Collaborative Research: The Relationship between Agriculture and Social Change

该项目调查史前农业实践，以了解在危机条件下财富和不平等是如何产生的。长期以来，集约耕作和控制农业剩余一直被认为是放大社会不平等的关键因素。反过来，在生态和社会不稳定时期，人们假定农民采取更加多样化和分散的耕作和放牧策略，导致有限的财富和不平等。然而，这种传统的解释对粮食生产、环境和社会政治复杂性之间的关系做出了过于简单化的假设。在干旱、战争和政治不稳定的情况下，集约化农业还能持续下去吗？相反，采取更多样化的生存战略是否真的会导致社会不平等的扩大？考古学非常适合研究农业、环境和人类关系的急剧和长期变化。在世界各地边缘环境中的传统农民和牧民面临越来越多的社会政治和生态挑战的当下，该项目具有迫切性。通过这个项目，主要研究人员在美国各自的大学培训本科生和研究生，学习跨国考古领域的方法和尖端的分析方法，为下一代从事科学和文化资源管理工作做好准备。研究团队分析农业和牧业实践的直接指标，并将它们与长期干旱和戏剧性社会政治变化期间的社会不平等指标进行比较。这项研究发生在史前高地山谷，这是一个人类占领时间很长的地区，拥有庞大的农业基础设施和丰富的自然资源。研究人员挖掘了一个大型聚落和相关的农业梯田，分析了来自多个地点的挖掘材料和遗产收藏，并对人类、植物、动物和土壤遗骸进行了专门的化学分析，以重建食物网、田地管理系统以及人类和畜群流动的模式。他们还使用无人机、三维计算机建模和地理信息系统分析土地利用和定居点模式。这种多方法的方法使研究人员能够调查居住在附近但具有不同生态潜力和不同社会政治史的社区的农牧战略和社会政治组织。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project investigates prehistoric farming practices to understand how wealth and inequality are generated under conditions of crisis. Intensive farming and the control of agricultural surplus have long been understood as key factors amplifying social inequality. In turn, during periods of ecological and social instability, it is assumed that farmers adopt more diverse and dispersed farming and herding strategies, resulting in limited wealth and inequality. Yet, this traditional account makes simplistic assumptions about the relationship between food production, the environment, and sociopolitical complexity. Can intensive farming persist despite conditions of drought, warfare, and political instability? Conversely, can the adoption of more diverse subsistence strategies actually lead to widening social inequality? Archaeology is well suited to investigate acute and long-term changes in farming, the environment, and human relationships. This project takes on immediate urgency in the present when traditional farmers and pastoralists in marginal environments around the world face increasing sociopolitical and ecological challenges. Through this project, the primary investigators train undergraduate and graduate students in transnational archaeological field methods and in cutting-edge analytical methods at their respective universities in the US, preparing the next generation for careers in science and cultural resource management.The research team analyzes direct proxies of agricultural and pastoral practices and compare them to measures of social inequality during a period of long-term drought and dramatic sociopolitical changes. The research takes place in a prehistoric highland valley, a region with significant deep time human occupation, vast agricultural infrastructure, and abundant natural resources. The researchers excavate a large settlement and associated agricultural terraces, analyze excavated materials and legacy collections from multiple sites, and conduct specialized chemical analysis of human, plant, animal, and soil remains to reconstruct food webs, field management systems, and patterns of human and herd mobility. They also analyze land use and settlement patterns using unmanned aerial vehicles, three-dimensional computer modeling, and Geographic Information Systems. The multi-methodological approach allows the researchers to investigate agropastoral strategies and sociopolitical organization across communities living in close proximity but with different ecological potentials and divergent sociopolitical histories.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.