As early as the twelfth century A.D., the settlements of Chaco Canyon in New Mexico in the American Southwest were notable for their "great houses," massive stone buildings that contain hundreds of rooms and often stand three or four stories high. Archaeologists have been trying to determine how the buildings were used. While there is still no universally agreed upon explanation, there are three competing theories.
One theory holds that the Chaco structures were purely residential, with each housing hundreds of people. Supporters of this theory have interpreted Chaco great houses as earlier versions of the architecture seen in more recent Southwest societies. In particular, the Chaco houses appear strikingly similar to the large, well-known "apartment buildings" at Taos, New Mexico, in which many people have been living for centuries.
A second theory contends that the Chaco structures were used to store food supplies. One of the main crops of the Chaco people was grain maize, which could be stored for long periods of time without spoiling and could serve as a long-lasting supply of food. The supplies of maize had to be stored somewhere, and the size of the great houses would make them very suitable for the purpose.
A third theory proposes that houses were used as ceremonial centers. Close to one house, called Pueblo Alto, archaeologists identified an enormous mound formed by a pile of old material. Excavations of the mound revealed deposits containing a surprisingly large number of broken pots. This finding has been interpreted as evidence that people gathered at Pueblo Alto for special ceremonies. At the ceremonies, they ate festive meals and then discarded the pots in which the meals had been prepared or served. Such ceremonies have been documented for other Native American cultures.
The reading passage in the given task exposes us to the early twelfth century settlements of the Chaco Canyon which were notable for their great houses. The passage provides three possible justifications, though not universally accepted upon, to explain the use of these houses. The professor in the lecture, however, has been quite critical of these arguments as he goes on to provide several counterintuitive logics to refute the explanations proposed by the text.
To start with the text passage states that the Chaco structures were purely residential as is supported by the fact that each of the housing had hundreds of people. The professor is quick to point out a possible flaw in this justification.He states that although these structures may presumably look like residential ones from outside, they are not so from the inside. He says that if actually hundreds of people lived within these houses, there would have been an equiproportionate number of fireplaces within them. Such fireplaces are usually required for cooking purposes. However, these places lack sufficient number of fireplaces. It has only a few tens of fireplaces for hundreds of rooms which seems to be unfit for a residential complex.
Secondly, the text states that the Chaco structure stores food supplies. It says that the structure of these houses are greatly preferable for storing maize which happened to be the main crop of that era. The professor argues that if maize was really stored in these builduings, grains of maize could have defiitely been found during excavation. But, no spill of maize or any substantial evidence was obtained to support the claim.
Finally, the passage concludes by stating that the houses could have served as ceremonial centres. This was supported by a claim that archaeologists had found a humongous pile of old material near a house named Pueblo Alto. Large number of broken pots were recovered which suggest that those were used to serve food during ceremonies. The professor aggressively challenges these claims by stating that there were lots of other materials which were also recovered during such excavations. These materials were stone, sand and other substances which comprise of typical construction materials. The professor goes on to claim that the building could have been used for construction purposes and that the pots believed to serve foods may have been used by construction workers to have their meals.
Thus, it is clear from the material provided that the author of the passage and professor share diametrically opposite notions on the settlements of Chaco Canyon. Although, a definite conclusion is not arrived at in this regard, but the author and the professor have opted for very different grounds on this issue.
| Post date | Users | Rates | Link to Content |
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| 2023-11-16 | TiOluwani97 | 87 | view |
| 2023-02-12 | zaid | 80 | view |
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Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 280, Rule ID: ENGLISH_WORD_REPEAT_BEGINNING_RULE
Message: Three successive sentences begin with the same word. Reword the sentence or use a thesaurus to find a synonym.
...on, to explain the use of these houses. The professor in the lecture, however, has ...
^^^
Line 3, column 240, Rule ID: SENTENCE_WHITESPACE
Message: Add a space between sentences
Suggestion: He
...t a possible flaw in this justification.He states that although these structures m...
^^
Line 7, column 549, Rule ID: COMPRISE_OF[1]
Message: Did you mean 'comprise' or 'consist of'?
Suggestion: comprise; consist of
... stone, sand and other substances which comprise of typical construction materials. The pro...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
actually, also, but, finally, however, if, look, may, really, second, secondly, so, thus, to start with
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 24.0 10.4613686534 229% => Less to be verbs wanted.
Auxiliary verbs: 6.0 5.04856512141 119% => OK
Conjunction : 6.0 7.30242825607 82% => OK
Relative clauses : 21.0 12.0772626932 174% => OK
Pronoun: 40.0 22.412803532 178% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 65.0 30.3222958057 214% => Less preposition wanted.
Nominalization: 6.0 5.01324503311 120% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2324.0 1373.03311258 169% => OK
No of words: 446.0 270.72406181 165% => Less content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.21076233184 5.08290768461 103% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.5955099915 4.04702891845 114% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.82142616689 2.5805825403 109% => OK
Unique words: 228.0 145.348785872 157% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.511210762332 0.540411800872 95% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 719.1 419.366225166 171% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.55342163355 103% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 9.0 3.25607064018 276% => Less pronouns wanted as sentence beginning.
Article: 10.0 8.23620309051 121% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 1.25165562914 80% => OK
Conjunction: 1.0 1.51434878587 66% => OK
Preposition: 2.0 2.5761589404 78% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 21.0 13.0662251656 161% => OK
Sentence length: 21.0 21.2450331126 99% => OK
Sentence length SD: 41.3271336145 49.2860985944 84% => OK
Chars per sentence: 110.666666667 110.228320801 100% => OK
Words per sentence: 21.2380952381 21.698381199 98% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.90476190476 7.06452816374 69% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 4.09492273731 122% => OK
Language errors: 3.0 4.19205298013 72% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 8.0 4.33554083885 185% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 4.45695364238 135% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 7.0 4.27373068433 164% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.168146245454 0.272083759551 62% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0523958171959 0.0996497079465 53% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0658752838627 0.0662205650399 99% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.09414899622 0.162205337803 58% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0442658459287 0.0443174109184 100% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 13.7 13.3589403974 103% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 50.16 53.8541721854 93% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 5.55761589404 158% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.5 11.0289183223 104% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.94 12.2367328918 106% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.54 8.42419426049 101% => OK
difficult_words: 109.0 63.6247240618 171% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 14.0 10.7273730684 131% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.4 10.498013245 99% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.2008830022 125% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Write the essay in 20 minutes.
Rates: 80.0 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 24.0 Out of 30
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.