Until recently, many anthropologists assumed that the environment of what is now the
southwestern United States shaped the social history and culture of the region’s indige-
nous peoples. Building on this assumption, archaeologists asserted that adverse envi-
ronmental conditions and droughts were responsible for the disappearances and
Line 5 migrations of southwestern populations from many sites they once inhabited.
However, such deterministic arguments fail to acknowledge that local environmen-
tal variability in the Southwest makes generalizing about that environment difficult. To
examine the relationship between environmental variation and sociocultural change in
the Western Pueblo region of central Arizona, which indigenous tribes have occupied
Line 10 continuously for at least 800 years, a research team
recently reconstructed the climatic,
vegetational, and erosional cycles of past centuries. The researchers found it impossi-
ble to provide a single, generally applicable characterization of environmental condi-
tions for the region. Rather, they found that local areas experienced different patterns
of rainfall, wind, and erosion, and that such conditions had prevailed in the Southwest
Line 15 for the last 1,400 years. Rainfall, for example, varied within and between local valley
systems, so that even adjacent agricultural fields can produce significantly different
yields.
The researchers characterized episodes of variation in southwestern environments
by frequency: low-frequency environmental processes occur in cycles longer than one
Line 20 human generation, which generally is considered to last about 25 years, and high-
frequency processes have shorter cycles. The researchers pointed out that low-frequency
processes, such as fluctuations in stream flow and groundwater levels, would not usu-
ally be apparent to human populations. In contrast, high-frequency fluctuations such
as seasonal temperature variations are observable and somewhat predictable, so that
Line 25 groups could have adapted their behaviors accordingly. When the researchers com-
pared sequences of sociocultural change in the Western Pueblo region with episodes of
low- and high-frequency environmental variation, however, they found no simple cor-
relation between environmental process and sociocultural change or persistence.
Although early Pueblo peoples did protect themselves against environmental risk
Line 30 and uncertainty, they responded variously on different occasions to similar patterns of
high-frequency climatic and environmental change. The researchers identified seven
major adaptive responses, including increased mobility, relocation of permanent
settlements, changes in subsistence foods, and reliance on trade with other groups.
These findings suggest that groups’adaptive choices depended on cultural and social
Line 35 as well as environmental factors and were flexible strategies rather than uncomplicated
reactions to environmental change. Environmental conditions mattered, but they were
rarely, if ever, sufficient to account for sociocultural persistence and change. Group size
and composition, culture, contact with other groups, and individual choices and
actions were — barring catastrophes such as floods or earthquakes — more significant
Line 40 for a population’s survival than were climate and environment.