On the correlation between the formation of the “Maowusu Desert” and land use in Liuhu sub-prefecture in the Tang dynasty

The historical changes of the “Maowusu Desert” can be divided into three phases: the late Tang dynasty phase, the Song-Yuan-Ming dynasty phase, and the late Ming dynasty to the present phase. Different parts of the desert were formed in different times, with the northwestern part being the earliest to form. As all evidence shows, the Maowusu Desert in its early stage is believed to have taken shape largely around the ancient site of the You state during the years of Tianbao in the Tang dynasty, which is nowadays the eastern half of the Etuoke banner and Prior-Etuoke banner. The formation of the initial Maowusu Desert is not attributed to the so-called over-cultivation from farming but to the long-time exceedingly quartered husbandry starting from the 4th year of the Zhenguan to the years of Tianbao in the Tang dynasty, which resulted in the destruction of the ecology of the natural grassland. __________ Translated from: Shaanxi Shifan Daxue Xuebao 陕西师范大学学报 (Shaanxi Normal University Journal), No.3, 2004     

Central European Heterotopias of Decay: the Poetics of the Real in Andrzej Stasiuk’s On the Road to Babadag

This article analyses Andrzej Stasiuk’s 2004 travelogue On the Road to Babadag: Travels in the Other Europe as a work that questions the existing narratives about the region commonly referred to as ‘Central Europe’. The main argument is that by bringing forward an original interpretation of ruins and decay — theorized here as ‘heterotopias of decay’ — Stasiuk’s poetics of villages and small towns from forgotten corners of Europe invites an interrogation of the notion of Central Europe itself. The narrative’s dismissal of the very term ‘Central Europe’, because it disregards the mundane qualities of the everyday, is presented as an original contribution to the debates about this region.     

On Khral-Ula Corvée System during the Period of the Old Local Government in Tibet (bKav-shag)

As both the economic pillar of the manor estates of feudal lords and the financial mainstay of the old local government of Tibet, Khral-Ula corvee reflected the political and economic relationship between feudal lords, serfs and herdsmen, the economic relations within the ruling regime, and the political and economic relationship between the local government and the Central Government in old Tibet. This paper intends to discuss the formation and basic features of     

What is the use of shaping a tang? Tool use and hafting of tanged tools in the Aterian of Northern Africa

We present the results of detailed microscopic examination of tanged tools from the site of Ifri n'Ammar. The rock shelter has a particularly rich and well-preserved stratigraphy that has yielded a large variety of tanged tools, thus offering a possibility to test hypotheses on the possible links between tangs and hafting. Earlier methodological work has demonstrated that patterned wear forms on the non-active part of the tool as the result of hafted tool use, and that the characteristics of the wear traces depend on the exact hafting arrangement used. In the present study, wear analyses were combined with further experiments that involved the hafting of tanged tools with various materials and arrangements and aimed at understanding the development of this important morphological innovation. We suggest that functional data are needed to understand the relevance of the "Aterian tang" for hafting (or use), and whether this innovation was triggered by functional, cultural or environmental factors.     

On the life and work of Korbinian Brodmann (1868–1918)

This study describes the life and work of early-twentieth-century German scientist Korbinian Brodmann (1868–1918). His medical training at universities in Munich, Würzburg, Berlin, and Freiburg and his further education are illustrated. His early Leipzig career and cooperation with brain researchers Oskar and Cécile Vogt in Berlin are portrayed, as are his contributions to a localization theory of the cerebral cortex—namely, Brodmann’s cytoarchitectonic approach—and the invention of a cortex area nomenclature, further developed until the beginning of World War I. His Tübingen professorship and being nominated to manage a major department of Emil Kraepelin’s Munich research unit represent further aspects of this study, a promising career ahead, harshly interrupted by an early and unexpected death.     

On the Centrality of Dionysus in Nietzsche’s Philosophy

Despite the widespread influence of Nietzsche’s iconoclastic works on twentieth-century intellectual and literary culture, there has been a surprising lack of academic focus on the parallels between his philosophical trajectory and the anthropological literature on the mysterious god Dionysus. The striking correlations between ancient Dionysian worship with Nietzsche’s oeuvre revalorise the celebration of ecstasy. In Twilight of the Idols, he states that the Dionysian is “beyond pity and terror, to realize in oneself the eternal joy of becoming.” By elucidating some of the mysteries surrounding this enigmatic god, this article aims to re-establish the central importance of Dionysus in Nietzsche’s work, and to suggest that if we are to understand Nietzsche at all, we must first undertake an anthropological reading of Dionysus.     

On the use of Nazi sources for the study of Fascist Jewish policy in the Italian-occupied territories: The case of south-eastern France,November 1942–July 1943

ABSTRACT

This article discusses the use of Nazi sources for the study of Fascist policy towards Jews in 1940–1943. By exposing the gap between the Nazi perception of and the reality of the Fascist policy towards Jews in Italian-occupied south-eastern France, the article demonstrates that Rome’s refusal to hand over Jews for deportation did not contradict the fundamental anti-Semitic nature of its Jewish policy in that context. Thus, the article highlights the risks for historians to read Fascist Jewish policy through Nazi lenses and thereby fall prey to stereotypical characterizations of the Italians as insubordinate, scheming and driven by what an S.S. official disparagingly labelled a ‘Jewish-friendly attitude’. At the same time, the article shows that, when combined with Fascist sources, Nazi sources can help shed light on the conceptual divide that underpinned the Axis partners’ disagreement over the means by which the ‘Jewish problem’ should be ‘solved’, thereby exposing the analytical limitations of the current prevailing understanding of the Fascist refusal to hand over the Jews as purely the outcome of ‘pragmatic’ opportunistic considerations.     

‘China-ware in the skies’: overlapping identities in the ornamental use of plates in Uruguay

Abstract

This is the study of a church where tableware manufactured in Great Britain was used to decorate the façade in the early 19th century. An argument is made that this one surviving case points to a larger regional tradition, now lost, whose greatest exponent was Montevideo Cathedral, Uruguay. The hypothesis presented here is that the use of British plates in religious façades shortly before the South American Wars of Independence was part of a search for identity in a region trying to break away from Spain, and in the process of becoming a small republic between the two larger countries of Argentina and Brazil.     

On the Subject of the “Unified” Geography (Landscape and Ethnos,VI)

A theory of ethnogenesis is advanced, associating stability of ethnic communities with homogeneous landscapes and ethnic change leading to the formation of new communities with heterogeneous landscapes. The ethnic aspect of population, unlike the social and political aspects, is found to be a function of geographical factors. The study of the interplay between ethnic man and the environment does not require an integration of the geographic disciplines but can be investigated within the framework of a special discipline, say, ethnology within geography.     

The use of ‘statbilized earth’ in the conservation of megalithic monuments

Abstract

The main features of the megalithic monuments in Sardinia, Italy, dated to the Middle-Late Bronze Age, are described. These constructions are in a poor state of preservation, especially those built with stones particularly vulnerable to weathering. To impede water ingress into the masonry structure of these archaeological ruins, it is proposed to use a stabilized earth-based mortar that acts as an effective substrate for a water-repellent polymer.     

Historical and Dialectical Perspectives on the Archaeology of Complexity in the Siin-Saalum (Senegal): Back to the Future?

Drawing on recent critiques of evolutionism, this article reviews the history of Iron Age studies in Siin-Saalum (Senegal) to examine the construction of African archaeological knowledge. From the 19th century to the 1980’s, analyses of complexity in Senegal have been animated by developmentalist views that have portrayed the regional past as a stagnant backwater. In the past 25 years, however, archaeological research has sought to redress these inaccuracies by exploring the diversity and idiosyncracy of African histories, and the processes behind sociopolitical change. These critical agendas can help us exploit the analytic potential of material culture to reincorporate African societies into the stream of world history, and to use the African past to reevaluate current scenarios of complexity and their applicability to various regions of the globe. To achieve these goals, however, and develop a fully self-reflexive archaeology in Senegal, researchers must eschew moral celebrations of African distinctness and strive instead to document how local pasts owe their particular qualities to complex political-economic articulations with other world societies. Concurrently, we must also attend to the dynamics of historical production in and out of guild circles, and consider our entanglement in the making of contemporary ‘culture wars.’ Because it is ideally suited to probe the historical and material depth of cultural differences and inequalities, archaeology must take a leading role in dispelling essentialist readings of Africa and promoting democratic knowledges about the continent.     

Evolution of Expenditure in the Budget of the European Union (1957–2002)

This article analyses the evolution of Community expenditure, on the basis of the data given in the budget and in the EDF, from the origin of the process in 1957 until the year 2002, the last definitive figures. The technique of principal component factor analysis has been applied to these variables. The basic objective of this study is to detect the interrelationships among the policies of the Union and to effect a classification of them, in order to detect the priorities of the European project and to estimate the dimension of the impact of its policies during the period.     

What Happened in Neiden? On the Question of Reburial Ethics

The Neiden Case reburial from Finnmark, North Norway, marks the closure of a process initiated with a controversial excavation in 1915 when 94 skeletons were brought to University in Oslo. The skeletons formed part of a monumental work in physical anthropology by the Norwegian anatomist Karl Emil Schreiner concluding that the Sámi belonged to a somewhat infantile proto-Mongolian race. There is little doubt about unethical aspects of the excavation as well as the exceedingly dubious character of racial research on the Sámi prior to the Second World War. However, considering the handling of the case, opposing facts and opinions, lack of knowledge and other uncertainties, ethical implications seem far from obvious. With regard to the dead themselves the reburial may even be considered unethical. This paper emphasizes the complexity of the ethics of reburials with particular attention to the dead, their graves and belongings.     

From enemy to opponent: the politics of delegitimation in the Italian Christian Democratic Party (1945–1992)

Abstract

This article reconstructs the dynamics of delegitimation of political opponents in the Italian Christian Democratic Party (DC), which had a relative majority and almost uninterruptedly led Italy’s governments from 1945 to 1992. The DC built its strategy of delegitimation on two levels, an ideological-religious one and a systemic one, which were only partly interdependent and overlapping. In almost half a century, the DC aimed its rhetoric and politics of delegitimation mainly at those opposition parties it considered as anti-establishment, that is, the Italian Communist Party (PCI) and the neofascist Italian Social Movement (MSI), and the form of delegitimation changed a great deal over this period. However, it is possible to grasp a specific dynamic: from a rigid form of delegitimation, from time to time it became possible to legitimate (at least in part) the opposition parties at different times and in different ways, depending on the changes in the political sphere and in society. It was a process full of contradictions and ambiguities within which the political enemy gradually gave way to becoming a political opponent.