Doctoral Dissertation Research: Utilization of Prior Cultural Features

博士论文研究：利用先前的文化特征

• 批准号: 2342127
• 负责人: Michael Dietler
• 金额: $ 2.46万
• 依托单位: University of Chicago
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2024
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2024-04-01 至 2025-03-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2342127&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Utilization; Prior

This doctoral dissertation projects seeks to understand how formations of identity and difference are established through interaction with the physical environment, and especially with material remains of the past. The physical remains of past peoples frequently persist in living cultural landscapes and are often engaged in ways that bear upon the present, including in the construction and legitimation of novel identities. This study focuses on the social mechanisms of these processes of identity construction: How do people understand the relevance of the past for their present? Which pasts become useful for which kinds of identity projects? An archaeological study concentrating on monumental landscapes with many phases of engagement can reveal how these social processes unfold, offering a diachronic perspective on the imagination of the past under different historical conditions. In studying these archaeological contexts of material engagement, this study provides novel insight on the role of the past in group formation and the maintenance of social difference. These issues are particularly relevant today, when political and social movements make ample use of symbols of pasts to claim legitimacy and cultural value. This research also establishes a framework for critical engagement with local heritage. It solicits input from local residents and visitors to the research sites and incorporates this input into the dataset. A version of the resulting composite dataset will be made openly available online for continued public engagement and contribution, benefiting both local stakeholders and the research community.Three study areas that each encompass a variety of monuments, settlements, and other archaeological features that show evidence of successive phases of reuse, re-occupation, modification, or other kinds of engagement have been identified. The investigators hypothesize that these landscapes constituted the material arenas in which identities were constructed in the early historic period, offering the material remains of prehistoric occupants as a resource in these constructions. The doctoral student seeks to understand whether there are distinct patterns in the ways these landscapes are reused through time, and if certain features or monuments from one period are more likely to be incorporated into the living landscape of another. Such patterns lend insight into the ways the relevant pasts were imagined to related to the early historic people who interacted with them. Drone-based aerial photography, used to produce high-resolution imagery and topographic models, serves alongside pedestrian survey as the primary means of data collection to apprehend spatial relationships within these complex landscapes. GIS-based statistical analysis of these data focuses on the ways contrasts between groups were created in these patterns of landscape reuse. The researchers are additionally excavating a cairn feature of prehistoric origin which may have been taken up as a salient cultural boundary marker in the early historic period. This excavation will allow the researchers to assess the nature of this feature and to attain radiocarbon dates for its multiple phases of use and possible modifications.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.

该博士学位论文项目试图了解如何通过与物理环境的互动，尤其是过去的材料遗体来建立身份和差异的形成。过去人民的身体遗骸经常持续存在于生活的文化景观中，并且经常以目前的方式参与，包括新身份的建设和合法化。这项研究的重点是这些身份构建过程的社会机制：人们如何理解过去与现在的相关性？哪些过去对哪些身份项目有用？一项考古研究集中在具有许多参与阶段的纪念性景观上，可以揭示这些社会过程的发展，从而在不同的历史条件下对过去的想象力提供了简短的观点。在研究这些物质参与的考古背景时，这项研究提供了有关过去在群体形成和维持社会差异中的作用的新见解。今天，当政治和社会运动能够充分利用过去的符号来声称合法性和文化价值时，这些问题尤其重要。这项研究还建立了与当地遗产进行批判性参与的框架。它索取了当地居民和访客对研究地点的输入，并将此输入纳入数据集中。将公开在网上公开提供该结果的复合数据集的版本，以持续公众参与和贡献，从而使当地利益相关者和研究社区受益。每个研究领域涵盖了各种纪念碑，定居点和其他考古特征，这些纪念碑，定居点和其他证据表明了连续的重复使用，重新占领，重新占领，修改，修改或其他参与的研究。研究人员假设这些景观构成了在历史早期建造身份的物质领域，从而将史前居民的物质保留为这些结构中的资源。博士生试图了解这些风景在时间上重新使用的方式是否存在明显的模式，并且如果一个时期的某些功能或纪念碑更有可能将其纳入另一个时期的生活景观。这种模式可以深入了解与与之互动的早期历史悠久的人相关的相关过去的想象。用于生产高分辨率图像和地形模型的基于无人机的航空摄影与行人调查一起作为数据收集的主要手段，以逮捕这些复杂景观中的空间关系。基于GIS的这些数据的统计分析重点是在这些景观重复使用模式中创建组之间的对比方式。研究人员还在挖掘史前起源的Cairn特征，在历史早期可能被视为一个显着的文化边界标记。该发掘将使研究人员能够评估此功能的性质，并在其多个使用阶段和可能的修改中获得放射性碳日期。该奖项反映了NSF的法定任务，并被认为是值得通过基金会的知识分子优点和更广泛的审查标准通过评估来获得支持的。