Archaeological markers of agricultural risk management

Managing agricultural risk, or variance in annual production, is a priority for farmers and herders. This article reviews the ethnographic and historical literature on agricultural risk management and identifies diversification and intensification as two distinct approaches to managing risk. Quantitative analysis of plant and animal remains from archaeological sites produces robust datasets that can be used to test predictions of risk management models related to diversification and intensification strategies. I present a variety of established and novel paleoethnobotanical and zooarchaeological measures that have implications for risk management and argue that multiple lines of evidence are needed to identify risk-management practices from archaeological remains. The article concludes with a case study of the multiperiod urban center of Gordion in central Turkey, where quantitative analysis of plant and animal remains demonstrates diachronic changes in agricultural risk management over 3000 years of occupation.     

“…being weary,they had rebelled”: Pueblo subsistence and labor under Spanish colonialism

Native American responses to Spanish colonialism are explored through an analysis of multiple lines of evidence concerning subsistence practices, diet, and health in the Salinas Pueblo area of central New Mexico. Zooarchaeological and paleoethnobotanical data from three Pueblo villages that experienced different degrees of Spanish missionization are the focus of this study. In addition, human osteological data from one village provide important information on activity patterns and health. These data are used to document the kinds of changes that occurred in Pueblo labor patterns, food consumption, and health from the pre-colonial to colonial periods. Synthetic analyses document the development of some degree of inter-village specialization in large game hunting, hide processing, and corn farming, presumably in response to Spanish tribute levies in corn and antelope hides, and demands on Pueblo labor in other arenas. There also appears to be a degree of divergence in women’s and men’s lives in the colonial period. These southwestern data are then compared with similar information from the southeastern US to identify patterns of similarity and difference in Native American experiences of and strategies for dealing with Spanish colonization.     

The Hand-Pump Flotation System: A New Method for Archaeobotanical Recovery

Abstract

At the sites of Acquachiara in Italy, el-Hemmeh in Jordan, and Beisamoun in Israel, archaeobotanical recovery was accomplished using flotation systems powered by hand-pumps, as opposed to non-circulating systems or systems powered by electricity or gasoline. These flotation tanks were simple and inexpensive to construct, easily operated by a single individual, highly durable, and easily transported. The speed of water flow was both ample and could be controlled without difficulty. These systems had the capacity to process samples at a rate sufficient to keep pace with large-scale sampling programs at all three sites. In three case studies, we describe two tanks that recycle water and one that does not, list the parts and procedures necessary to construct a hand-pump system, and detail the results of a recovery test that demonstrates the efficacy of this technique. The type of flotation tank described would be appropriate for a range of research projects with various resource constraints, enabling substantial paleoethnobotanical data collection with only a minimal initial investment of time and money.     

Feminist geographies in Norway from the turn of the millennium

Abstract

Based on an overview of feminist and gender research over two decades, this article reflects on feminist geographies in Norway within a wider political and social context. We identify eight broad, partly overlapping themes of feminist geography: rurality; development policies and practices; entrepreneurship and economic change; migration and mobility; children and youth; sexuality and health; landscape and place; and emotions and autobiography. We find that much of the research has been collaborative, interdisciplinary, multicultural, and transnational. Feminist geographies in Norway are characterized by increasing emphasis on multiple realities and situatedness, and focus on rights and power relations among men and women in all spheres of society, including academia. Yet the gender dimension has tended to focus on geographies of women, with few studies of masculinity. Inspired in part through feminist critiques of research practices in social sciences, a recent development has been autobiographical approaches examining the significance of personal lives and emotions for the research process. We conclude that feminist geographies in Norway are diverse, empirically and contextually informed, and have become embedded within several fields of human geography.     

Locating migrant Latinas in a diverse economies framework: evidence from Chicago

In this article I use an intersectional diverse economies framework and weak theory to build knowledge about migrant Latinas' economic spaces in Chicago. Drawing on qualitative data, I demonstrate how multiple and dynamic identities are linked to economic practices. I show that Latina migrants are not limited to capitalist or noncapitalist forms of economic engagement within neoliberal structures or to single spaces within or outside ethnic economies. Their multiple and dynamic practices shifted, as did their identities and geographies. I captured a snapshot of one migrant Latina economic community and provide insights about the nature and scale of its activities as well as the opportunities, and obstacles it faces. I propose future research and policy resulting from seeing economies differently. What kinds of programs might support collective economies and migrant Latina crafts? How might we re-envision workforce development programs if we see economies differently? What kinds of creative campaigns and advocacy do we need with new kinds of economies? More data and reflection on the nature and scale of intersectional identities within migrant (and other) economic communities and the geoeconomic ramification within those communities is needed. Furthermore, I call for the imagination of new global forms and practices that respond to the crisis that the current economic structures are facing.     

Multi-Scale and Nested-Intensity Sampling Techniques for Archaeological Survey

Abstract

This paper discusses sampling techniques for archaeological survey that are directed toward evaluating the properties of surface artifact distributions. The sampling techniques we experimented with consist of a multi-scale sampling plot developed in plant ecology and the use of a nested-intensity survey design. We present results from the initial application of these methods. The sampling technique we borrowed from plant ecology is the Modified-Whittaker multiscale sampling plot, which gathers observations at the spatial scales of 1 sq m, 10 sq m, 100 sq m, and 1000 sq m. Nested-intensity surveys gather observations on the same sample units at multiple resolutions. We compare the results of a closely-spaced walking survey, a crawling survey, and a test excavation to a depth of 10 cm. These techniques were applied to ten 20 × 50 m survey plots distributed over an area of 418 ha near the Hudson-Meng Bison Bonebed in NW Nebraska. These approaches can significantly improve the accuracy of survey data. Our results show that high-resolution coverage techniques overlook more material than archaeologists have suspected. The combined approaches of multi-scale and nested-intensity sampling provide new tools to improve our ability to investigate the properties of surface records.     

“Keep withstanding”: Territory in the body,home and market in Xinjiang,China

Geographic literature has explored how territorialization occurs by multiple actors in material and symbolic spaces, especially in the home and body. Building on the important research in feminist geography concerning the body as territory, important questions remain: How do Uyghurs in China respond to state territory in their everyday lives? How does fear, pleasure, and mistrust constitute the social relations of territory? How do people experience and navigate state dispossession of territory? I use long-term ethnographic fieldwork to study these questions. China is a strong, authoritarian state with a monopoly on power and seemingly unlimited surveillance and policing capabilities. Uyghurs explored survival strategies that constituted social relations of territory as a node in overlapping networks in Xinjiang. My main argument is that despite a strong government presence, embodied Indigenous practices enabled survivance for the Uyghur people. People escaped the stress of government surveillance and policing by turning to material and symbolic modes of constituting embodied territory.     

Community Collaboration and Other Good Intentions

Collaborative and community-based archaeological research encompasses a broad spectrum of approaches; however, there are often discrepancies between how researchers ‘sell’ the collaborative endeavour in theory and how it is actually practised. Over the past several years, I have had the opportunity to participate in several projects, ranging from those that claimed to be ‘truly collaborative,’ to research that maybe should have asked, ‘what community?’ These experiences raised difficult and disturbing questions concerning the nature and practice of collaborative and community-based archaeology. In this paper, I confront these issues as I have experienced them personally. While community-based practices aim to redress a historical and ongoing power imbalance between the researcher and the researched, constant vigilance is required lest the ‘good intentions’ of anthropologists inadvertently mask an exploitation that may be inherent in the structure of research itself. In considering the corporate nature of academia, I query whether the collaborative research model represents a break with the past, or is instead simply the same old practice dressed up in fashionable new language.     

Recent Research in Paleoethnobotany

This article discusses paleoethnobotanical research and results presented in the recent literature. Although archaeobotany is a fairly recent addition to the study of the past, it now encompasses a diverse range of techniques, analyses, and new results. Issues that are prominent in this archaeological subdiscipline include the origins of agriculture, resource use, environmental reconstruction, anthropogenic environmental change, political-economic change, plant cultivation and crop production, plant processing, consumption (diet), and site deposition. Some of the plant identification methods for macrobotanical remains include morphology using light microscopes, histology with the scanning electron microscope, and statistics. The study of microbotanical remains has expanded greatly and now includes pollen, phytolith, chemical, and molecular analyses.     

A New Methodology for the Provenance of Marble Based on EPR Spectroscopy

Fifteen years of research in investigating the characteristics of the EPR spectra of different types of white marble from several quarries in the Eastern Mediterranean has produced an accumulation of a large number of data, and much experience. Statistical treatment of these EPR data (statistical distributions and parameter correlations), has led to the selection of 10 parameters that are useful for quarry discrimination. Apart from the EPR parameters, the maximum grain size, measured with a stereomicroscope, has been found very useful. Boxplots have been found to be very useful as a first easy visual tool for evaluating the discrimination capacity of each parameter. On the basis of these results, a new methodology for determining the provenance of an archaeological sample was developed in stages, using a different pair or combination of parameters each time. In the first stage, the Penteli, Naxos, Hymettus and Proconnessus quarries are completely separated from each other. However, overlapping occurs between the parameter fields of Paros and Proconnessus, Paros and Hymettus and between the two archaic quarries of Melanes and Apollon on Naxos. If the sample is located in a non‐overlapping area, its provenance is obvious and easily determined. If the sample lies in one of the above three overlapping areas, an additional stage is necessary, in which other parameters are used to eliminate or decrease the overlap. Despite the partial overlapping of Paros with other quarries, the famous Lychnites marble of Paros, which was quarried underground, is clearly distinguished.     

Strange Bedfellows: Explaining Political Cooperation between Communist Successor Parties and Nationalists in Eastern Europe

Abstract. In postcommunist politics many of the ‘new national right’ political formations in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union have joined forces with the communist successor parties. Such a combination is, on the surface, a baffling mixture; how is it possible that two fundamentally different ideological approaches (nationalism and internationalist socialism) can coexist and actively cooperate to form such a potent political force? What are the conditions under which such political cooperation emerges? This article attempts to answer the above questions by, first, empirically testing the effects of several factors which might explain postcommunist–nationalist political cooperation. Second, the quantitative analysis is buttressed with a comparison of the Hungarian and Russian cases. The analysis indicates that the most important variable associated with the emergence of postcommunist–nationalist political cooperation is the effect of previous regime type.     

Minority nationalism and immigrant integration in Canada

Immigrant integration is currently a prominent issue in virtually all contemporary democracies, but countries in which the historic population itself is deeply divided – particularly those with substate nations and multiple political identities – present some interesting questions where integration is concerned. The existence of multiple and potentially competing political identities may complicate the integration process, particularly if the central government and the substate nation promote different conceptions of citizenship and different nation‐building projects. What, then, are the implications of minority nationalism for immigrant integration? Are the added complexities a barrier to integration? Or do overlapping identities generate more points of contact between immigrants and their new home? This article addresses this question by probing immigrant and non‐immigrant ‘sense of belonging’ in Canada, both inside and outside Quebec. Data come from Statistics Canada's Ethnic Diversity Study. Our results suggest that competing nation‐building projects make the integration of newcomers more, rather than less, challenging.     

Globalizing the local in Roman Britain: An anthropological approach to social change

This article considers the incorporation of part of Britain into the Roman empire in the context of globalization theory and world-systems history. Emphasis is placed on the local effects of the expansion of global systems and their impact on the social practices of eating and drinking at a range of settlements in the southeast of Britain in the Iron Age to Roman transition, c. 50 BC–AD 200. Through the analysis of consumption practices via quantitative pottery assemblage data, it is argued that globalization offers a more sophisticated framework to describe change than current archaeological approaches to Romanization and identity. The results show that while much of the populace was subject to a progressively homogenizing supply of food-related pottery vessels, the use of such technologies was negotiated within social practices drawing on the integration of both local and global cultural elements. Such findings highlight the potential of critical applications of globalization theory to conceptualize economic, social, and cultural changes in Roman provincial societies.     

Historic landscape management: a validation of quantitative soil thin-section analyses

The archaeological interpretation of past land management practices can be greatly enhanced through examination of soil thin sections. Features relating to manuring practice are among those key to interpreting agricultural practices. The sources and the processes leading to the distribution of these manure materials may further improve knowledge of the past landscape utilisation. The use of quantitative analyses to examine soil thin sections opens the possibility of considering these relationships between manured areas in greater detail and to extract more subtle spatial and temporal changes in past management. In this study the validation of this methodology has been tested with quantitative image analysis methods used to examine manure inputs to a well-documented historical landscape of Papa Stour, Shetland, where intensive manuring has been practised until the 1960s. By using both historic and ethnographic evidence to validate the image analysis protocol, differences in spatial and temporal distribution are examined for the practices of manuring with both fuel residues and with turf. The validation of the hypotheses expected from ethnographic and historical data that quantitative soils-based evidence allows the definition of variations in manuring strategies and provides a more secure basis from which to interpret manuring management strategies in archaeological landscapes.     

Trading Speed for Accuracy? Managing Goal Conflict and Accommodation in the U.S. Unemployment Insurance Program

Public managers must often cope with competing and conflicting goals. The common formulation is to assume that managers must trade‐off goals against each other. But is this always true? An alternative hypothesis is that sometimes managers may instead be able to improve outcomes on multiple goals simultaneously—by altering management practices. We test this “trade‐off” notion using a panel of state‐level administrative data from the U.S. unemployment insurance (UI) system from 1997 to 2004 and qualitative interviews from selected states. The trade‐off examined is timeliness of UI benefit payments versus the quality of UI determinations. In general, we find that state administrators often adopt management practices that facilitate improved outcomes for both timeliness and quality, indicating no trade‐off but instead a synergy between outcomes. We also find evidence of a feedback effect linking higher performance on timeliness to better quality determinations.     

Sampling Design and Inferential Bias in Archaeological Soil Chemistry

The ways and extent to which sampling design influences data collection and archaeological inference is a constant concern for archaeologists. Yet, spatial analyses based on anthrosol chemistry have been less willing to concede this problem and to explore potential solutions. This article reviews the recent literature on soil sampling for spatial studies and then uses an example from prehispanic Honduras to examine how both quantitative and qualitative interpretations of soil chemical patterns can shift when sampling design changes. The results of this study suggest that the principal challenges to selecting an appropriate sampling design are in determining the sample size and density, as well as recognizing and adequately dealing with variation in the soil properties being measured. These findings provide cautionary tales for spatial studies aimed at using soil chemical data to infer activity patterns in the archaeological record.     

The Moral Politics of Gendered Labour in Artisanal Mining in Sierra Leone

Drawing on current anthropological approaches to labour, this article examines some of the moral politics mobilized around women and artisanal mining in policy-inflected scholarship with reference to particular gold mining zones in Tonkolili district, Sierra Leone. In so doing, the article proposes that such a focus on labour not only allows one to appreciate how sentiments concerning (im)proper behaviour infuse wider policy proposals to amend social arrangements in regard to what is called ‘artisanal mining’, but it also offers insight into some of the enduring moral politics helping to constitute women as ‘family workers’ in the actual artisanal gold mining zones. The article suggests that examining the overlapping moral politics constituting women's labour practices provides a more supple understanding of the contested economic possibilities for women in this livelihood practice.     

A cooperative spatial future for RheinRuhr

As is the case with other metropolitan regions, there are claims that the emerging functional urban region of RheinRuhr needs to develop a cooperative spatial future. This article explores the underlying difficulties in seeking to move forward in regional cooperation and strategic regional development for RheinRuhr. At present, no clear shift can be observed from traditional land use planning and local development approaches towards more strategic planning for the whole urban region. There are still many obstacles to be overcome. Nevertheless, strides have been taken in the direction of improved cooperation. A dense and functionally overlapping (sub)‐regional associationalism seems to be one step towards future city‐regional governance and possibly government. An evaluation is reported of two new innovative modes of structural and regional policies, namely the Regional Conferences and the IBA Emscher Park Planning Company; their impacts on regional policy‐making structures are reviewed. A discussion on more recent approaches to regional cooperation follows. It is argued that, in the long term, as a multi‐regionalized space, RheinRuhr requires some kind of coordinator and moderator and new practices of regional planning and management. The future development of a RheinRuhr metropolitan region requires further steps to be taken towards strategic planning by the Land government as well as a deepening of the level of institutionalization. Some ideas are put forward on how the elaboration of a spatial Leitbild for RheinRuhr could be initiated and supported.     

David Warren Sabean. Landbesitz und Gesellschaft am Vorabend des Bauernkriegs: Eine Studie der sozialen Verhältnisse im südlichen Oberschwaben in den Jahren vor 1525

In conventional approaches to computer analysis of historical sources, one must represent the data in structured formats in which content and context are discarded. Extensible markup language (XML), developed for data transfer on the Internet, permits preservation of the full text of irregular historical sources without sacrificing the ability to conduct systematic analysis. Related querying tools offer most functions of a relational database management system, including data transformation facilities for coding, standardizing, and aggregating nominal data. An XML database permits multiple interpretations of the data because the unit of analysis and the coding schemes are not defined at entry. In a case study of probate inventories, the author demonstrates how structured analysis of domestic interiors can be performed and introduces approaches to studying semistructured data.     

Breadfruit Fermentation in Pohnpei,Micronesia: Site Formation,Archaeological Visibility,and Interpretive Strategies

Fermentation is a common method of processing and preserving breadfruit throughout the Pacific Islands. While these pits are often reported in the archaeological record, they can pose some interpretive challenges. This paper presents an analysis of probable archaeological breadfruit (Artocarpus altilis (Parkinson) Fosberg) fermentation pits on Temwen Island, Pohnpei, Micronesia. Using the existing ethnographic record as a guide, I present archaeological and paleoethnobotanical criteria for identifying fermentation features. Architectural and stratigraphic analyses from four excavated pits match ethnographic expectations. Phytolith analysis shows some concurrence in terms of taxonomic data, but is more useful for indicating disturbance specific to building activities. Based on the distribution and size of pits present in the survey area, I suggest that breadfruit fermentation took place as primarily a household level (rather than community level) activity during the late prehistoric and early historic period in Pohnpei.