Eastern Sonora Research Articles

Cultural-Historical Continuity Between Sonora and Arizona

Arizona and Sonora share a history of mutual development. Sonorans worked and lived in Arizona long before it became an American possession, and cultural ties continue to unite both states. While Sonora has always been the dominant source of Mexican migrants to Arizona, cultural-historical ties also influence contemporary patterns of undocumented migration from within Sonora. Eastern Sonora, often characterized as an area of stagnation and decline, has maintained migration links with Arizona. Western Sonora is also an important source for undocumented migrants, but not as important as would be expected with its larger population and economic linkages to Arizona. The undocumented migration rate to Arizona for the two regions does not differ. Economic indicators within the state of Sonora are shown to be inadequate to explaining the migration rate, and cultural-historical ties within the Arizona-Sonora culture region are presented as a better explanation.

Intermittent Use and Agricultural Change on Marginal Lands: The Case of Smallholders in Eastern Sonora, Mexico

Most studies of agricultural land-use treat change as though it is essentially permanent. This paper demonstrates that in some cases marginal lands are used intermittently. They are brought into and taken out of cultivation frequently, rapidly, and repeatedly for reasons other than fallow, usually environmental or economic vagaries. Over time, intermittency decreases and fields become permanently cultivated. This gradual change occurs as the result of small improvements made to the land each time parcels are brought back into use. Improvements accumulate, eventually resulting in well-developed field complexes that are not abandoned lightly. A model of intermittent use and agricultural change is first outlined. Data on smallholdings in eastern Sonora, Mexico, are then analyzed and discussed in terms of the model. Finally, the theoretical implications are discussed.

Intermittent Use and Agricultural Change on Marginal Lands: The Case of Smallholders in Eastern Sonora, Mexico

Intermittent Use and Agricultural Change on Marginal Lands: The Case of Smallholders in Eastern Sonora, Mexico

Cabeza de Vaca's land of maize: an assessment of its agriculture

The inhabitants of eastern Sonora were reported by the Spaniards to be more populous and culturally more advanced than other groups in northern México and the southern portion of the American Southwest at the time of Spanish contact. They were also reported to have possessed a well developed agricultural complex. In spite of their achievements, the ancient people of this region have been the subject of few studies because of perceived data limitations. Although they are sparse, data are sufficient to reconstruct the agricultural base. Historical documentations, archaeological remains, and ethnographic analogs indicate that these people relied on a variety of cultivars and agricultural techniques. In addition to dry farming maize, beans, and squash, they also double cropped and irrigated through intricate canal systems. With such elaborate practices and techniques, enough was produced to feed a population of nearly 100,000 and to support a culture that was the only one in the region to be at its zenith when the Spaniards arrived.

Agricultural Change as an Incremental Process

Abstract At least two major views of agro-ecosystem change can be recognized–systematic and incremental. Systematic change involves the addition of new fields and associated features that are constructed completely prior to cultivation; incremental change involves gradual transformation of fields and features in conjunction with cultivation. The systematic view has been the more dominant of the two, particularly as applied to interpretations of past agro-ecosystems. Using present-day data on temporales or runoff-dependent fields in eastern Sonora, Mexico, this study describes one case of incremental agro-ecosystem change. Small, individual fields are developed into a more complex system by progressive modification resulting from the cumulative actions of individual farmers. In this case, the resulting constructional form of the agro-ecosystem alone does not allow assessment of the process of its development. Interpretations of past agro-ecosystems should recognize that both change processes are possible.

Settlements and the Development of “Statelets” in Sonora, Mexico

AbstractThe late prehistoric and protohistoric population of eastern Sonora, Mexico, has been described on the basis of reports by early Spanish explorers, as being organized into modified chiefdoms called “statelets.” The development of these small, regionally discrete political units has been seen as the result of Casas Grandes influence. Archaeological data on late prehistoric settlement patterns gathered during an intensive survey of the Valley of Sonora and presented here verify that statelets did exist. Data on earlier settlements and settlement-pattern changes, however, are interpreted as meaning that statelets developed without external influence. A growing population and increasing local exchange are proffered as the underlying causes for statelet development. Contact and trade with neighboring groups did exist, but probably were consequences rather than causes of changes evident in the settlement patterns.

Agricultural Expansion in a Marginal Area of Mexico

ARMING by smallholders in arid northern Mexico has historically been limited by a shortage of land. In general, well-watered agricultural land is not abundant, and it either is owned by large-scale farmers or is controlled by the government.1 The smallholders have minimum access to this type of land, and they have two options when increased production is needed: to intensify activities on land already in use, or to expand cultivation to poorly watered land. Intensification is pursued in some cases, but smallholders usually encounter land-tenure and monetary constraints.2 With the exception of the Sistema Alimentario Mexicano (SAM), an integrated program for the accelerated production of basic foodstuffs that began in 1980 but was abandoned early in 1983 because of funding problems, the central government has been guided by the prevalent belief that lands not currently under cultivation are marginal and cannot be economically improved.3 Preference has been given to the development of large-scale mechanized agriculture and off-farm employment in urban areas rather than to the cultivation of marginal lands from which the return is slightly greater than production cost. Expansion of cultivated hectarage has not been encouraged in Mexico, but it is the option pursued by many smallholders. It will probably be used more frequently as demographic and urban problems worsen. The farmers who cultivate temporales, the fields that are dependent on direct precipitation or runoff, in bottom lands of arroyos near the pueblo or town of Baviacora in the valley of the Rio Sonora in eastern Sonora are only one group of Mexican smallholders who are expanding agriculture into marginal lands. The pueblo of Baviacora, with a population of 2,297 in 1980, is located in a municipio (the equivalent of a county in the United States) of the same name

Living fencerows of the Rio San Miguel, Sonora, Mexico: Traditional technology for floodplain management

In southwestern North America, agriculture is limited by both arable land and available water supplies. In the upper Rio San Miguel, as well as in other narrow river valleys of eastern Sonora, Mexico, floodplain farming is dependent upon living fencerows for its environmental stability. Propagated fencerows of willow and cottonwood maintain, extend, and enhance floodplain fields. These ecological filters also protect fields from cattle, harbor agents of biological control of pests, and provide renewable supplies of wood. Traditional Sonoran farmers do not perceive cottonwoods and willows as phreatophytic pests, as their Anglo-American neighbors do. The stability of the upper San Miguelagroecosystem con-trasts with severely eroded conditions within the region's other arid watersheds.

: A Survey of Indian Assimilation in Eastern Sonora . Thomas B. Hinton. ; Marobavi: A Study of an Assimilated Group in Northern Sonora . Roger C. Owen.

: A Survey of Indian Assimilation in Eastern Sonora . Thomas B. Hinton. ; Marobavi: A Study of an Assimilated Group in Northern Sonora . Roger C. Owen.