Incorporation and Culture Change as the Result of Culture Contact

University Of Colorado At Boulder, Boulder CO

Investigators

Abstract

Dr. Scott Ortman of the University of Colorado Boulder will conduct research that re-frames the effects of Spanish contact on Pueblo Indian communities. Recent studies of the initial century of Spanish contact in New Mexico have tended to focus on population decline, resistance and revitalization. The hardships brought on by Spanish colonization were real, but contemporary Pueblo tradition also incorporates ideas and practices that were introduced by Spanish settlers. This suggests a deeper understanding of the Columbian encounter can be obtained through study of this incorporation process. Dr. Ortman will conduct archaeological, ethnographic, and linguistic research in collaboration with the Pueblo of Pojoaque, a federally-recognized Indian tribe, to determine why certain elements of Spanish culture were incorporated into Pueblo tradition while others were not, to document the effects of introduced domesticates for Pueblo settlement and land-use, and to determine the extent to which Spanish introductions affected material standards of living, or what Pueblo people refer to today as "abundance." The research activities will involve contemporary Pueblo community members and University of Colorado students in all stages of the process, from field recording to exhibit design to final publications. The work will document and provide insight into a unique American way of life. Existing documentary evidence concerning the Columbian encounter is highly biased toward the perspectives and perceptions of Spanish colonizers, and reliance on these sources has led to an imbalanced view of this period in contemporary society. This research addresses the imbalance by collecting new archaeological data from Pueblo settlements inhabited before, during, and after Spanish contact, and by analyzing words for Spanish introductions in Pueblo languages. The results will support a more realistic understanding of native experience during the Columbian encounter. The project will problematize the concepts of "native" and "tradition" in developing a view of Spanish contact that de-emphasizes historical rupture and emphasizes social processes that have governed cross-cultural interaction throughout history. It will also blur the boundary between Pre-Hispanic and Historical archaeology in New Mexico by extending the chronological scope of regional archaeological datasets, and it will provide the first comprehensive study of changes in Pueblo languages that accompanied Spanish contact.