Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Community Organization In Capital Cities

University Of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh PA

Investigators

Abstract

Cities are at the center of political, economic, religious and social life. A key way to understand how they function is through the investigation of their social and spatial organization, seen in the way neighborhoods, districts and ethnic groups form and interact. Compact and highly centralized cities function in different ways when compared to garden cities with more dispersed layouts. Cities that are capitals of large states provide unique information on political organization and the nature of rulership since they are home to a society's leaders and central institutions. A capital city may be dominated by a centralized single governing institution, or may contain several, suggesting a more segmented form of rulership. Archaeology is particularly well suited to study social relations in capital cities as it can trace long term trajectories of city formation and change and their relationship with political power and statecraft. Under the supervision of Dr. Elizabeth Arkush, the doctoral candidate Gabriela Cervantes will study the social organization of the Sican capital city in Peru, with emphasis on urban organization and interaction, domestic economies and subsistence practices, economic differentiation and power relations and statecraft. This project will provide training to US and Peruvian students from various universities in contemporary archeological techniques. The information obtained, which will provide the basis for Cervantes' dissertation, will also be presented in a public talk in the Sican National Museum in Peru for the local community; detailed data will be made available through the Center for Comparative Archaeology of the University of Pittsburgh webpage. The researcher will examine how urban patterns and city life involve social relations, economy and power. The Sican state in Peru was one of the most developed societies in metallurgy technology and long distance trade in the Americas. The research will involve a program of full coverage survey, systematic surface collection and mapping of the city. The data obtained will be used to address the residential nature of the capital, its size, density and urban layout and the socioeconomic differentiation and economic occupation of its residents. The research will expand current views of urban variability and neighborhood formation and compact versus dispersed settlements in cities. Further, the research will investigate how power is structured and practiced, and use this information to refine and compare current constructs of statecraft and sociopolitical trajectories.