Meet Society of Fellows Archaeology Scholar Jacob Bongers
Dr. Jacob Bongers is an
anthropological archaeologist who received a Ph.D. in archaeology from the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA in 2019. He employs multidisciplinary methodologies built around archaeological science and digital archaeology to investigate how Indigenous communities confront social and environmental change. His doctoral research examined how groups configured ritualized behaviors to deal with imperial conquest in southern Peru. His current research explores how Indigenous communities in highland and coastal Peru mitigate climatic hazards and conflict in everyday life. Prior to joining BU, Bongers conducted archaeological fieldwork in Portugal, Chile, Ethiopia, Oman, and Peru. Learn more about Dr. Bongers’s background and current work in an interview with CISS communications intern Lily Belisle.
What made you decide to be a social scientist/ why does social science matter to you?
I decided to become a social scientist because I wanted to learn more about past human cultures, how they adapt to varying environmental, climatic, and social challenges, and how and why they change over time. As a young kid, I traveled a lot to the Netherlands to visit family. I spent a lot of time with my grandfather, who passed his love of history and archaeology of the Romans to me. This sparked an interest in the past. I was lucky to visit museums and archaeological sites throughout Europe. I worked on my first archaeological dig in Portugal when I was sixteen years old and after finding a Roman coin in one of the units, I was hooked. Discovery and learning new things about the distant, yet relevant past is incredibly thrilling and rewarding. After taking archaeology courses in college and carrying out fieldwork in Chile and Peru, I decided to focus on the Andes for my research because I became fascinated with learning about how societies adapted to such a challenging environment. I am interested in thinking creatively about how we can use this type of knowledge to confront our current challenges. This drives me to become a social scientist.
Furthermore, social science research matters to me because it contributes data on how societies, past and present, cooperate to solve problems. It furthers understanding of the social contexts and conditions that contribute to and shape human behavior and cultural change. We live in very uncertain times, faced with challenges that are as environmental and climatic as they are social. Technology is powerful and impactful when used ethically, but it is not a panacea. Social science research can draw from its many constituent fields to elucidate social strategies for building better relationships amongst ourselves and mitigating pressing issues, such as global climate change.
Can you tell us about a current research project that you’re excited about?
I am extremely excited about my current research! My project looks at community, conflict, and climate in the Andes. I will investigate how communities in highland and coastal Peru managed risks of drought, El Niño-based flooding, and violent conflict in their everyday lives during one of the most turbulent periods in Peruvian history: the Late Intermediate Period (1000 – 1400 CE). This period preceded the rise of the Inca Empire. I focus on two large, fortified towns located in the Ancash region (highlands) and the Pisco Valley (coast). I will use various methods—household excavations, analyses of soils from terraces, drone mapping, etc.— to learn about how these communities balanced trade-offs in domestic practices, resource management, and land use to mitigate conflict and climatic hazards. I will connect our findings to contemporary risk management practices through community engagement. We will hold workshops involving community members, researchers, and government officials. These events will bring our findings into dialogue with how contemporary peoples in Peru are dealing with drought and El Niño. My hope is that this synergy will enrich and enhance capacity-building policies geared towards mitigating climatic hazards in Peru.
What has led you to the intersection of disciplines within which your expertise lies? How does your research benefit from an interdisciplinary approach?
The main question that has driven me to this intersection is the following: how can we creatively use digital, “traditional”, and community-based methods to develop understandings of the past and mobilize our findings to bring them to bear on contemporary issues, such as global climate change? This question can only be answered with an interdisciplinary approach.
I believe archaeology’s real power lies in its interdisciplinarity. Archaeological datasets lend themselves so well to other fields, such as geology, architectural studies, and genetics. Archaeological practice can connect nicely with community engagement. While I was conducting my doctoral research in the Chincha Valley of southern Peru, I was, fortunately, able to carry out interdisciplinary research with an excellent and diverse team of specialists. I collaborated with and sought advice from conservators, bioarchaeologists, zooarchaeologists, paleoethnobotanists, architectural historians, and geneticists, among other specialists. Working with these scholars generated a synergy that propelled me forward in my dissertation research. This synergy fostered new collaborative relationships that invigorated the research process. It illuminated questions I hadn’t thought to ask before.
For instance, it compelled me to connect my interest in the nature of Andean mortuary practices to imperial conquest: How did imperial conquest shape local mortuary practices? It enabled me to bring together various strands of independent data not only to evaluate hypotheses and claims, but to evaluate them with more confidence. For example, I recently integrated written records and archaeological, isotopic, and genetic data to examine mobility in the Chincha Valley. I firmly believe that interdisciplinary research built around archaeology in the Andes – and elsewhere – is the methodological gold standard. I am always excited to hear about new interdisciplinary projects in the Andes and the new collaborative ties that they generate. I am excited about the prospects of integrating ethical, locally rooted, and community-driven ancient DNA (aDNA) analyses and archaeology into interdisciplinary research designs to advance our understandings of the past.
I am thrilled about the proliferation of interdisciplinary archaeological projects that explore and draw from the past to develop strategies for combating contemporary issues, such as global climate change. While I believe we should all strive to perform interdisciplinary research, it is important to note the challenges of this kind of research. The costs of carrying out multiple types of analyses to produce diverse and insightful datasets can be prohibitively expensive. Working with big teams to conduct interdisciplinary work can produce political tensions among and between scholars and Indigenous communities. It is critical to develop trust with Indigenous communities over time and incorporate them at every step of the research process, to be mindful of budgetary constraints, and to set realistic goals. Sound, community-driven, interdisciplinary work requires a considerable amount of time, effort, and funds, but it is definitely worth it in the end.
More specifically, how do you see anthropology and archaeology overlap?
There is significant overlap between anthropology and archaeology. Archaeology seeks to understand the past human behavior through material remains that have been left behind. Anthropology seeks to understand cultural variation, past and present. I consider myself an anthropological archaeologist that is interested in the analysis of past remains to address anthropological questions that concern how societies, past and present, confront social and environmental change through ritualized behavior and daily practice.
What do you hope to accomplish during your time at BU?
I am very excited to be at BU! I hope to accomplish many things. I am looking forward to meeting colleagues within and outside archaeology and BU and developing new, interdisciplinary collaborations. I am eager to carry out my current research on climate, conflict, and community in the Andes. I aim to fulfill several writing goals, including completing a book manuscript on mortuary practice and imperial conquest and publishing articles on ancient red pigment use and genetic variation in coastal Peru. I am also excited to develop my pedagogical skills and teach a course on Andean Archaeology next Spring. Overall, I am hoping to develop as a scholar, mentor, and instructor during my time at BU.
Learn more about the CAS Society of Fellows program here!