2007

Debra Green

  • Doctoral Candidate
  • University of Illinois at Chicago

Project

Late Holocene Geoarchaeology in the Bais-Tanjay River Basin: Landscape Change and Subsistence Strategies of Prehispanic Philippine Societies in Negros Oriental

Program

Henry Luce Foundation/ACLS Grants to Individuals in East and Southeast Asian Archaeology and Early History Dissertation Fellowships (North America)

Department

Anthropology

Abstract

This dissertation project involves an interdisciplinary approach using archaeology, geology, and paleoethnobotany to assess strategies of agricultural land use and landscape change in the central Philippines. Excavations are being conducted at two-multi-component sites. The first is a buried paddy rice field associated with the prehispanic maritime trading port at Tanjay. The second site is an interior dry field possibly associated with swidden cultivators at an upriver village. Geological investigations are focusing on river terrace sediments, on-site sediments from excavation areas, and the collection of paleoenvironmental data from off-site mangrove swamp areas.