Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Household Spaces and Everyday Practices at Xaltocan Under Aztec Imperial Expansion

在Elizabeth M. brumfield博士的指导下，Lisa Overholtzer将研究墨西哥中部后古典时期Xaltocan遗址的社会、政治和经济转型，以及它被征服并融入阿兹特克帝国的过程。因此，这个项目将揭示战争、帝国扩张、遗弃和流离失所的过程，这些都是人类学中长期关注的话题。Overholtzer女士将对民族历史的断言进行评价，即在经历了漫长的战争之后，Xaltocan被当地居民抛弃，然后被阿兹特克进贡者重新安置。她还将探讨平民在这种新背景下如何改革日常生活。现场工作将包括水平挖掘两个房屋土丘，已知其中包含可追溯到阿兹特克帝国合并前后的国内沉积物。如果民族历史的陈述是准确的，仔细的挖掘应该揭示遗址被破坏、被迅速遗弃和占领中断的证据。房屋的背景分析和其中的文物分布将有助于重建融入阿兹特克国家之前和之后的日常生活空间。然而，由于许多家庭用品经常被清扫和扔进垃圾桶，或者在房子被遗弃时被主人带走，它们在房子里的存在和位置可能不能反映它们的使用场所。因此，Overholtzer女士还将对不受这些过程影响的微残留物进行分析，比如古代活动的化学特征，以及被践踏后嵌在地板上的人工制品的小碎片。本研究将通过以下方面做出理论贡献：1)对战争和征服的常见经历进行长期案例研究；2)考虑自下而上的过程和Xaltocan的家庭决策，例如逃亡或重建的决定，这些决定有助于阿兹特克帝国的特征。这个项目关键性地改变了分析框架，将重点放在不断变化的政治经济中的普通选择上，而不是自上而下的精英对普通生活的限制。因此，它将允许人们以更全面的方式理解帝国，考虑所有人在帝国进程中的角色。在墨西哥，一种强烈的自豪感建立在民族传统之上。Overholtzer女士将创造更多关于这一遗产的知识，并将其传播到几个方面：通过对居民进行考古方法的培训，向当地学校提供实地考察，在当地博物馆举办展览，并通过当地文化中心传播研究成果。更广泛地说，研究结果将以报告的形式分发给墨西哥国家人类学和历史研究所，并以论文和出版物的形式分发给全世界的学术界。其他更广泛的影响包括促进国际教学。该项目将为来自墨西哥和美国代表性不足的群体的两位年轻考古学家提供机会，以获得宝贵的实地经验。通过开发新的多媒体课程材料和通过互联网网站传播考古信息，作者将鼓励在大学教室和其他地方学习。

Under the direction of Dr. Elizabeth M. Brumfiel, Lisa Overholtzer will examine the social, political, and economic transition at the Postclassic Central Mexican site of Xaltocan upon its conquest and integration into the Aztec empire. Thus, this project will shed light on warfare, imperial expansion, and abandonment and displacement processes, topics of perennial concern within anthropology. Ms Overholtzer will evaluate ethnohistoric assertions that, having been conquered after a long war, Xaltocan was abandoned by its native population and then resettled with Aztec tribute payers. She will also explore the ways in which commoners reformed everyday life in this new context. Fieldwork will include horizontal excavations of two house mounds known to contain domestic deposits dating to before and after incorporation into the Aztec empire. Careful excavation should reveal evidence of site destruction, rapid abandonment, and a hiatus in occupation, if ethnohistoric statements are accurate. The contextual analysis of houses and the distribution of artifacts within them will help reconstruct the spatial routines of daily life before and after incorporation into the Aztec state. However, because many household items were regularly swept up and placed in trash or were taken by their owners when the house was abandoned, their presence and location within a house may not reflect their places of use. Therefore, Ms Overholtzer will also employ analyses of micro-residues - such as chemical signatures of ancient activities and small fragments of artifacts that become imbedded in floors with trampling -that are not affected by these processes. This research will make a theoretical contribution by 1) offering a long-term case study of commoner experiences of war and conquest, and 2) considering bottom-up processes and household decisions at Xaltocan, such as the decisions to flee or rebuild, that contributed to the character of the Aztec empire. This project critically shifts the frame of analysis to focus on commoner choices within a changing political economy, rather than on top-down elite constraints on commoner life. As a result, it will allow one to understand empires in a more comprehensive way that considers the roles of all people in imperial processes. Within Mexico a strong sense of pride rests on national heritage. Ms Overholtzer will create additional knowledge of this heritage and distribute it in several contexts: by training residents in archaeological methods, providing site tours to local schools, constructing an exhibit in the local museum, and distributing research results through the local cultural center. More broadly, research findings will be disseminated in the form of reports to Mexico's National Institute for Anthropology and History, and in dissertation and publication form to academic communities worldwide. Additional broader impacts include the promotion of teaching and learning internationally. The project will provide opportunities for two young archaeologists from underrepresented groups in Mexico and the United States to gain valuable field experience. Through the development of new multi-media curriculum materials and the dissemination of archaeological information via an internet website, the author will encourage learning in university classrooms and beyond.