Economic geography under postcolonial scrutiny

Because the economy is not found as an empirical object among other worldly things, in order for it to be 'seen' by the human perceptual apparatus it has to undergo a process, crucial for science, of representational mapping. This is doubling, but with a difference; the map shifts the point of view so that viewers can see the whole as if from the outside, in a way that allows them, from a specific position inside, to find their bearings. ( Buck-Morss 1995 , 440)     

Investments in Scientific Research: Examining the Funding Threshold Effects on Scientific Collaboration and Variation by Academic Discipline

This paper seeks to examine how federal financial support of academic scientists shapes their collaborative behavior. More specifically, it investigates two questions: (i) are there threshold sizes of federal grants that have effects on collaboration? and (ii) do the threshold sizes differ by discipline? To test and model these questions, this paper uses data collected in a 2004–2005 survey by the Research Valuing Mapping Project (a project based at Georgia Tech and led by Barry Bozeman) of 2,086 academically based research scientists and engineers. The analysis in this paper reaffirms the positive relationship between federal funding and collaboration seen in previous works, but the findings suggest that there is in fact a threshold effect—as the positive relationship has a diminishing influence. The findings of this paper are more limited with respect to how academic disciplines’ threshold levels differ. The results indicate a difference in the threshold levels between disciplines for three of the eight models.     

Re‐examining the relationship between cranial deformation and extra‐sutural bone formation

The relationship between cranial deformation and the occurrence of extra‐sutural bones remains poorly understood. Scholars are divided about whether or not cranial deformation causes an increased occurrence of these bones, and even those who agree that deformation does have an influence often disagree about which locations on the crania are most impacted. Part of this issue clearly stems from the difficulties in finding appropriate samples from which to test the hypothesis that deformation leads to an increased expression of extra‐sutural bones. The present study examines the effects of fronto‐occipital and occipital‐only deformation on the occurrence of extra‐sutural bones through an analysis of 59 deformed and undeformed crania from the Philippines. Relative to the undeformed crania, both deformed samples showed an elevated number of extra‐sutural bones. Using two different statistical tests, we identified a significantly higher occurrence of extra‐sutural bones at two distinct cranial localities for both the fronto‐occipitally deformed crania (coronal suture and asterion) and for those showing only occipital flattening when compared to the undeformed crania (lambdoidal and asterion). However, as our data reveal, individuals with highly elevated occurrences of extra‐sutural bones are not necessarily deformed. As such, we argue that deformation practices may have a positive impact on the formation of extra‐sutural bones; however, future studies using larger samples of deformed and undeformed crania—ideally from the same site—will be necessary to distinguish between the influence of cranial deformation on extra‐sutural bone formation relative to other population factors which may play a role in shaping variation in this feature. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

New models,new questions: historiographical approaches to the Romanian Holocaust

This essay surveys the historiography on the Romanian Holocaust, focusing in particular on four monographs published by Western historians within the past five years. Earlier research was limited both empirically and theoretically, and these works suggest new research paradigms and raise new questions about the genocide in Romania during the Second World War. Dennis Deletant assesses the rule of General Ion Antonescu in light of his responsibility for the Holocaust and attempts to explain why the General began and ended the Holocaust when he did. Vladimir Solonari argues that the Holocaust should be read in the context of plans for ethnic homogenisation which were implemented when the opportunity presented itself in 1941. Jean Ancel examines the expropriation of Jewish property and shows that, among other things, the Romanian perpetrators were motivated by a desire to enrich themselves at the expense of the Jews. Finally, Armin Heinen reads the Holocaust by looking at how different groups of perpetrators used violence and attempts to recreate the logic that shaped their actions. In addition, the essay discusses Holocaust denial, survivor memoirs and the state of primary-source collections on the Romanian Holocaust.     

Too late to buy a home? School redistricting and the timing and extent of capitalization

In the past 50 years, a voluminous literature estimating the value of schools through capitalization in home prices has emerged. Prior research has identified capitalization using a variety of approaches including discontinuities caused by boundaries. Here, we use changes in school boundaries and the opening of a new school in Fayette County (Lexington), Kentucky to identify this capitalization. Critical to properly estimating the effect of redistricting is to account for when information on redistricting is available. We treat the information about the effects of zoning as occurring in three stages: announcement of the intent to open the new high school and redistricting, approval of the specific redistricting plan (map), and implementation (opening of the new high school and actual changes in boundaries). We find significant changes in values for homes redistricted from lower-performing schools and we find that this capitalization occurs well before implementation of the redistricting. As we show, failure to account for capitalization occurring before implementation will attenuate and even change the sign of capitalization.     

Interpreting the expansion of sea fishing in medieval Europe using stable isotope analysis of archaeological cod bones

Archaeological fish bones reveal increases in marine fish utilisation in Northern and Western Europe beginning in the 10th and 11th centuries AD. We use stable isotope signatures from 300 archaeological cod (Gadus morhua) bones to determine whether this sea fishing revolution resulted from increased local fishing or the introduction of preserved fish transported from distant waters such as Arctic Norway, Iceland and/or the Northern Isles of Scotland (Orkney and Shetland). Results from 12 settlements in England and Flanders (Belgium) indicate that catches were initially local. Between the 9th and 12th centuries most bones represented fish from the southern North Sea. Conversely, by the 13th to 14th centuries demand was increasingly met through long distance transport – signalling the onset of the globalisation of commercial fisheries and suggesting that cities such as London quickly outgrew the capacity of local fish supplies.     

Enabling persistent presence? Performing the embodied geopolitics of the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle assemblage

Military Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are being increasingly used to provide surveillance and attack capabilities within war zones. At the heart of much of the rhetoric about these aircraft is their supposed ability to enable persistent presence across the battlespace. They are also unique in that they actively distance the aircrew from the aircraft. This paper seeks to question whether this claim to persistent presence can be justified and considers the implications of the distancing of pilot from machine in this. In order to achieve this, the paper focuses upon conceptualising UAVs as assemblages, composed of both human and machine elements. It uses firsthand accounts from a Royal Air Force Reaper UAV aircrew as a basis to analyse the ways in which the deployment of these aircraft in Afghanistan is changing the ways that war is experienced by aerial combatants. It does this through the utilisation of a feminist, embodied geopolitics, refiguring it from a concern with victims of war to argue for its use to understand the micro-scale of how the humans within these UAV assemblages experience combat. This paper thus focuses upon the extent to which the Reaper UAV achieves a persistent presence through analysis of its supposed more-than-human loitering and vision abilities, and the limitations associated with the requirement for a human-in-the loop. The paper contends that although UAVs like the Reaper change the geopolitics of combat, the continuing requirement for the human element of the assemblage restricts their ability to provide persistent presence.