Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Role of Material Culture in Community Designation

University Of Arizona, Tucson AZ

Investigators

Abstract

This doctoral research investigates how multicultural communities negotiate their identities following migration. Over the last thirty years, archaeologists have expanded the study of migration from a topic limited to identifying the movement of people, to one that explores the different forms of interaction between local and migrant populations over time. Archaeology is well-placed to assess change over time in the interactions of local and migrant populations at various group sizes. By studying material culture, archaeology can address the extent to which migrants remained distinct versus becoming integrated into the newly formed multicultural communities. This is of particular concern now, as national and transnational migration is a current topic of discourse worldwide. Although migration is often framed as a "problem" to be solved, the investigators emphasize that migration is not a problem but something that humans have always done and always needed to navigate. In particular, this work contributes to how people navigate identity in multicultural communities. Additionally, this work funds an undergraduate research assistant, helping them understand and experience the research process by doing archival and museum collections work. The project examines how corrugated ceramics, or hand-built vessels with exposed coils, were used as a form of identity negotiation after a large migration of late prehistoric people. These ceramics are examined to address the question of whether migrants and hosts remained distinct groups or alternatively formed more cohesive communities. The researchers use these vessels to identify communities of potters at past settlements by looking at the technological and stylistic characteristics of each vessel. When examined together, subtle characteristics of a vessel create a "signature" for a potter or potting community because people learned to make these vessels differently. The investigator looks at vessels and archives from six archaeological sites before and after the migration. These sites were excavated from the 1940s to 1990s. The data set created by this analysis examines how pots were made at different sites and even within the same site before and after the migrations. These analyses reveal connections between the ways people were taught to make vessels across the region and identify communities that make corrugated vessels similarly, informing the researchers about how potters who migrated into new areas integrated (or not) into their new community. The team will thus contribute knowledge regarding how social dynamics were navigated for comparison to other case studies around the globe. 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.