Killing Kith and Kin: The Viability of British Military Intervention in Rhodesia, 1964-5

This article uses correspondence from former members of theRhodesian security services, recent oral testimony from Britishpoliticians and civil servants, and newly available documentaryevidence from archives around the world, to re-examine the viabilityof British military intervention in Rhodesia during 1964 and1965. It argues that the military and political obstacles tothe use of force cited at the time and since have been grosslyexaggerated. This article argues that with sufficient resolve,the Labour government led by Harold Wilson could have used forcein an attempt to prevent or end Rhodesia's Unilateral Declarationof Independence of 11 November 1965. This might have offereda possible solution to one of the most protracted and embarrassinginternational problems that confronted successive British governmentsduring disengagement from Empire.     

Do online newspapers promote or undermine nation‐building in divided societies? Evidence from Africa

Seminal contributions to the study of nation‐building emphasized the role of newspapers in the development of national consciousness. But do such theories apply in the modern context of online news sites, especially in diverse, postcolonial societies? Because online news sites contain forums for reader comments, this provides an opportunity to assess the relationship between exposure to media content and citizen sentiments. We investigate the extent to which a major online news site makes ethnic categories salient in sub‐Saharan Africa's largest country, Nigeria. Analysing more than 35,000 news articles and 300,000 comments, we find that commenters frequently broadcast strong expressions of subnational ethnic animus in response to a wide variety of stories. In particular, the use of some ethnic categories in headlines is associated with more than 40 percentage point increase in the probability of at least one reader making an ethnic‐based comment. Extending the analysis to South Africa, we show that these patterns generalize beyond Nigeria. By amplifying ethnic animus, ‘national’ newspapers may impede nation‐building efforts.     

From Network Connectivity to Human Mobility: Models for Minoanization

While network techniques are now used with some frequency in archaeology for tackling questions of connectivity and mobility at regional and inter-regional scales, they are still somewhat underexploited for more local scales. The considerable potential for multiscalar analysis has recently seen some progress, however, wedded to the idea of communities of practice. In this paper, I consider how this multiscalar approach could aid in the study of ancient globalizations, with the particular case of Minoanization from the Aegean Bronze Age. Although this specific problem has seen some network applications, they have mostly not been multiscalar in nature. I address some of the reasons for this state of affairs, using a distinction between “theory” and “data” models—and suggest some possible outcomes of a more explicitly multiscalar approach to Minoanization.     

East Polynesian Islands as Models of Cultural Divergence: The Case of Rapa Nui and Rapa Iti

The diverse island societies of East Polynesia are well-suited as models for comparative evolutionary analysis. Settled ca. 750 BP by a common ancestral population, colonists of the remote corners of the Pacific shared a pool of cultural traits that included commensal species, language, technology, and other cultural practices. Following colonization however, island populations diverged in language, subsistence practices, degree of territoriality, settlement patterns, investment and forms of monumental architecture, and social organization. Driven by historical circumstances and varied environmental conditions, this divergence presents evolutionary case studies of alternative paths of cultural change. One explanatory approach to this evolutionary divergence involves isolating the critical ecological parameters that likely constrained and shaped the diverse history of island populations. Here, we offer a comparative evolutionary analysis that explores the divergent histories of two marginal East Polynesian islands: Rapa Nui and Rapa Iti.