Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Award: Rural Land Use Practice In Response To Political Change

Indiana University, Bloomington IN

Investigators

Abstract

Ph.D. candidate Alex Elvis Badillo of Indiana University will document long-term changes in the ways humans modify and use land in the mountainous rural region of Quiechapa, Oaxaca, Mexico. The major goal of the research is to determine how political and economic transformations and conflict in neighboring urban areas affected rural land-use in southern Oaxaca and to determine which land-use strategies proved most effective during times of large-scale change. While political unrest in complex urban areas often has visible and measurable effects on local demography, food security, and land-use, one should also expect that rural hinterlands experience change. This is true in both the past and the present. As a result of this research, Badillo will determine the kinds of decisions people made regarding agriculture, settlement, and land-use in rural areas when confronted with large-scale sociopolitical shifts. Quiechapa, which lies equidistant from two important stopping points on routes of Postclassic trade and conquest, is a prime location to study the effects of wider political unrest on rural regions. Rural land-use data collected in Quiechapa will complement over 40 years of regional survey research in Oaxaca in providing a broader context within which to analyze urban/rural land-use dynamics. Archaeology is uniquely qualified to contribute data pertaining to land-use change over the long term, which is vital to understanding the historical trajectories that have led to current global situations. This archaeological study will advance theoretical understandings about rural land-use change and its relationship to demography, economy, technology, politics, and the environment. To understand how broader sociopolitical and economic changes in southern Oaxaca affected land-use in Quiechapa, Badillo will address the following questions: (1) Where and when did anthropogenic land modification occur?; (2) In what ways did the people of Quiechapa modify their landscape?; (3) How were the people living in Quiechapa connected to the broader interregional politics and exchange networks? Data will be collected through a regional pedestrian settlement survey in which the survey team will walk the 168 square kilometers study region recording all evidence of land-use and settlement using a high precision global positioning system (GPS). Observational data and surface artifact sample locations associated with evidence of land-use will be organized into the common platform of a geographic information system (GIS) database for analysis. Surface artifacts and data on land-use modifications such as terracing, water management features, and residential architecture, in combination with other environmental datasets, will allow Badillo to detect changes in land-use and settlement from the Classic (A.D. 200 - 800) to the Postclassic Period (A.D. 800 - 1521). Badillo will involve citizens of Quiechapa in the research of their own history and heritage, while also teaching scientific principles through the practice of archaeology. Moreover, information about how Quiechapa's local landscape has been modified and used in the past will be collected in collaboration with local land authorities and will be used in current agricultural intensification efforts.