Selbstständigkeit als Berufsalternative?!

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Demography and ethnic continuity in the Tlailotlacan enclave of Teotihuacan: the evidence from stable oxygen isotopes

Mechanisms for the maintenance of Zapotec ethnicity in Tlailotlacan, an enclave of Teotihuacan, Mexico, are reconstructed using oxygen-isotope analyses of bone and enamel phosphate. The data indicate continual interaction among the enclave inhabitants, their Oaxacan homeland, and other diaspora colonies, with no dominant post-marital residence pattern. There is no apparent association between social status and place of origin, and individual agency is indicated by variable acceptance of Teotihuacan traditions. Striking patterns of movement include the sojourning of children in other regions and the relocation of breastfeeding women. These segments of the population would have played major roles in the social and political articulation of diaspora colonies. Foreign signatures in primary burials indicate that some immigrants died shortly after their arrival in Tlailotlacan. Data from secondary burials indicate the transportation of dead relatives or ancestors to Teotihuacan for burial. We conclude that the behaviour of immigrants in ancient and modern cities is analogous in many ways.     

Yellowstone embodied: Truman Everts' ‘Thirty-seven days of peril’

In September 1870, explorer Truman C. Everts, a member of the Washburn-Doane expedition to the then little-known region of the Upper Valley of the Yellowstone River, became separated from the main party and found himself without his horse and supplies alone in the ‘wilderness’. Everts spent 37 days struggling to effect his escape from his life-threatening predicament before being rescued by a two-man search party. The news of his separation, conjecture as to his possible fate, and reports of his subsequent rescue caused a sensation both locally and nationally and consequently earned celebrity for Everts and, crucially, for the place where the calamity occurred. Drawing on Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology and non-representational work in cultural geography which explores the relation between self and world, body and landscape, this article revisits Everts' 1871 account of his ‘perilous’ misadventure to consider how his encounter with Yellowstone was embodied and, through its retelling, ultimately became inscribed on the place itself.     

Gendered responses to the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires in Victoria,Australia

This paper presents findings from a gendered analysis of resident responses to the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires (wildfires) in Victoria, Australia. One hundred and seventy‐three people lost their lives in the bushfires and more than 2000 houses were destroyed. Previous research on Black Saturday has largely focused on issues of resident preparedness and response, with limited consideration of the role of gender in household decisions and actions. This paper examines the gendered dimensions of risk awareness, preparedness and response among households affected by the bushfires. Data were collected through in‐depth interviews with over 600 survivors and a questionnaire of 1314 households in fire‐affected areas. Analysis revealed that women more often wanted to leave than men, who more often wanted to stay and defend property against the bushfires. Nevertheless, findings suggest that broad‐brush characterisations of staying to defend as a masculine response and leaving as a feminine response are misguided. Although some women expressed a strong desire to leave, others were resolute on staying to defend. Equally, while some men were determined to stay and defend, others had never considered it an option. Despite this, the research identified numerous instances where disagreement had arisen as a result of differing intentions. Conflict most often stemmed from men's reluctance to leave, and was most apparent where households had not adequately planned or discussed their intended responses. The paper concludes by considering the degree to which the findings are consistent with other research on gender and bushfire, and the implications for bushfire safety policy and practice.     

Connecting global health interventions and lived experiences: suspending ‘normality’ at funerals in rural Tanzania

In this paper, we use the funeral space and its liminal nature as a milieu for exploring how a ‘modern’ health intervention, the mosquito bednet, is negotiated by its recipients in relation to its (non)-usage in such spaces. With a focus on sleeping arrangements at funerals and drawing on empirical data from participants living in rural southern Tanzania, we discuss how the bednet is linked to the notion of being unsympathetic to the death. Viewed as a symbol of modernity and a reflection of wealth and individual pride, the bednet becomes physically and symbolically inappropriate in the more sacred, ‘in-between’ site of the funeral. We also uncover how risk perceptions regarding malaria transmission are re-cast in funeral spaces, with socio-cultural practices and health-related behaviours being simultaneously ‘risky’ for individual mourners and reinforcing in terms of group social cohesion. As individual mourners' concerns about malaria risks are suspended, notions of pain and discomfort come to the fore as part of the mourning process and respect for the deceased.