Doctoral Dissertation Research: Northern Innovation: Modelling Copper Technologies

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项目编号	1647105
	Doctoral Dissertation Research: Northern Innovation: Modelling Copper Technologies
	Harold Cooper
主持机构	Purdue University
项目开始年	2017
	2017-07-01
项目结束日期	2018-06-30
资助机构	US-NSF
项目类别	Standard Grant
项目经费	18893(USD)
国家	美国
语种	英语
英文摘要	Technological innovation is an essential component of the human ability to adapt to environmental and social challenges. Today, technology is imagined to be cutting edge digital, biomechanical, and robotic inventions that have the potential to propel humanity into the imagined future. However, it should be recognized, that these modern advances are simply the most recent and visible examples of people manipulating materials from their environment to solve any number of engineering, physical and social problems. This project researches native copper technologies that are up to 2,000 years old, but in their time these technologies were highly innovative and represented huge technological advancements. Archaeology, with its ability to investigate the development of human societies through advanced time, has shown that technological advancements are subject to a great variety of environmental and cultural influences that innovators must navigate as they experiment with new materials and ideas. Just as contemporary IT start ups must develop new materials, create new software and navigate the world of venture capital, ancient people had to locate native copper sources, create new tool forms, and navigate trade networks over long distances that frequently were travelled on foot. The insights archaeologists gain into the relationship between the physical and social environment surrounding innovation gives us insights into the physical and social hurdles to innovation in a contemporary context. This research examines technological innovation through the lens of Indigenous metallurgy in the Pre-Columbian, North American Arctic and Subarctic. The use of geologically pure native copper by Indigenous peoples of this region spans the past 2 millennia. This includes a diverse set of cultural groups adapted to a variety of ecological zones, spanning multiple fluctuations in global and regional climate. Native copper in this context is an ideal subject to examine technological innovation. A database of native copper artifacts from across this large region has been compiled, and includes a wide range of sizes, types, and functions. Since native copper is limited to just a few reliable source regions, the investigators can quantify the amount of effort needed to acquire and transport raw material or finished goods from geological sources to archaeological sites using geospatial models. When combined with ongoing study of the production process of various objects, a complete life history can be modeled within the context of local, functional requirements for the individual craftspeople and traders who created and used these objects, including novel and innovative ways they adapted copper technology to suit their individual needs. In addition to using archaeological and museum artifacts, objects that have been collected from archaeological sites by local descendant communities, primarily Indigenous communities, in the Arctic and Subarctic will be examined and incorporated into the database. This will not only expand the database substantially by incorporating objects that are relatively inaccessible to scientific researchers, but will also engage Indigenous communities in the research process. A central goal of the research and the grant is the exchange of information between the researchers and the Indigenous communities, including knowledge about objects that are typically inaccessible in museum collections archives.
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文献类型	项目
条目标识符	http://119.78.100.173/C666/handle/2XK7JSWQ/71149
专题	环境与发展全球科技态势
推荐引用方式 GB/T 7714	Harold Cooper.Doctoral Dissertation Research: Northern Innovation: Modelling Copper Technologies.2017.