Building More Inclusive Solidarities for Socio‐Environmental Change: Lessons in Resistance from Southern Appalachia

It is increasingly recognized that socio‐environmental justice will not be achieved through liberal and cosmopolitical forms of activism alone. Instead, more diverse and inclusive solidarities must be achieved across political ideologies for transformative change. By engaging with one constituency often overlooked by mainstream environmentalists—rural, conservative Americans—we argue for a situated solidarity that can be forged among people whose views of nature, community, and politics differ significantly. This framework rejects totalizing expressions of global ambition that erase important place‐based differences. To explore this ethic, we examine a localized anti‐fracking campaign in western North Carolina to determine how place‐based forms of environmental resistance can be brought in closer connection with the cosmopolitical movement for climate and energy justice. This requires that cosmopolitical movements make room for more customary forms of cultural politics, while conservative movements look beyond their own place‐based struggles to resist mutually experienced forms of oppression.     

Establishing a ‘Cultural Base’? The Creation of the Fulbright Program in Portugal

This paper deals with the cultural and educational relations between the United States and Portugal during the Cold War. It is built upon the premise that cultural policies and cultural relations between states are a fundamental part of international relations. History of International Relations, therefore, should overcome an analysis based only upon political and diplomatic dimensions to address what can also be referred to as ‘cultural diplomacy’. The Cold War period, because of its historical features, is particularly relevant to the study of processes of cultural diplomacy and some authors even consider it as the ‘golden age’ of cultural diplomacy.¹1. William Glade, ‘Issues in the Genesis and Organization of Cultural Diplomacy: A Brief Critical History’ in The Journal of Arts Management, Law, and Society (Winter 2010), vol. 39, issue 4, 242. For cultural diplomacy during the Cold War see Jessica Gienow-Hecht, ‘Culture and the Cold War in Europe’ in Leffler, Melvyn & Westad, Odd Arne, The Cambridge History of the Cold War Vol. i, (Cambridge University Press, 2010), 398–419; Akira Iriye, ‘Culture and International History’ in Michael J. Hogan and Thomas G. Paterson (ed), Explaining the History of American Foreign Relations, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004); Richard T. Arndt, The First Resort Of Kings: American Cultural Diplomacy In The Twentieth Century (Virgínia: Potomac Books, 2005).View all notes     

al‐Khafaji reinterpreted: New insights on Umm an‐Nar monuments and settlement from Bat,Oman

Al‐Khafaji is a central and well‐known point on the early third millennium BC map of the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Bat, in the Sultanate of Oman. For years, Kasr al‐Khafaji (“Tower 1146”) has been understood as an Umm an‐Nar (ca. 2800–2000 BCE) monument standing amid a contemporary village. However, recent excavations by the Bat Archaeological Project (BAP) reveal that the entirety of the known site—monument(s) and settlement—is situated on an anthropogenic clay mound that elevated it meters above the surrounding landscape. This paper presents the results of BAP's recent excavations, emphasising the social spaces created by architecture of various functions and scales. It also considers the implications that this new interpretation of al‐Khafaji may have for how the relationship between Umm an‐Nar towers and settlement should be understood. The paper closes with a discussion of Umm an‐Nar tower function and social meaning, concluding that the Khafaji monument(s) likely served a symbolic and possibly performative role in Umm an‐Nar society that was perceived as separate from Umm an‐Nar settlement.     

The Mythical Shapeshifting of Capital and Petrification of Labour: Deepening Conflict on the Agrofuel Frontier

In the great civilisations of the past, shapeshifting promised a restoration of order in turbulent times in return for the deference of loyal subjects. It was a strategy of the powerful to maintain advantage and could also be used to bind opponents to an undesired form. This study finds its resonance in the contemporary shapeshifting that is the supposed transition from the fossil fuel economy. With reference to the fusion of oil, grain and sugar companies in Brazil's ethanol sector, it explores how amidst economic, environmental and political insecurity these “old villains” of the carbon economy have fused and emerged as the “new heroes” of the green economy. Accounts of dissenting rural subjects, however, unveil the mythical nature of avowed social gains from this shapeshifting. Amidst rural conflict and a successive weakening of regulation, it becomes evident how their petrification, in a metaphorical and increasingly literal sense is required.     

Limits to interpretation of skeletal trauma — Two case studies from Medieval Abingdon,England

Two adult male skeletons from the Medieval lay cemetery at Abingdon show multiple trauma to the upper limbs and torso. Although this in itself is not uncommon in this cemetery the two skeletons in question stand out by virtue of the near-identical distribution of their injuries. The skeletons are used as examples to discuss the difficulties facing the palaeopathologist in deciding whether to attribute particular examples of trauma to violence. This is particularly relevant to Abingdon, where at least one major episode of civil conflict is documented historically. It was concluded that although the number of skeletons displaying signs of trauma may show the level of violence and high-risk occupations in a society, skeletal evidence rarely can distinguish between the two in individual cases.     

Historical development of the dopamine hypothesis of schizophrenia

This review examines the history of discoveries that contributed to development of the dopamine hypothesis of schizophrenia. The origin of the hypothesis is traced to the recognition that neuroleptic drugs interfere with brain dopamine function. This insight was derived from two distinct lines of research. The first line originated from the discovery in 1956 that reserpine depletes brain serotonin. This finding resulted in a sequence of studies that led to the discovery that brain dopamine is involved in neuroleptic-induced extrapyramidal motor disturbances. The second line of research was aimed at determining the mechanism of action of psychomotor stimulants. This research produced evidence that stimulants directly or indirectly activate brain dopamine receptors. Because nonreserpine neuroleptics such as chlorpromazine block stimulant-induced movement, these findings suggested that neuroleptics were dopamine antagonists. Most previous accounts of the development of the dopamine hypothesis of schizophrenia emphasize the first line of research and ignore the second.