Department of Anthropology

The Department of Anthropology is pleased to present A Series on Environmental Archaeology. The second of five lectures will take place over lunch on January 11th at 12:30p in Haldeman 125.

“Spontaneity and Order in the Agricultural Hinterland of the Ancient North Coast of Peru ”

Ari Caramanica
PhD Candidate
Harvard University

Ari Caramanica's research is focused on the sociopolitical impacts of borderland occupation and the reconstruction of agricultural landscapes of pre-Hispanic coastal Peru using remote sensing techniques and paleobotanical analysis. She is currently an NSF Graduate Research Fellow. Her dissertation research is focused on the ancient agricultural landscape, the Pampa de Mocan, where she has been conducted research since 2013. The Pampa de Mocan is a desert area located in the northern right margin of the Chicama Valley on the North Coast of Peru. There the extremely dry conditions pose obstacles for modern-day habitation, however, the landscape was densely occupied and developed in the pre-Hispanic periods beginning in the Early Horizon (900-500 BC) and through the Late Intermediate Period (AD 1000-1476).