Recovering social and cultural dynamics from plaster floors: chemical analyses at ancient Chunchucmil,Yucatan, Mexico

Phosphate analysis and trace metals analysis were used to determine activities that took place on plaster floors in domestic contexts at the ancient Maya site of Chunchucmil, Yucatan. Research on activities and the use of space contributes to an understanding of social relations within household groups as well as unforeseen patterns that structure refuse discard. The floors analyzed in this paper pertain to three structures in two neighboring houselots dating to the Early Classic (300–600 A.D.) period. Data from the chemical analyses were utilized in conjunction with associated architectural features and artifacts found on the floors. These three lines of information were interpreted with the help of models developed from ethnographic and ethnoarchaeological research. The results demonstrated functional differentiation of rooms within elaborate residences and suggested that front rooms were used to host visitors. The results also suggested that different types of debris were managed differently. Finally, chemical analyses suggest that non-elite Maya occasionally enacted rituals often restricted to elites.     

Something Borrowed and Something New?: Welfare Reform and Social Science

William M. Epstein, Welfare in America : How Social Science Fails the Poor.
Herbert J. Gans, The War Against the Poor : The Underclass and Antipoverty Policy
Joel F. Handler, The Poverty of Welfare Reform     

Teachers' Attitudes and the Success of School Choice

The 1990s witnessed growing attention to the adoption of choice-based school reforms, particularly charter schooling and school vouchers. Although researchers have approached the school choice debate from theoretical, normative, and empirical directions, little attention has been paid to examining how teachers view school choice or what factors shape their attitudes. This oversight is significant because teachers can impact the success of school choice experiments in many ways, such as through their willingness to launch and staff schools of choice, adopt new practices developed in schools of choice, and support choice-based reform efforts in their unions and communities. Using a survey of Arizona and Nevada teachers, we find that White, experienced, unionized, Democratic educators and those working in a "positive" school environment are less supportive of school choice. Arizona teachers, who live in close approximation of a free market for education, are particularly hostile to choice, but teachers who have had personal contact with a charter school are more supportive. The results indicate that the success of school choice will likely be influenced by the characteristics of the teacher workforce and teachers' familiarity with competition.     

Survey,Shovel Probes,and Population Estimates: Studying Regional Demography in the Intermediate Area Using Subsurface Sherd Deposits

Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory - Shovel probes are a common form of archaeological data collection in densely vegetated landscapes. They were once the subject of critical analyses that...     

Everyday nationalism and international hockey: contesting Canadian national identity

This paper examines how hockey is used to construct and demarcate the Canadian national community from external others, namely, the USA, Europe and Russia/USSR. The paper suggests popular nationalist narratives around the sport of hockey construct difference from external others in ways that place them in tension with state and corporate interests. Drawing on the concept of everyday nationalism, this article explores how the interplay between international competition, national identity and commercial sport has made hockey an ambiguous and contested national symbol in Canada.     

The body mass index of blacks and whites in the United States during the nineteenth century

Body mass index (BMI) values reflect the net balance between nutrition, work effort, and calories consumed to fight disease. Nineteenth-century prison records in the United States demonstrate that the BMI values of blacks and whites were distributed symmetrically; neither underweight nor obese individuals were common among the working class. BMI values declined throughout the nineteenth century. By modern standards, however, nineteenth-century BMIs were in healthy weight ranges, though the biological living standards in rural areas exceeded those in urban areas. The increase in BMIs during the twentieth century did not have its origin in the nineteenth century.