Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Community Identity in the Late Prehistoric Northern Yazoo Basin

在Vincas P.Steponaitis博士的指导下，Erin Stevens女士将从Parchman Place收集和分析数据，Parchman Place是密西西比州晚期的遗址，位于密西西比州西北部的亚祖盆地北部。帕克曼遗址可以追溯到15世纪中叶，由四个土丘和至少三个独立的居民区组成。这些社区是利用地球物理勘测技术(特别是磁梯度法)确定的，由成组的国内结构以及相关的矿坑特征和活动区组成。帕奇曼的土丘挖掘揭示了与建造土丘有关的社区建设仪式活动的证据，以及可能标志着次社区一级群体之间竞争的破坏性事件。这一证据表明，帕奇曼的土堆建筑传统是可塑性的，个人或群体能够操纵或调整他们的建筑做法，以强调特定的身份。史蒂文斯将调查在社区层面的社会凝聚力或分化的类似模式是否可以在除土丘建造之外的实践的物质遗迹中看到。这些包括：(1)公共和家庭空间的组织；(2)陶器的生产和使用，用于在家庭和仪式环境中储存、烹饪和提供食物；以及(3)帕奇曼居民生产和消费的食物的类型、数量和组合。从广义上讲，社区的考古研究很重要，因为社区是邻居、亲戚和陌生人之间社会互动的主要场所。史蒂文斯女士的研究将把对社区和社区身份的研究牢牢地置于当前关于密西西比社会政治形态的讨论中，这将有助于我们理解史前晚期雅祖盆地中人和群体的互动，这些讨论主要集中在地区政治的性质上。地方一级的调查将通过关注构成日常生活的实践来丰富对密西西比州生活方式的解释。社区空间的安排可以解决日常活动的社会性问题，如陶器制作和做饭。饮食习惯是人们强调相同或不同的一种方式。食物方式和空间的组织都涉及社会不平等和社区内身份形成的问题，还可以提出地方社区与更大的(区域)政治形态相联系的方式。除了其学术价值，本研究还产生了一些更广泛的影响，包括有助于对史蒂文斯女士和一些本科生研究助理和志愿者进行传统和技术创新领域和实验室方法的培训。更广泛地说，通过出版物和专业会议以及地方报纸和区域历史学会传播考古发现，有助于更深入和更广泛地了解当地历史。南方的历史，尤其是密西西比三角洲的历史，经常被描绘成黑人和白人的历史。考古学的强大之处在于，它使不同的历史在风景中可见。这种提高的知名度最终导致以考古遗址的形式保存这一历史及其记录，目前这些遗址受到发展项目和现代农业做法的威胁。

Under the direction of Dr. Vincas P. Steponaitis, Ms Erin Stevens will gather and analyze data from Parchman Place, a late Mississippi period site located in the northern Yazoo Basin of northwest Mississippi. The Parchman site dates to the middle of the 15th century and consists of four mounds and at least three discrete residential neighborhoods. These neighborhoods have been identified using geophysical survey techniques (notably magnetic gradiometry) and consist of grouped domestic structures and associated pit features and activity areas. Mound excavations at Parchman reveal evidence of community-building ritual activity associated with the building of mounds, as well as destructive events that may signal competition between groups at the sub-community level. This evidence suggests that mound building traditions at Parchman were malleable and that individuals or groups of people were able to manipulate or adapt their construction practices in order to emphasize particular identities. Stevens will investigate whether similar patterns of social cohesion or differentiation at the community level can be seen in the material remains of practices other than mound building. These include: (1) the organization of public and domestic space; (2) the production and use of pottery for storage, cooking, and serving of food in domestic and ritual contexts; and (3) the types, quantities, and combinations of foods produced and consumed by those living at Parchman. Broadly speaking, the archaeological study of communities is important because communities are the primary locus of social interaction between neighbors, relatives and strangers. Ms Stevens's study will contribute to our understanding of the interactions of people and groups in the late prehistoric Yazoo Basin by situating the study of communities and communal identities firmly within current discussions of Mississippian sociopolitical formations, which have largely focused on the nature of regional polities. Investigations at the local level will enrich interpretations of Mississippian lifeways by focusing on the practices that structure daily life. The arrangement of community space can address questions about the social nature of daily activities such as pottery production and meal preparation. Food practices serve as a means through which people emphasize sameness or difference. Both foodways and the organization of space speak to issues of social inequality and identity formation within communities, and can additionally suggest ways in which local communities articulate with larger (regional) political formations. In addition to its intellectual merits, the present study has a number of broader impacts, including contributing to the training of Ms Stevens and a number of undergraduate research assistants and volunteers in traditional and technologically innovative field and laboratory methods. More broadly, the dissemination of archaeological findings through publications and professional meetings, as well as local papers and regional historical societies, leads to deeper and broader understandings of local histories. The history of the South, and particularly of the Mississippi Delta, is too often depicted as a history of blacks and whites. Archaeology is powerful in that it makes alternative histories visible on the landscape. This increased visibility ultimately results in the preservation of that history and its record in the form of archaeological sites, which are currently threatened by development projects and modern agricultural practices.