Zukunft Ruhr 2030

Zusammenfassung  Regionale Entwicklungsstrategien werden in der Regel ohne substanzielle Beteiligung der Wirtschaft entwickelt. Das war im Projekt „Zukunft Ruhr 2030“ anders. Hier hat der „Initiativkreis Ruhrgebiet“, die Vereinigung gro?er Unternehmen in der Metropolregion Ruhr, Entwicklungsperspektiven für die Region aus Sicht der Wirtschaft entworfen. Sechs führende Unternehmensberatungen haben in Zusammenarbeit mit Experten aus Wissenschaft und Wirtschaft verschiedene Themenfelder untersucht, eine Vision entwickelt und daraus eine Entwicklungsstrategie für die kommenden Jahre abgeleitet.     

Der „Mitteleuropäische Kristall“ – zwischen „Blauer Banane“ und „osteuropäischem Pentagon“

Der deutsch-tschechische Grenzraum liegt gewisserma?en in einer Sandwich-Position zwischen verschiedenen europ?ischen Makroregionen; auf europ?ischer Ebene wird er bislang eher als Verbindungselement wahrgenommen. Seine innere Struktur ist von einer relativ geringen Besiedlungsdichte und ausgepr?gten Stadt-Land-Unterschieden gekennzeichnet. Im Frühjahr 2006 gründeten die beiden nationalen Regierungen eine deutsch-tschechische Arbeitsgruppe für Raumentwicklung. Der Artikel skizziert, welche Ziele und Erwartungen damit verbunden werden und welche Funktionen ein solches Gremium übernehmen kann. Dazu wird zun?chst die Ausgangssituation dieses Raumes skizziert. Abschlie?end wird das m?gliche Leitbild des „Mitteleurop?ischen Kristalls“ vorgestellt.     

Early Medieval Trade on Japan’s Southern Frontier and its Effect on Okinawan State Development: Grey Stoneware of the East China Sea

In this paper I examine the development of a particular kind of grey stoneware called kamuiyaki which was produced and traded within the Ryukyu Islands, southwestern Japan, in the eleventh to fourteenth centuries. The wares themselves, their chronology, and archaeological context are discussed. The kilns represent the first enterprise in the islands in which a commodity was made for exchange on a substantial scale. The establishment of the kilns in a remote area, with technological borrowing from both Japan and Korea, reflects social and economic trends of the beginning of the Medieval Period in Japan. Greyware production, circulation, and consumption, reconstructed from recent excavations, shows a political economy capable of fostering the development of small states on the island of Okinawa in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.     

Ethnoarchaeology: A Non Historical Science of Reference Necessary for Interpreting the Past

Ethnoarchaeology appears nowadays as a poorly formulated field. However, it could become a real science of reference for interpreting the past if it was focused upon well-founded cross-cultural correlates, linking material culture with static and dynamic phenomena. For this purpose, such correlates have to be studied in terms of explanatory mechanisms. Cross-cultural correlates correspond to those regularities where explanatory mechanisms invoke universals. These universals can be studied by reference to the theories found in the different disciplines they relate to and which are situated outside of the domain of archaeology. In the domain of technology, cross-cultural correlates cover a wide range of static and dynamic phenomena. They allow the archaeologist to interpret archaeological facts—for which there is not necessarily analogue—in terms of local historical scenario as well as cultural evolution. In this respect, it is shown that ethnoarchaeology, when following appropriate methodologies and focussing on the universals that underlie the diversity of archaeological facts, does provide the reference data needed to climb up in the pyramid of inferences that make up our interpretative constructs.     

The Art of Taphonomy and the Taphonomy of Art: Layer IV,Molodova I,Ukraine

Level IV of Molodova I, an open-air Middle Paleolithic site in the Ukraine has been described by some researchers as a possible source of evidence for early symbolic behavior. We examined bone objects from this layer that were identified by Ukrainian researchers as exhibiting possible Neandertal produced engravings including two anthropomorphic figures. While we have determined that there is no evidence of symbolic activity at Molodova I, the database we have created, with its systematic recording of traces left by taphonomic agents on faunal remains, provides a better understanding of the overall site taphonomy.     

Shark attack!: A cultural approach

Many Australians would concur with the view of the novelist Tim Winton that we have an ‘almost supernatural fear and hatred’ of sharks. Especially in the wake of fatal attacks by great white sharks (on average once or twice per year), the extent of fascination and fear within the population at large is undeniable. This paper rejects the frequently encountered explanation that this is because we have an ‘instinctual’, ‘hard wired’ and ‘primal fear’ of wild animals that can kill people. Its focus instead is on the contemporary cultural interpretations of great whites and their behaviour which come to the fore when fatal attacks take place.     

Gamming Chairs and Gimballed Beds: Seafaring Women on Board Nineteenth-Century Ships

During the nineteenth century, many captains’ wives from New England took up residence on the ships their husbands commanded. This article focuses on how those women at sea attempted to use material culture to domesticate their voyaging space. While writing in their journals, they referred to not only the small personal things such as books and knitting needles that they brought in their trunks, but also large items, built for and used by women, such as gamming chairs, deckhouses, parlor organs, sewing machines, and gimballed beds. Mary Brewster attempted to retreat from the ship’s officers in her small deckhouse, Annie Brassey slept in the gimballed bed, and Lucy Lord Howes disembarked in a gamming chair when captured by Confederates during the Civil War. Evidence of these artifacts found during shipwreck archaeology could be used to further what is known of the culture aboard ships on which women lived. Analysis of the material culture reveals how a captain’s wife domesticated space, altered her environment, and made a home on the ship for her family.