Sclerochronological analysis of archaeological mollusc assemblages: methods,applications and future prospects

Accreting skeletal tissues found in bone, teeth, otoliths and molluscan shell act as sensitive recorders of local environmental and climatic conditions. Owing to their robust nature, ubiquity and abundance in the archaeological record as well as the potential for high-resolution data acquisition, the accreting skeletal tissues of archaeological molluscs are increasingly employed as palaeoenvironmental proxies. Researchers have chiefly utilised such proxies to extend instrumental records of environmental conditions through palaeoenvironmental reconstruction and explore the impact of environmental and climatic change on human populations. However, the use of environmental proxies from the archaeological record can be hampered by a number of methodological challenges including inadequate sampling strategies, appropriate calibration, the use of inappropriate proxies and the broad extrapolation of localised results. This paper reviews the use of molluscan shell from archaeological contexts as palaeoenvironmental proxies. We focus on the application of sclerochronology—a suite of high-resolution physical and geochemical data recovery methods widely used in conjunction with molluscan shell. This paper presents an overview of the potential of these techniques in approaching more nuanced understandings of human-environment interactions and how they can be more successfully incorporated into archaeological research.     

Development of a systems model to visualise the complexity of children's independent mobility

Substantial changes to the built environment, urbanisation patterns, and societal norms have contributed to limiting children's opportunities for being independently mobile. Several linear causal pathway models have been developed to understand the influences on children's independent mobility; however feedback loops between and within the various levels of influence cannot be modelled using such an approach. The purpose of this paper is to refine the interrelationships of factors related to children's independent mobility, taking into account earlier models, broader contextual factors, recent children's geographies literature, and feedback loops. Systems model components were informed by attributes known to influence children's independent mobility, related qualitative findings, and the development of a framework that could lend itself to multilevel modelling approaches. This systems model may provide a useful structure for identifying how best to develop and monitor interventions to halt the declining rates of children's independent mobility.     

Hydrodynamic sorting in a coastal marine skeletal assemblage

In this paper I evaluate the effects of wave and tidal erosion on element‐specific measures of phenotypic variability. Previous research has found a high correlation between skeletal weight, shape, and density and the transport potential of an element exposed to hydrodynamic forces. However, no previous studies have attempted to address the issue of within‐element sorting based on selective removal of only the smallest members of a given element class. I evaluate this hypothesis using a human skeletal sample from Bird Island (8DI52) located in Dixie County, Florida. This sample comprises two components, an eroded sample that was exposed during severe storm and tidal activity, and an uneroded sample excavated from primary context. The measurement‐specific means for the subcomponents were compared using Student's t and Wilcoxon tests and variability differences were evaluated based on standard deviations, coefficients of variation, and maximum/minimum indices. The data included maxillary and mandibular tooth dimensions and postcranial metrics. No evidence for selective winnowing based on within‐element size was found in this data set. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Governmentality and power in politically contested space: refugee farming in Hong Kong's New Territories, 1945–1970

A small proportion of Mainland Chinese refugee flows into British Hong Kong following the 1949 Communist Revolution in the People's Republic of China were vegetable farmers, who by the late 1960s engendered a vegetable revolution in New Territories agricultural space. Heterogeneous actors and their differing modalities of power in the late-colonial government possessed an active managerial role in this vegetable revolution anchored in issues of marketing and land tenure. While post-World War Two developmentalist ontologies help explain government intervention in the post-war agricultural economy, this research focuses primarily on the disciplinary techniques deployed within the governance rationalities of the early Cold War period to cultivate pro-government loyalties among a potentially proletarianized, trans-border refugee farming population perceived by colonial authorities as being susceptible to Communist influence. As ‘experimental space’, marketing innovations were a qualified success, but progress in land reform failed because of the local geopolitical context of colonial rule in the contested space of the New Territories.     

Bedding, hearths, and site maintenance in the Middle Stone Age of Sibudu Cave, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

Micromorphological analysis of sediments from the Middle Stone Age site of Sibudu Cave, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, provides a high-resolution sequence and evidence of site formation processes of predominantly anthropogenic deposits. This methodology allows for a detailed interpretation of individual anthropogenic activities, including the construction of hearths and bedding and the maintenance of occupational surfaces through the sweep out of hearths and the repeated burning of bedding. This analysis also provides a context for evaluating other studies at the site relating to magnetic susceptibility, paleobotany, paleozoology, anthracology, and studies of ochre.     

Recent Research in Western Mexican Archaeology

Western Mexico is vast and geographically diverse and has received far less attention compared to other areas of Mesoamerica. Research over the past decade allows the definition of four major subregions characterized by cultural factors and distinct historical trajectories. A large proportion of the research in western Mexico is still culture-historical in nature, oriented toward establishing chronologies and relationships between regions. But along with a number of recent efforts toward synthesis and consolidation, current theoretical research contributes to the study of mortuary patterns and social organization, alternative forms of social complexity, agricultural intensification, empire formation, state involvement in the economy, human-land relationships, and the interlocking relationship between migration and sociopolitical reorganization.