Under the direction of Dr. Gary Wright, Mr. Adrian Burke will collect data for his doctoral dissertation. His goal is to understand the social organization of prehistoric Native American inhabitants of the Maritime Peninsula, an area which includes Maine and adjacent parts of Canada. This is a issue which is extremely difficult to address because archaeological sites in this region generally have poor preservation of remains and thus it is usually difficult to wring much information from them. Mr. Burke has already conducted a significant amount of excavation in this region and has recognized that it is possible both to locate the geological deposits which provided the raw material for the stone tools which were used throughout the area. In this study Mr. Burke will continue his fieldwork to locate additional rock outcrops. Materials collected from these sources will be subjected to both microscopic and chemical analysis to search for identifying structural characteristics and chemical signatures. Mr. Burke will conduct similar analyses on stone tools recovered from many sites across the region. On this basis he will then be able to establish trade routes and economic interactions. It will thus be possible to reconstruct one important aspect of social organization. Mr. Burke will also analyze the kinds of tools which were made and by this means describe a technological system which was crucial for survival in this region which lacked metal. In addition to providing information which is of interest to a wide range of archaeologists, the research will also serve to advance archaeological methodology. Researchers have postulated a number of models which concern how human populations, at a simple level of technology, make use of irregularly scattered resources. Some have postulated that individual mobility is limited and that trade serves as a primary mechanism to distribute these resources. Others have argued for a high degree of population mobility. The proposed research will address this question directly. It will also assist in the training of a promising young archaeologist.
