Book reviews

JAPAN'S ECONOMY IN WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION. By Jerome B. Cohen. With a Foreword by Sir George Sansom (Issued under the auspices of the International Secretariat, Institute of Pacific Relations. University of Minnesota Press, 1949).

INTERNATIONAL LAW AND HUMAN RIGHTS. By H. Lauterpacht, K.C., LL.D., F.B.A. (London, Stevens and Sons Limited, 1950).

EMPIRE OF THE NORTH ATLANTIC. By Gerald S. Graham, University of Toronto Press, 1950. xvii+338 pp.

KOREA TO‐DAY. By George M. McCune with the collaboration of Arthur L. Grey, Jr. (I.P.R.) (Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1950. pp. 372–74 (Appendices)—16 (Bibliography)—6 (Indices) $5.00).

THE MAKING OF PAKISTAN: By Richard Symonds. London: Faber & Faber, 1950, pp. 227.

IMMIGRATION INTO NEW ZEALAND. Report of a Study Group of the Dunedin Branch of the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs, June, 1950, p.p. 22.

SEVEN FALLEN PILLARS, The Middle East, 1915–1950, by Jon Kimche. (London, Secker & Warburg, 1950, 316 pp. Appendix, Index).     

Early Neolithic diet and animal husbandry: stable isotope evidence from three Linearbandkeramik (LBK) sites in Central Germany

The first appearance of the Neolithic Linearbandkeramik (LBK) in Central Germany occurred during the 6th millennium BC. However, though LBK sites are abundant in the German loess areas, there are only a few studies that reconstruct the diet of these first farmers using biochemical methods. Here we present the largest study undertaken to date on LBK material using stable isotope analysis of carbon and nitrogen to reconstruct human diet and animal husbandry strategies. We analyzed the bone collagen of 97 human individuals and 45 associated animals from the sites of Derenburg, Halberstadt and Karsdorf in the Middle Elbe–Saale region of Central Germany. Mean adult human values are ?19.9 ± 0.4‰ for δ¹³C and 8.7 ± 0.8‰ for δ¹⁵N. The δ¹³C values are typical for terrestrial, temperate European regions, whereas the δ¹⁵N values fall within an expected range for farming societies with a mixed diet consisting of products from domestic animals and plants. The consumption of unfermented dairy products is unlikely as there is direct palaeogenetic evidence of lactose intolerance available for one of the sites. There are no clear indications for dietary differences in sex. Young children under three years of age are enriched in δ¹⁵N due to breastfeeding indicating that weaning likely occurred around the age of three years. The fauna exhibit mean δ¹³C values of ?20.9 ± 0.8‰ and mean δ¹⁵N values of 7.0 ± 0.9‰ respectively. Variation in the δ¹³C and δ¹⁵N in the domestic animals is probably caused by different livestock managements.     

On the frontlines of the law: Legal advocacy and political protest by lawyers in contested Kashmir (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

This article analyzes the role of Kashmiri lawyers working in a context of conflict, militarization and political resistance in Kashmir Valley, India. It finds that the Kashmir Bar Association, operating under conditions of state control that are maintained and legitimized through the law, constitutes an authoritative normative community and powerful institutional actor, working within the parameters of the Indian legal system while simultaneously supporting and maintaining solidarity with the movement for self‐determination, and contesting the legitimacy of Indian state rule. The association's decidedly moral vision of the law offers an alternative form of legal imagination that draws on transnational normative frameworks and practices to challenge the legal provisions and legal failures that function to legitimize human‐rights violations taking place under conditions of militarization. As we show in this article, the recent crisis period in Kashmir has posed challenges to KBA lawyers, as they negotiate and assess their relationship to the state, their place in the struggle for self‐determination, and the promise and potency of law as a strategy for social change.