Geoarchaeological Evidence of Landscape Change

该奖项是作为NSF的社会，行为和经济科学博士后研究奖学金（SPRF）计划的一部分提供的。SPRF计划的目标是为学术界，工业界或私营部门和政府的科学事业准备有前途的早期职业博士级科学家。SPRF奖项包括在知名科学家的赞助下进行为期两年的培训，并鼓励博士后研究员进行独立研究。NSF致力于促进来自科学界各部门的科学家，包括来自代表性不足的群体的科学家参与其研究计划和活动;博士后期间被认为是实现这一目标的专业发展的重要水平。每个博士后研究员必须解决重要的科学问题，推进各自的学科领域。阿琳罗森和得克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校的赞助下，这个博士后奖学金支持早期职业科学家进行农业系统对北方新墨西哥州景观的多标量影响的地质考古学调查后，这些系统作为16 - 19世纪西班牙殖民项目的一部分。前殖民后期和殖民西南部的特点是一系列戏剧性的几十年干旱事件，深刻影响了结果。从西班牙殖民者到北美西南部的技术、植物、动物和疾病的“哥伦比亚交流”对该地区的历史产生了深远的影响。然而，很少有研究已经进行了生产的经验数据记录地貌变化的土地。该项目确定并测试了西班牙殖民统治下西南地区景观变化的三种模型。它将产生第一个直接分析的地质考古学和微植物学数据的沉积物系统采样的地质剖面相邻和下游已知的农业地区的两个殖民定居点和一个普韦布洛定居点殖民影响下的格兰德河流域地区的新墨西哥州北部：迪克森，Cuyumunge，和Picuris普韦布洛，分别。这样的沉积物剖面保存了随时间推移的景观过程的证据，如沉积物搬运（侵蚀模式）、沉积物的盐碱化（表明灌溉制度、土地稳定性，从而表明人类的流动模式）、地下水位（表明侵蚀性土地使用做法或筑坝）和有机含量（评估存在何种环境，包括干旱化事件）。研究这些部分将使本项目的研究人员能够评估土地过程如何改变与北方新墨西哥州殖民过程中引入的其他变化，并评估人们如何应对其不断变化的景观。特别值得注意的是，该项目是与该地区两个首次由当地后裔社区主办的项目合作开展的-这些后裔社区的参与将提高对取样地区的访问，增进对数据和历史的背景知识，以及对社区遗产利益的更广泛贡献。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为值得通过使用基金会的学术价值和更广泛的影响评审标准。

This award was provided as part of NSF's Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences Postdoctoral Research Fellowships (SPRF) program. The goal of the SPRF program is to prepare promising, early career doctoral-level scientists for scientific careers in academia, industry, or private sector, and government. SPRF awards involve two year of training under the sponsorship of established scientists and encourage Postdoctroal Fellows to perform independent research. NSF seeks to promote the participation of scientists from all segments of the scientific community, including those from underrepresented groups, in its research programs and activities; the postdoctoral period is considered to be an important level of professional development in attaining this goal. Each Posdoctoral Fellow must address important scientific questions tat advance their respective disciplinary fields. Under the sponsorship of Dr. Arlene Rosen and the University of Texas-Austin, this postdoctoral fellowship award supports an early career scientist conducting a geoarchaeological investigation of the multi-scalar impacts of farming systems on the landscapes of northern New Mexico upon the introduction of those systems as part of the Spanish colonial project of the 16th-19th centuries CE. The late pre-colonial and colonial Southwest was marked by a series of dramatic multi-decadal drought episodes that profoundly affected outcomes. The "Columbian Exchange" of technologies, plants, animals, and diseases from Spanish colonists to the North American Southwest has had profound impact on the history of the region. However, very little research has been conducted to produce empirical data documenting the geomorphological changes to the land. This project identifies and tests three models for landscape change in the Southwest under Spanish colonization. It will produce the first direct analysis of geoarchaeological and microbotanical data from sediments systematically sampled from geological sections adjacent to and downstream from known agricultural areas of two colonial settlements and one Pueblo settlement under colonial influence in the Rio Grande River Valley region of northern New Mexico: Dixon, Cuyumunge, and Picuris Pueblo, respectively. Sediment sections such as these preserve evidence for landscape processes over time, such as sediment transportation (erosional patterns), salinization of sediments (indicating irrigation regimes, land stability, and therefore human mobility patterns), water table levels (indicative of erosive land use practice or damming), and organic content (to assess what kinds of environments were present, including aridification episodes). Studying these sections will allow the researcher of this project to assess how land processes changed in relation to the other changes introduced over the course of colonization in northern New Mexico, and to assess how people responded to their changing landscape. It is particularly notable that this project is in cooperation with two projects in the region that are being hosted by local descendent communities for the first time - the participation of these descendent communities will enhance the accessibility to sampling areas, the contextual knowledge of the data and history, and the broader contribution to community heritage interests.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.