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Calculating Hohokam Domestic Architecture Building Costs to Test an Environmental Model of Architectural Changes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 April 2019

David R. Abbott*
Affiliation:
School of Human Evolution and Social Change, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, 85287-2402, USA
Douglas B. Craig
Affiliation:
Northland Research, 1865 E. Third Street, Tempe, AZ, 85281, USA
Hannah Zanotto
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ, 86011, USA
Veronica Judd
Affiliation:
School of Human Evolution and Social Change, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, 85287-2402, USA
Brent Kober
Affiliation:
Northland Research, 1865 E. Third Street, Tempe, AZ, 85281, USA
*
([email protected], corresponding author) https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4912-631X

Abstract

Studies of domestic architectural variation are rare in archaeological research, possibly because the essential methods remain underdeveloped. To encourage a comparative approach to explaining the construction differences in household dwellings, we designed and utilized objective and easily applied means to calculate labor costs for constructing a variety of domestic architectural styles in Hohokam society. We applied Abrams's (1989, 1994) approach, labelled “architectural energetics,” which converts architecture into its labor equivalents for building structures. By doing so, we derived standard units of measurement that promote comparative analysis. To demonstrate the method's utility, we turned to the pithouses and adobe surface structures at Pueblo Grande. We wanted to test whether the history of construction was driven by environmental degradation, and, in particular, a depletion over time of wood resources for home building (see Loendorf and Lewis 2017). Our analysis indicated that factors in addition to wood depletion likely contributed to the architectural changes at Pueblo Grande and across the Hohokam world.

Los estudios de variación arquitectónica doméstica son raros en la investigación arqueológica, posiblemente debido a que los métodos esenciales permanecen subdesarrollados. Para fomentar un enfoque comparativo para explicar las diferencias de construcción en viviendas familiares, diseñamos y utilizamos medios objetivos y fáciles de aplicar para calcular los costos laborales para construir una variedad de estilos arquitectónicos domésticos en la sociedad Hohokam. Aplicamos el enfoque de Abrams (1989, 1994), denominado “energía arquitectónica”, que convierte la arquitectura en sus equivalentes de trabajo para las estructuras de construcción. Al hacerlo, derivamos unidades de medida estándar que promueven el análisis comparativo. Para demostrar la utilidad del método, recurrimos a las estructuras de superficie de adobe y adobe en Pueblo Grande. Deseamos probar si la historia de la construcción se debió a la degradación ambiental y, en particular, al agotamiento de los recursos de madera para la construcción de viviendas (ver Loendorf y Lewis 2017). Nuestro análisis indicó que factores además del agotamiento de la madera probablemente contribuyeron a los cambios arquitectónicos en Pueblo Grande y en todo el mundo de Hohokam.

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Copyright © 2019 by the Society for American Archaeology 

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References

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