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Acknowledgments
This book is an archaeological investigation on the patterns and processes involved in the cultural changes across the coast of southeast China during the Neolithic period (ca. 3500–6500 B.P.). It is based on my Ph.D. dissertation completed at Harvard University in 2003. Subsequent researches over the past three years have changed some of the initial ideas, and this monograph has incorporated the resulting data as well as the new directions of this research. A modified version of Chapter Five was published in a paper co-authored with Barry Rolett (Jiao & Rolett, 2006), and part of Chapter Seven was published in an article co-authored with my colleagues (Guo et al., 2005).
I am indebted to many people and institutions for their generous help during the process of writing this book. First and foremost, I am very grateful to my thesis advisors, Professor Ofer Bar-Yosef, Professor C. C. Lamberg-Karlovsky, Professor Yun Kuen Lee, Department of Anthropology, Harvard University; and Professor Barry Rolett, Department of Anthropology, University of Hawai‘i at Manoa. Their guidance ensured progress in the right direction. Ofer graciously agreed to write a foreword for this book. As one of the students who was “dropped on his desk,” I am privileged to continue working with Ofer on a series of expeditions in China after graduating from Harvard. Professor Rolett inspired my interests in Pacific archaeology when he was a visiting professor at Harvard University, and he provided invaluable support for the excavation in Fujian. I wish to extend my heartfelt gratitude to the late Professor K. C. Chang who sadly passed away just when I started to conduct my dissertation field works. I was privileged to study at Harvard University because of Professor Chang‘s special recommendation, and he had been a major source of support and inspiration for my life and research.