Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Award: The Role of Material Culture in Determining Social Affiliation

这个博士论文项目利用全球化的概念，或者说不同人群之间的互动和融合的过程，来研究习俗在空间和时间上的传播和采用。虽然人们很容易对在实践、信仰体系和物质文化上有共同点的许多群体进行广泛的比较，但全球化可能会将群体转变为具有复杂身份的混合社区。全球化作为一种社会过程，最常被用来描述现代世界，但这种现象的不同版本在整个历史上都可以被认识到。与现代进程一样，前现代的例子代表了文化特征在令人印象深刻的规模上的传播，这些特征促进了变革性的互动和重组。这项研究通过分析陶瓷制造领域的变化如何表明“全球”工艺知识如何在区域内转移，以及这些实践与当地传统的融合程度，来应对全球化。从公元1000年左右开始，一个地区经历了一段全球化时期(“密西西比化”)，这影响了宗教和日常生活的许多方面。虽然美国中部大陆正在进行的考古研究往往侧重于从一个中心位置传播的离散文化属性的模式，但前现代全球化更可能是一个可变的过程，导致共享文化的不同地方版本，部分基于每个群体的政治、环境和社会环境。该项目聚焦于这个关键的社会变革时代，以及之前和之后的几个世纪(公元600-1550)。为了了解全球和当地实践的融合，该项目研究了文化转型如何通过宏观、微观和基本层面的日常技术盆栽选择展开。该项目将通过激光烧蚀电感耦合等离子体质谱(LA-ICPMS)收集的化学数据与通过陶瓷岩石学和X射线衍射(XRD)收集的矿物学数据相结合。这项研究表明，日常物品，包括非常小的碎片，可以用来理解过去传统的采纳和适应，而不是专注于声望很高的物品。这些构成研究评估了一系列陶瓷制造实践，这些实践将提供有关自然资源利用和技术选择在空间和时间上的连续性、变化和融合的信息。该奖项反映了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 doctoral dissertation project utilizes the concept of globalization, or the process of interaction and integration among diverse people, to investigate the spread and adoption of customs over space and time. While it is tempting to draw broad comparisons between many groups that share commonalities in practices, belief systems, and material culture, globalization can potentially transform groups into blended communities with complex identities. Globalization as a social process is most often used to describe the modern world, but versions of this phenomenon can be recognized throughout history. Like modern processes, premodern examples represent the spread of cultural traits on impressive scales that fostered transformative interaction and restructuring. This study addresses globalization by analyzing how changes in ceramic manufacturing can be indicative of how ‘global’ craft knowledge was transferred within regions and the degree at which these practices were integrated with local traditions. Beginning around AD 1000, one region experienced a period of globalization (“Mississippianization”), which affected many aspects of religious and daily life. While ongoing archaeological research of the mid-continental United States often focuses on a pattern of discrete cultural attributes spread from a central location, premodern globalization was more likely a variable process that led to differing local versions of a shared culture based in part upon each group’s political, environmental, and social settings. The project focuses on this era of critical social change, as well as the centuries preceding and following, (AD 600-1550). To understand the fusion of global and local practices, this project studies how cultural transformations unfold through daily technical potting choices at the macroscopic, microscopic, and elemental levels. This project integrates chemical data collected via laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) and mineralogical data collected via ceramic petrography and X-ray diffraction (XRD). Instead of concentrating on prestige items, this study shows that everyday objects, including very small sherds, can be used to understand the adoption and adaptation of past traditions. These compositional studies assess the array of ceramic manufacturing practices, which will inform regarding continuity, change, and amalgamation of natural resource utilization and technological choices over space and time.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.