Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant-Trade and Social Boundaries During the Late Neolithic on the Great Hungarian Plain

社会和文化的界限争论不休，而且不断变化。它们并不总是与政治边界相关(例如，前南斯拉夫、波斯尼亚和黑塞哥维那、匈牙利和罗马尼亚的社会边界经常贯穿政治边界)，因此，研究早期社会边界对于学者理解该区域的现代发展是非常必要的。在她的导师William Parkinson博士的支持下，研究生Danielle Riebe将对新石器时代晚期(公元前5000-4500年)匈牙利大平原上的边界和相互作用之间的关系进行研究。考古学家经常引用人与人之间的互动作为触发因素，通过思想和技术的传播以及农业和动物驯化的传播来看到新出现的社会复杂性。Plain通过关注两个考古定义的群体，Tisza和Herpály，提供了一个理想的位置来研究互动，特别是贸易，如何影响社会和文化边界的形成、改变和破坏。在一个环境同质的地区，这些群体在新石器时代晚期的考古记录中出现，并以非常不同的物质文化区分开来，包括陶瓷和碎石工具。随着人们交易这些材料，他们的思想、传统、技术和社会实践也同时传播。分析技术，包括激光烧蚀-电感耦合等离子体质谱(LA-ICP-MS)，将用于评估陶瓷和碎石材料的成分，以便根据沉积环境模拟原料来源。通过分析物品是如何被创造出来的，它们是在哪里建造的，以及它们是如何在生产后流通的，里贝将探索平原上的社区如何区分自己和他们的邻居。除了研究互动在社会发展中的作用的理论问题外，这个项目还通过挑战文化边界是如何划定的，对人类学领域做出了智力贡献。传统上，根据相似或不同的文化材料的识别来划定边界。然而，这种简单化的方法没有考虑到尽管贸易，边界如何保持不变，建议更多地关注重建人民之间的互动，以了解区域互动和边界形成过程之间的关系。本文将通过促进美国和匈牙利公民和学者在史前边界和社会变化研究中的国际合作，促进更广泛的影响。调查结果将通过公开讲座、在会议上的陈述、同行评议文章和专著向学者和公众公布。该项目的所有发现和解释都将包括在里贝女士的论文中，论文的副本将提供给所有参与的机构。该项目的资金将使里贝女士能够利用她在学术培训期间获得的技能和经验，撰写一篇既具有人类学启发性又具有进步意义的论文，并促进人类学领域的发展，促进我们对史前东欧的了解，以及我们对现代世界社会政治发展的理解。

Social and cultural boundaries are highly contested and constantly changing. They do not always correlate with political boundaries (e.g., the social boundaries of former Yugoslavia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Hungary, and Romania often cross-cut political demarcations), thus making the study of early social boundaries imperative for scholars to understand the modern developments in the region. With the support of her advisor, Dr. William Parkinson, graduate student Danielle Riebe will conduct research on the relationship between boundaries and interaction during the Late Neolithic (5000-4500 BCE) on the Great Hungarian Plain. Archaeologists often cite interactions between people as a trigger for emergent social complexity as seen through the dissemination of ideas and technology and the spread of agriculture and animal domestication. The Plain offers an ideal location to investigate how interaction, specifically trade, impacts the formation, alteration, and destruction of social and cultural boundaries by focusing on two archaeologically defined groups, the Tisza and Herpály. In an area that is environmentally homogenous, these groups emerged in the archaeological record at the beginning of the Late Neolithic and are differentiated by very distinct material culture, including ceramics and chipped-stone tools. As people trade these materials, their ideas, traditions, techniques, and social practices are diffused at the same time. Analytical techniques, including laser ablation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS), will be used to assess the composition of ceramic and chipped-stone material in order to model raw material provenience in relation to depositional context. By analyzing how objects are created, where they are constructed, and how they are circulated after production, Ms. Riebe will explore how communities on the Plain differentiated themselves and their neighbors. In addition to investigating theoretical issues concerning the role of interaction in social developments, this project also makes intellectual contributions to the field of anthropology by challenging how cultural boundaries are delineated. Traditionally, boundaries are demarcated based on the identification of similar or dissimilar cultural material. However, this simplistic approach does not account for how boundaries persist in spite of trade, suggesting that more attention be given to the reconstruction of interactions between peoples in order to understand the relationship between regional interactions and the process of boundary formation.This dissertation will contribute to a broader impact by promoting international collaboration between U.S. and Hungarian citizens and scholars, in the study of prehistoric boundaries and social change. Findings will be made available to academics and the public through public lectures, presentations at conferences, peer-reviewed articles and a monograph. All of the findings and interpretations from this project will be included in Ms. Riebe's dissertation, and copies of the dissertation will be provided to all participating institutions. Funding for this project will allow Ms. Riebe to utilize the skills and experiences that she has acquired during her academic training to produce a dissertation that is both anthropologically illuminating and progressive, and that advances the field of anthropology, our knowledge of prehistoric Eastern Europe, and our understanding of socio-political developments in the modern world.