Long term Societal Reaction to Environmental Change

对环境变化的长期社会反应

• 批准号: 1850259
• 负责人: Steven Falconer
• 金额: $ 18.91万
• 依托单位: University of North Carolina at Charlotte
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2019-03-15 至 2025-02-28
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1850259&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Long; term; Societal; Reaction; Environmental

Dr. Steven Falconer and Dr. Patricia Fall from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, along with Dr. Suzanne Pilaar Birch (University of Georgia), Dr. Elizabeth Ridder (California State University San Marcos) and Mary Metzger (Vancouver Community College) will evaluate the role of environmental change in the dramatic abandonment of the earliest cities in the ancient Southern Levant (modern Israel, Palestine and Jordan). This research addresses basic social and environmental questions regarding the development of early agrarian civilizations, and the social and physical landscapes they engendered and in which modern societies continue to live. Interdisciplinary studies featuring collaboration between archaeologists, geographers and earth scientists are particularly well-suited to apply deep time perspectives to the role of long-term environmental change, and thereby assess competing explanations for early urban collapse, as exemplified in the Southern Levant and witnessed repeatedly elsewhere. Understanding possible trajectories and potential impacts of ancient environmental change holds major implications for understanding how and why the earliest urban civilizations rose and collapsed. Accordingly, this research illuminates the often-precarious relationships between agrarian societies, both ancient and modern, and their ecological settings. This project takes great pride in the training of young female scholars in archaeology and geography. Among the five principal collaborators on this project, four are women, including two early career female assistant professors, one of whom is of Hispanic descent. This project will continue to recruit students from underrepresented groups and provide opportunities that broaden their participation in science through multiple avenues. In close collaboration with their research team, Drs. Falconer and Fall will evaluate several competing scenarios to explain the strikingly pervasive and lengthy abandonment of the earliest Levantine cities 2500-2000 BC, and their rapid and dramatic reemergence immediately thereafter. This study features a controlled comparative analysis of environmentally-sensitive evidence excavated from four strategically-selected Bronze Age communities along the Jordan Rift: two in the northern Jordan Valley, Jordan and two lying just east of the Dead Sea Basin. Each pair of excavated sites includes a village occupied during urban abandonment (2500-2000 BC) and a village inhabited during the rebirth of cities (2000-1600 BC). Fine-grained radiocarbon dating of carbonized seeds will provide high precision chronologies for these sites. Coordinated analyses of stable isotopes from crop seeds, and animal bones and teeth will be used to estimate ancient rainfall and temperatures through time. Changing profiles of cultivated crops and herded animals will portray shifting human responses to environmental change. The analytical results from our four sites will be compared to infer trends of environmental change, both chronologically and geographically. Resulting trajectories of environmental change between 2500 and 1600 BC will be used to assess competing hypotheses to explain Levantine urban collapse. In sum, this research will contribute to the growing discussion of environmental dynamics at the heart of ancient social change with timely pertinence for human responses to environmental change in the modern world.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.

北卡罗来纳大学夏洛特分校的Steven Falconer博士和Patricia Fall博士，以及Suzanne Pilaar Birch博士（佐治亚大学）、Elizabeth Ridder博士（加州州立大学圣马科斯分校）和Mary Metzger（温哥华社区学院）将评估环境变化在古代南黎凡特（现代以色列、巴勒斯坦和约旦）最早的城市被遗弃的过程中所起的作用。本研究解决了关于早期农业文明发展的基本社会和环境问题，以及它们所产生的社会和自然景观，以及现代社会继续生活的环境。以考古学家、地理学家和地球科学家合作为特色的跨学科研究特别适合将深时间视角应用于长期环境变化的作用，从而评估早期城市崩溃的相互竞争的解释，如在南黎凡特和其他地方反复出现的例子。了解古代环境变化的可能轨迹和潜在影响，对于理解最早的城市文明如何以及为什么兴起和崩溃具有重要意义。因此，这项研究阐明了古代和现代农业社会及其生态环境之间往往不稳定的关系。该项目以培养年轻的女考古学和地理学学者而自豪。在该项目的五位主要合作者中，有四位是女性，其中包括两位早期职业女性助理教授，其中一位是西班牙裔。该项目将继续从代表性不足的群体中招收学生，并提供机会，通过多种途径扩大他们对科学的参与。在与研究团队的密切合作下。Falconer和Fall将评估几种相互竞争的情景，以解释公元前2500-2000年最早的黎凡特城市惊人地普遍和漫长的被遗弃，以及之后它们迅速而戏剧性的重新出现。本研究的特点是对从约旦裂谷沿线四个战略性选择的青铜器时代社区挖掘的环境敏感证据进行对照比较分析：两个在约旦约旦河谷北部，两个位于死海盆地以东。每一对出土的遗址都包括一个在城市废弃期间（公元前2500-2000年）被占领的村庄和一个在城市重生期间（公元前2000-1600年）有人居住的村庄。对碳化种子进行精细的放射性碳定年将为这些地点提供高精度的年表。对农作物种子、动物骨骼和牙齿的稳定同位素的协调分析将用于估计古代的降雨量和温度。种植作物和放牧动物的变化将反映人类对环境变化的反应。我们将比较四个站点的分析结果，以推断环境变化的趋势，包括时间和地理上的变化。由此产生的公元前2500年至1600年间的环境变化轨迹将用于评估解释黎凡特城市崩溃的竞争性假设。总而言之，这项研究将有助于对古代社会变化核心的环境动力学进行越来越多的讨论，并及时针对人类对现代世界环境变化的反应。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，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。

项目成果

Sacred Spaces and Liminal Behavior in Levantine Temples in Antis

安蒂斯黎凡特神庙的神圣空间和阈限行为

• DOI: 10.1515/janeh-2021-0013
• 发表时间: 2022
• 期刊: Journal of Ancient Near Eastern History
• 作者: Falconer, Steven E.;Fall, Patricia L.
• 通讯作者: Fall, Patricia L.

Crop management and agricultural responses at Early Bronze IV Tell Abu en-Ni'aj, Jordan

约旦 Tell Abu en-Niaj 早期青铜 IV 的作物管理和农业应对措施

• DOI: 10.1016/j.jas.2021.105435
• 发表时间: 2021
• 期刊: Journal of Archaeological Science
• 影响因子: 2.8
• 作者: Steven Porson;Steven E Falconer;S. P. Birch;Elizabeth Ridder;Patricia L. Fall
• 通讯作者: Patricia L. Fall

NEW AMS CHRONOLOGY FOR THE EARLY BRONZE III/IV TRANSITION AT KHIRBAT ISKANDAR, JORDAN

• DOI: 10.1017/rdc.2022.22
• 发表时间: 2022-04
• 期刊: Radiocarbon
• 影响因子: 8.3
• 作者: Patricia L. Fall;Suzanne Richard;Suzanne E. Pilaar Birch;Elizabeth Ridder;M. D'andrea;Jesse C Long;Geoffrey Hedges-Knyrim;Steven Porson;Mary C. Metzger;Steven E Falconer