Drive the Spike and Dig the Ditch: Ethnicity, Racism, and the Economic Development of New York State.

Summary

This study aims to evaluate the efficacy of archaeological study in the identification of ethnic boundaries in nineteenth-century contexts along the railroads and canals of New York State. The connections between ethnic boundaries, imposed racialized groups, and economic status have been discussed at length in archaeology. By illustrating the economic development of the state using ArcGIS, the regional growth of access to market and class separation can be linked to the development of racist attitudes and ethnic divisions visually. The ultimate goal of this project is to generate a map to diachronically illustrate the possibility for archaeological study to produce data that reasonably shows economic and social difference to support ethnic identification if it at all possible. The model produced by this project should contribute to discussions on ethnic identification and the archaeology of racism by providing a base layer of possibility of archaeological difference between supposed ethnic groups in rural contexts across the state.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage