An archaeologically validated protocol for computing obsidian hydration rates from laboratory data

This paper reports the computation of hydration rate for Topaz Mountain obsidian from laboratory data, and a comparison with archaeological data from a well-dated site, Camels Back Cave, in western Utah. Topaz Mountain obsidian is found to be slow-hydrating, with a rate of 0.071 ± 0.021 μ/yr^½ at an effective hydration temperature of 16.01 °C. This rate agrees with a rate developed from archaeological data from Camels Back Cave within ∼6%. Activation energy of Topaz Mountain obsidian is 10370 ± 544 K, and its diffusion constant is (1.87 ± 9.13) × 10¹³ μ²/yr, both of which are independent of temperature. Its intra-source variability in hydration rate is very low (CV < 0.01), implying a low variability in intrinsic water. We present a model of chemical erosion which shows why earlier laboratory-determined rates were incorrect, and discuss the implications of our findings on the determination of experimentally derived rates in obsidian hydration dating.     

Time Consuming: Women's Radio and the Reconstruction of National Narratives in Western Germany 1945-1948

The question of the proper place of women in German societywas one of the most pressing issues of the time immediatelyafter the Second World War. The sheer numerical disproportionof women to men in Germany, combined with the expanded publicroles many women had adopted during wartime, meant that therewas hardly a debate about postwar German society that was notin some way touched by this question. The expanded role andvisibility of women in the immediate postwar era coincided withthe unprecedented dominance of the radio, which had emergedfrom the war as the best preserved means of mass communication,information and cheap entertainment. This article shows theimportant role played by the radio, and in particular women'sprogrammes, in helping to shape the role and visions of womenin the developing West German society. Based on an analysisof the way women's programmes addressed the activity of womenin society, it is argued that in the years of scarcity beforethe 1948 currency reform, women's time gained unprecedentedvalue as a consumer ‘commodity’. In particular,the efforts of women's programmes to structure and disciplinewomen's use of time contributed significantly to the discourseof women as consumer citizens that developed dominance in thesocial market economy of the Federal Republic. The image ofthe female time consumer was combined in women's programmeswith essential notions of femininity to create new narrativesof German national identity. Within the broader context of thedebate on the role of women in society, radio programming ofthe immediate postwar years helped to embed certain discourseson femininity, consumption and Germanness that later developedin 1950s society.     

Regional inequality in the U.S.: Evidence from city-level purchasing power

Using quarterly data for 42 products over the period from 1990 to 2015, we find that there has been a large and growing dispersion of purchasing power across U.S. cities since 1990 and the dispersion varies widely across products. We also find that total factor productivity shock precedes or predicts the rise in regional inequality of purchasing power. We view that the growing regional inequality found in the purchasing power among U.S. cities might have proceeded after nationwide productivity shocks mainly by the cities with higher share of skilled workers through the products with more flexible price adjustments.     

Design Space and Cultural Transmission: Case Studies from Paleoindian Eastern North America

Tool design is a cultural trait—a term long used in anthropology as a unit of transmittable information that encodes particular behavioral characteristics of individuals or groups. After they are transmitted, cultural traits serve as units of replication in that they can be modified as part of a cultural repertoire through processes such as recombination, loss, or partial alteration. Artifacts and other components of the archaeological record serve as proxies for studying the transmission (and modification) of cultural traits, provided there is analytical clarity in defining and measuring whatever it is that is being transmitted. Our interest here is in tool design, and we illustrate how to create analytical units that allow us to map tool-design space and to begin to understand how that space was used at different points in time. We first introduce the concept of fitness landscape and impose a model of cultural learning over it, then turn to four methods that are useful for the analysis of design space: paradigmatic classification, phylogenetic analysis, distance graphs, and geometric morphometrics. Each method builds on the others in logical fashion, which allows creation of testable hypotheses concerning cultural transmission and the evolutionary processes that shape it, including invention (mutation), selection, and drift. For examples, we turn to several case studies that focus on Early Paleoindian–period projectile points from eastern North America, the earliest widespread and currently recognizable remains of hunter–gatherers in late Pleistocene North America.     

Overcoming the Resource Curse: Reform and the Rentier State in Chile and Argentina, 1973–2000

This article examines the possibility of overcoming the resource curse through case studies of the appropriation and use of mining rents derived from public–private joint ventures in Argentina and Chile in the period 1973–2000. In particular, it examines how two similar cases of sectoral liberalization resulted in divergent outcomes: the deployment of rent‐appropriation strategies around multinational corporations in Argentina and an innovative and productivist approach based on joint ventures with foreign capital in Chile. The article argues that while the liberalization of the sector created similar opportunities for appropriating rents in both countries, the existence of strong civil society pressures in Chile constrained rent‐appropriation and waste by the state, in comparison to the absence of such pressures in Argentina.     

Conceptions of Reinhart Koselleck's Theory of Historical Time in the Thinking of Michael Oakeshott

In recent years students of politics have begun to recognise Reinhart Koselleck's practice of Begriffsgeschichte, the study of conceptual history, as a useful approach for investigating key concepts in political ideologies and the history of ideas. But his theory of historical time—the temporal dimension to his semantic project and his broader theorising of the historical discipline—is often overlooked and underused as a heuristic device. By placing the thinking of Michael Oakeshott alongside Koselleck's theory of historical time, this article brings his thinking on temporality to the forefront, fashioning a conversation between the two thinkers about the place for history and the formal criteria necessary for ordering the past properly. In doing so, it juxtaposes Koselleck's reflections on historicity and his theory of historical time with Oakeshott's philosophical enquiry on the historical mode of understanding. It identifies important convergences and divergences between the two thinkers' theories, focusing in particular on questions regarding the potential for representing the past as multilayered and plural historical times. The article then suggests that their respective thoughts on the theory of history are in part a reaction to the modern politicisation of historical time and comprise a shared critique of radical political change.     

First Lessons in Neo-Colonialism: The Personalisation of Relations between African Politicians and French Officials in sub-Saharan Africa, 1956–66

In scholarly debates, ‘French neo-colonialism’ is defined as the social history of relations between Francophile African elites and French decision-makers in African policy, and it is frequently interpreted as a sinister manipulation of rather passive African populations. Exploring the newly accessible French archival documents, it is now possible to understand better how French officials became neo-colonial players, from the frustration of the last days of colonialism, to a new model of friend and foe in sub-Saharan Africa. A complex and highly emotional interplay of relations with African leaders accounted for the seemingly rational ‘neo-colonialist’ behaviour of French civil servants from 1955 at least to the decade after decolonisation.     

Economic Structure and Regional Performance in Germany, 2002–2007

This paper explores the impact of industrial clusters on regional growth at the German labour market region level using a regional convergence model. Based on the results of an exploratory study of the geography of German industrial clusters, we are able to differentiate the impact of industrial clustering from a horizontal and a vertical perspective while taking regional convergence into consideration. The results indicate that in addition to an all-German process of convergence, a specific East German one can be identified. The different types of industrial clusters show mixed effects within this framework. While vertically isolated industrial clusters have a negative impact on regional growth in this period, positive growth effects can be identified when industrial clusters show an intra-regional vertical interconnectedness.