Response Sensitivity of Highway Bridges to Randomly Oriented Multi-Component Earthquake Excitation

In two-dimensional and single axis three-dimensional finite element analyses, the ground motion incidence angle can play a significant role in structural response. The effect of incidence angle for three-dimensional excitation and response is investigated in this paper for response of highway bridges. Single-degree-of-freedom elastic and inelastic mean spectra were computed from various orientation techniques and found indistinguishable for combinations of orthogonal horizontal components. Probabilistic seismic demand models were generated for the nonlinear response of five different bridge models. The negligible effect of incidence angle on mean ensemble response was confirmed with a stochastic representation of the ground motions.     

Brackish water foraging: isotopic landscapes and dietary reconstruction in Suisun Marsh,Central California

While bone stable isotope signatures of humans foraging in open coastal and fully terrestrial environments have been relatively well documented, the signature of foraging near brackish-water estuaries is less well known. This study examines the Central California isotopic landscape, or isoscape, showing how foods in different ecosystems have distinctive isotopic compositions. We present new bone collagen and apatite stable isotope data from two Late Holocene sites (CA-SOL-11 and CA-SOL-69) near Suisun Marsh, a low salinity brackish water estuary upstream from San Francisco Bay. Faunal remains at the sites include significant numbers of aquatic resources including fish and shellfish, in addition to terrestrial mammals, while paleobotanical remains suggest mainly terrestrial nuts and seeds. Stable isotope data at the population level corroborate this finding and show consumption of significant levels of brackish water nutrients, including both dietary protein and dietary carbohydrates and fats, paired with terrestrial foods. This dietary focus generates a unique brackish-water isotopic signature that is distinct from others in Central California. The documentation of an isoscape with strong regional gradients can be of tremendous help in reconstructing ancient patterns in subsistence, migration, and trade.     

Child experiences as street traders in Peru: contributing to a reappraisal for working children

By exploring the experiences of over a hundred child traders in Cusco, this research provides an insight into the more everyday circumstances of children's work in developing countries. The working conditions of child traders raise serious concerns, including: dangers of accidents, theft and abuse; shortage of time for play; and some disruption to education. Nevertheless, the positives of trading work are substantial. Although the children feel that they have to work, they gain enjoyment and economic empowerment. Moreover, they display a certain self esteem and confidence in the knowledge of their trading skills, and a spatial awareness of the best trading sites, demonstrating agency in their choice of trading locations. The findings suggest that international policy, which emphasises universal condemnation and prohibition of child work, requires revision. Such policy should be replaced by a more flexible approach, which recognises the benefits of children's work and embraces supportive protection for children engaged in the lighter forms of work such as trading.     

Writing on Domesticity,Thinking about Politics: Women Organising during Decolonisation in Cambodia, 1948–52

By examining the intellectual renderings of previously marginalised voices in mid-twentieth-century Cambodian history, this article reconstructs notions of who is a political agent and what constitutes the ‘political’ in tumultuous moments of decolonisation. In 1948, Cambodian women founded the Samāgam Khmaer Sahajīvinī (SKS), or Association of Khmer Female Comrades/Companions, and produced the first Khmer-language magazine for women, Dassanāvaṭti Nārī (Women's Magazine). The organisation was structured around four committees representing interests in clothing, food, good manners and publishing, and organisers engaged in issues related to visions of governance, ethnic difference and modernisation. These gendered organising efforts occurred alongside political in-fighting among male politicians in the turbulent years prior to gaining independence from the French Union in 1953. Due to their lack of electoral rights prior to 1955, women were excluded from political institutions. Yet, when the organising women founded the SKS and committed to producing a magazine from 1949 to 1952, they asserted women as political agents with important perspectives on Cambodian politics and society. Centring the efforts and writings of the SKS provides new insights into how decolonisation was not just a male-dominated and top-down movement but rather a multitude of organising and intellectual contributions.