Complex Identities on Egypt's Early Peripheries: A Focus on the 'Egyptian' Colonisation of Indigenous Landscapes of the Western Desert and Upper Nile

我建议的研究重点是旧王国西部沙漠绿洲和上尼罗河谷城镇的相互联系的网络。我建议我们将这些遗址确定为外围地区，并将这些地区的新石器时代群体确定为非洲本土文化，被入侵的下尼罗河谷群体殖民。后者引入了埃及的定居点和行政管理，提供了早期的殖民模式。我的研究问，这些地方的土著群体在多大程度上受到埃及南部和西部边境周边地区行政中心发展的影响？在此之后，这种早期的殖民主义如何影响精英和多个非精英群体在一个严重的埃及背景下的社会、政治和行政身份的出现？我将使用现有的所有证据来追踪这些特定的土著社区，这些社区存在于这个相互关联的遗址网络中，在他们在旧王国的殖民之前和整个过程中。这将使我能够确定，当埃及的物质文化和建筑被认为主导着社会和政治格局时，出现了什么类型的身份。应用与跨文化、世界体系分析和对土著人民的后殖民分析有关的各种理论模型，将使我能够增强我的解释，以主题思考数据的一些方面，这些方面经常被忽视为随着国家影响力的扩大而消失或变得埃及化。

My proposed research focuses on the interconnected network of the Western Desert Oases and Upper Nile Valley towns in the Old Kingdom. I propose that we identify these sites as peripheries, and the Neolithic groups in these areas as indigenous African cultures, colonised by invading Lower Nile Valley groups. The latter introduced Egyptian settlement and administration, providing an early model of colonisation. My research asks, how far were the indigenous groups at these sites impacted by the development of administrative hubs within Egypt's south and western border peripheries? Following this, how did this early colonisation affect the emergence of social, political, and administrative identities of elites and multiple non-elite groups, within a heavily 'Egyptian' context? I will use all evidence available to trace these specific indigenous communities present throughout this interconnected network of sites, prior to and throughout their colonisation in the Old Kingdom. This will enable me to determine what types of identities emerged as Egyptian material culture and architecture supposedly dominated the social and political landscape. The application of a variety of theoretical models pertaining to transculturation, world systems analysis and post-colonial analysis of indigenous peoples will enable me to enhance my interpretations, thinking thematically about aspects of data that are often overlooked as 'disappearing' or becoming Egyptianized as state influence expands.