Friday, April 18, 2008

Irrigation Agriculture and Fieldhouses?

I've finished a draft of the presentation I gave on campus earlier this semester. If anyone wants to read it and comment, I'd be glad to send it along.

AGRICULTURAL LABOR AMONG SMALL-SCALE IRRIGATION AGRICULTURALISTS:
INVESTIGATING FIELD HOUSE OCCUPATION IN THE PHOENIX BASIN HOHOKAM
Abstract

While Hohokam researchers have been primarily interested in large village sites, investigations have periodically been undertaken at field house and farmstead sites asking why the Hohokam built field houses when large villages were located nearby. We propose four possible answers to this question; households holding tenure to the land from adjacent villages were marking ownership of the land, pioneers lived in field houses prior to the establishment of more permanent villages, migratory laborers from outside the canal system lived in the structures seasonally, and field houses were utilized by land inheritors who held a primary residence in a distant village on the same canal system. These hypotheses are evaluated for two recently excavated field houses. Evidence is given supporting the idea that some Hohokam field houses were occupied by migrant laborers. We conclude with a discussion of agricultural labor among the Hohokam and the implications for small-scale irrigation agriculture.

1 comment:

SoCo said...

About to finish my comps. Send it my way. Thanks.
mike