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。虽然人们很容易对许多在实践、信仰体系和物质文化上有共同之处的群体进行广泛的比较，但全球化有可能将群体转变为具有复杂身份的混合社区。作为一个社会过程的全球化最常被用来描述现代世界，但这种现象的版本可以在整个历史中得到认可。像现代过程一样，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，促进了变革的互动和重组。本研究通过分析陶瓷制造业的变化如何表明“全球”工艺知识如何在地区内转移，以及这些实践与当地传统的融合程度，来解决全球化问题。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。虽然对美国中部大陆的考古研究经常关注于从中心位置传播的离散文化属性模式，但前现代全球化更可能是一个可变的过程，它导致了基于每个群体的政治、环境和社会背景的共享文化的不同地方版本。该项目侧重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年）。为了理解全球和地方实践的融合，该项目研究了文化转型是如何通过宏观、微观和基本层面的日常技术选择展开的。该项目整合了通过激光烧蚀电感耦合等离子体质谱（LA-ICP-MS）收集的化学数据，以及通过陶瓷岩石学和x射线衍射（XRD）收集的矿物学数据。这项研究表明，日常物品，包括非常小的碎片，都可以用来理解对过去传统的采用和适应，而不是专注于名牌物品。这些组成研究评估了陶瓷制造实践的阵列，这将告知关于自然资源利用和技术选择在空间和时间上的连续性，变化和合并。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。

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.