of Islamic Period religious change in the Horn of Africa, and more broadly on the nature of religious change among mobile, pastoralist societies. The issue of religion and religious change is relevant, and often violence related, in many regions of the world today and the results of this research have the potential to shed interpretive light on current day processes.The project will examine how and when Islam spread to seasonally mobile pastoralist communities living along the Somali Coast by mapping the organization and evolution of religious infrastructures across pastoralist landscapes. It will be conducted in eastern Djibouti, an important area in the spread of Islam from the Arabian Peninsula through the Horn of Africa. Under the supervision of Dr. Norman, Bassett will examine the spatial and diachronic patterning of Islamic Period structures and artifacts at a large, pastoralist seasonal aggregation site in the Ambouli River drainage of eastern Djibouti. This project will test the hypothesis that pastoralist political economies - and the social and religious institutions at their center - influenced how pastoralists integrated Islam into their daily routines and seasonal settlement practices. As the first study in eastern Africa to date pre-Islamic and Islamic-Period stone structures using a combination of OSL (Optically Stimulated Luminescence) and AMS radiocarbon dating methods, this project will develop the first detailed chronology for the integration of Islamic architectural elements into archaeological sites along the Somali coast. By establishing a solid chronological sequence for Islamic architectural elements, this project will bolster understandings of when and how eastern Africa's rural pastoralist societies converted to Islam and improve general chronologies for the spread of Islam in Africa. In so doing, this project will make significant contributions to anthropological theory by extending the scope of research on religious change to include pastoral societies and their political economies. Finally, one broader impact of this project will be the creation of a database of information about pre-Islamic and Islamic Period archaeological sites and structures.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

在威廉玛丽学院的尼尔·诺曼博士的监督下，马德琳·巴塞特将进行考古研究，研究游牧政治经济对非洲之角伊斯兰时期宗教变革的时间和性质的影响。伊斯兰时期（公元前200年）。公元800-1400年）标志着非洲之角的转型时期：在几个世纪的时间里，城市中心出现沿着索马里海岸和数千名祖先索马里牧民皈依伊斯兰教。以前关于宗教变革的学术研究主要集中在大规模的定居农业社会。例如，非洲学者有效地证明了伊斯兰教在东非和印度洋世界历史上的重要性，主要集中在斯瓦希里海岸的定居社会。通过对吉布提牧民定居点的考古研究，该项目侧重于季节性移动的牧民社会，以及他们的经济网络、政治制度和地方生态如何界定宗教转变的条件和限制。最终，这项研究试图回答两个相关的问题：当地行为者如何影响或参与这一过程（即，时间和性质）的宗教变化在吉布提？具体而言，当地行为者如何塑造宗教空间的创造和使用？该项目非常适合解决这些问题，因为它利用考古学方法，可以系统地收集和分析与跨时空宗教习俗有关的物证。该项目意义重大，因为它将揭示非洲之角伊斯兰时期宗教变革的进程，并更广泛地揭示移动的游牧社会宗教变革的性质。宗教和宗教变化的问题是相关的，往往是暴力有关的，在当今世界的许多地区，这项研究的结果有可能阐明解释当今的进程。该项目将研究伊斯兰教如何以及何时传播到季节性移动的牧民社区生活沿着索马里海岸，通过绘制组织和演变的宗教基础设施跨越牧民景观。这次会议将在吉布提东部举行，这是伊斯兰教从阿拉伯半岛向非洲之角传播的一个重要地区。在Norman博士的监督下，Bassett将在吉布提东部Ambouli河流域的一个大型游牧季节性聚集地考察伊斯兰时期结构和文物的空间和历时模式。本项目将检验这样一个假设，即牧民的政治经济及其中心的社会和宗教机构影响了牧民如何将伊斯兰教融入他们的日常生活和季节性定居实践。该项目是在东非首次采用光释光和AMS放射性碳测年法对伊斯兰时代以前和伊斯兰时代的石结构进行测年的研究，将编制第一份详细的年表，以便将伊斯兰建筑元素纳入索马里沿着的考古遗址。通过建立一个坚实的伊斯兰建筑元素的时间顺序，该项目将加强对东非农村牧民社会何时以及如何皈依伊斯兰教的理解，并改善伊斯兰教在非洲传播的一般年表。在这样做的过程中，本项目将通过扩大宗教变革的研究范围，包括牧区社会及其政治经济，对人类学理论作出重大贡献。最后，该项目的一个更广泛的影响将是建立一个关于前伊斯兰和伊斯兰时期考古遗址和结构的信息数据库。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。