Doctoral Dissertation Research Award: The Development of Mobile Pastoralism

长期以来，研究人员一直试图了解欧亚大陆中部独特的田园生活方式的出现和发展。几千年来，这片辽阔土地上的许多居民都靠放牧绵羊、山羊、牛和马维持生计。畜群必须不断地被转移到新鲜的牧场，这种模式往往排除了建立永久居住地的可能性。这种生存系统与定居农业或高度流动的野生资源觅食之间的关系还知之甚少。特别令人感兴趣的是，专门的放牧可能是直接从移动的觅食发展而来的，而不是作为对久坐耕作的补充的适应。在Robert Drennan博士和Loukas Barton博士的监督下，Jennifer Farquhar将调查狩猎-采集者在蒙古沙漠草原地区流动牧业发展中的作用。这项研究的重点是整个经济和社会转型中的流动模式，从大约7000年前的小规模平等主义社会到大约2500年前青铜时代的更复杂、更大规模的社会政治一体化。机动性对觅食和放牧生产方式都至关重要。它的研究不仅对定居策略如何随着家畜的增加而改变提供了重要的见解，而且还将社会生活的其他方面放在了背景中，包括社会互动的模式、等级制度以及获得物质财富、声望、生产和仪式的不同途径。进化生态学的模型将被用来更好地理解猎人和后来的牧民如何在栖息地内分布，识别人们如何、何时和为什么迁移的变化。对这些模型的评价将有助于我们理解人类决策的本质以及行为变化的机制。在过去二十年中，这些模型的应用促进了对一系列现象的理解，包括农业的起源和体制不平等的出现。Farquhar将在蒙古东南部的Ikh Nart自然保护区进行系统的区域规模调查，以确定可以找到高流动性猎人和牧民短暂遗骸的位置，并收集这些材料的样本进行研究。这项研究是法夸尔博士培训的核心部分，将为美国和蒙古学生提供实地培训和经验。美国和蒙古团队成员在实地工作、实验室分析和解释方面的合作将鼓励人员、想法和信息的交流，以促进反映所有参与者的目标和价值观的结果。与当地牧民社区和乌兰巴托的大型城市中心合作，将有助于Ikh Nart自然保护区和中央政府促进环境管理和资源保护的目标，鉴于最近面临前所未有的开采，自然和文化资源的减少尤其令人关注。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Researchers have long sought to understand the emergence and development of the distinctive pastoral ways of life characteristic of central Eurasia. Many inhabitants of this enormous territory have been sustained for thousands of years by herding sheep, goats, cattle, and horses. The animal herds must be moved continually to fresh pastures in a pattern that often precludes the establishment of permanent residences. The relationship of such subsistence systems to sedentary agriculture or to highly mobile foraging for wild resources is poorly understood. The possibility that specialized herding may have developed directly from mobile foraging rather than as an adaptation complementary to sedentary farming is especially interesting and little investigated. Under the supervision of Dr. Robert Drennan and Dr. Loukas Barton, Jennifer Farquhar will investigate the role of hunter-gatherers in the development of mobile pastoralism in the desert-steppe region of Mongolia. The study focuses on patterns of mobility across the entire economic and social transition from small-scale egalitarian societies some 7000 years ago to the more complex larger-scale sociopolitical integration of the Bronze Age some 2500 years ago. Mobility is critical to both foraging and herding modes of production. Its study provides not only important insight into how settlement strategies changed with the addition of domestic animals, but also puts in context other aspects of social life including patterns of social interaction, hierarchy, and differential access to material wealth, prestige, production, and ritual. Models from evolutionary ecology will be used in the effort to understand better how hunters and, later on, herders distributed themselves within habitats, identifying changes in how, when, and why people moved. The evaluation of these models will contribute to our understanding of the nature of human decision making as well as of the mechanisms of behavioral change. Application of these models over the past two decades has led to advances in understanding a range of phenomena including the origins of agriculture and the emergence of institutional inequality.Ms. Farquhar will carry out systematic regional-scale survey in the Ikh Nart Nature Reserve in southeastern Mongolia to identify locations where the ephemeral remains of highly mobile hunters and herders can be found, and to collect samples of these materials for study. The research is a central part of Ms. Farquhar's doctoral training and will provide field training and experience for both U.S. and Mongolian students. Cooperation among US and Mongolian team members in field work, laboratory analysis, and interpretation will encourage the exchange of people, ideas, and information in order to promote outcomes that reflect the goals and values of all participants. A collaborative approach to public outreach to local herding communities and the large urban center of Ulaanbaatar will contribute to the goals of Ikh Nart Nature Reserve and the national government to promote environmental management and resource conservation, topics of particular concern in light of recent declines in both natural and cultural resources in the face of unprecedented extraction.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.