Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Award: Historical Ecology of Alluvial Landscapes

博士论文改进奖：冲积地貌历史生态学

• 批准号: 2034107
• 负责人: Arlene Rosen
• 金额: $ 3.17万
• 依托单位: University of Texas at Austin
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2021-01-01 至 2023-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2034107&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Improvement; Award; Historical

In recent decades, archaeological research has provided critical understanding about the history of environmental impacts of crop domestication, low-level cultivation, and the spread of agriculture in diverse landscapes. Mounting paleo-botanical evidence has demonstrated that pre-colonial societies, starting millennia ago, had the tools and knowledge to modify and adapt to environmental variability. Present-day communities are facing new challenges from shifting seasonal patterns, recurring droughts, and intense and more frequent hurricanes. Geoarchaeological records from around the world have provided examples of how past communities adapted to similar challenges, and thus supply lessons for guiding future land-use management decisions. This project contributes to the emerging scholarship of the Anthropocene in island settings by identifying different episodes of social and environmental change during the pre-colonial period in a region that is highly underrepresented in geoarchaeological research. Local undergraduate and graduate students from multiple disciplines will participate in the field and laboratory components of this research, where they will learn geoarchaeological methods, theoretical frameworks, and analyses. Through these experiences, students build skills and gain knowledge that are crucial to their own and societal resilience. This doctoral dissertation project traces the long-term history of human land-use and its impacts in two lower catchments of alluvial valleys that are susceptible to environmental variability and human land-use, but which have been preferred locations for settlement. The investigators ask: how has the vegetation and hydrology of the region changed over time? How do episodes of landscape change relate to contemporary human land-use in these catchments? What are the ecological legacies of these anthropogenic landscapes and how are present-day communities still adapting to these cumulative legacies? To address these questions, the project assesses long-term environmental changes associated with settlement patterns and subsistence economies. Specifically, the researchers will systematically collect sediments cores from these river floodplains and a lagoon, and then analyze their chemistry and physical properties, phytoliths, and radiocarbon dates. These various lines of paleoenvironmental evidence will be combined with archival information about archaeological sites within the boundaries the catchment basins. The project will produce and test models of human occupation of both catchments from early periods to the present.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.

近几十年来，考古研究对作物驯化、低水平耕作以及农业在不同景观中的传播对环境影响的历史提供了重要的了解。越来越多的古植物证据表明，从几千年前开始，前殖民社会就拥有改变和适应环境变化的工具和知识。当今的社区正面临着季节性模式变化、反复发生的干旱以及强烈和频繁的飓风等新挑战。 来自世界各地的地质考古记录提供了过去社区如何适应类似挑战的例子，从而为指导未来的土地使用管理决策提供了经验教训。该项目通过确定地质考古研究中代表性严重不足的地区前殖民时期社会和环境变化的不同时期，为岛屿环境中人类世的新兴学术做出了贡献。来自多个学科的当地本科生和研究生将参与这项研究的现场和实验室部分，在那里他们将学习地质考古方法、理论框架和分析。通过这些经历，学生可以培养技能并获得对自身和社会复原力至关重要的知识。该博士论文项目追溯了人类土地利用的长期历史及其对冲积山谷两个较低流域的影响，这两个流域容易受到环境变化和人类土地利用的影响，但一直是定居的首选地点。调查人员提出疑问：随着时间的推移，该地区的植被和水文发生了怎样的变化？景观变化的事件与这些流域当代人类土地利用有何关系？这些人类景观的生态遗产是什么？当今的社区如何适应这些累积的遗产？为了解决这些问题，该项目评估了与定居模式和自给经济相关的长期环境变化。具体来说，研究人员将系统地从这些河流泛滥平原和泻湖收集沉积物核心，然后分析它们的化学和物理特性、植硅体和放射性碳年代。这些不同的古环境证据将与流域盆地边界内考古遗址的档案信息相结合。 该项目将制作和测试从早期到现在这两个流域的人类占领模型。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。