Seventy Years of Pottery Studies in the Archaeology of Mesolithic and Neolithic Sudan

African Archaeological Review - This review article examines seventy years of research and methodological approaches to the analysis of Mesolithic and Neolithic pottery in Sudan. It begins with the...     

European statistics on cultural participation and their international comparability

This paper will consider a number of issues. Section 1 will introduce the paper, establishing why reliable internationally comparable statistics on cultural participation are needed. Section 2 will address the major and various difficulties that arise in comparing national surveys, both over time and to each other. Section 3 will consider the problems that persist even with cross-national surveys for comparative purposes. Section 5 will conclude the paper with some policy recommendations.     

故宫灵沼轩风振响应分析

故宫灵沼轩是一座砌体结构与钢结构组合而成的文物建筑。为有效对其保护,采用数值模拟方法,研究了风振作用下结构的动力响应。基于灵沼轩结构现状,建立了有限元模型。通过模态分析,获得了灵沼轩的基频和主振型;通过对结构施加y向脉动风荷载,研究了重现期为50年时结构的风振特性,评价了结构在风荷载作用下的安全现状。结果表明:灵沼轩结构基频为f=5.75Hz,在x及y向的主振型以局部振动为主;脉动风压作用下,结构保持稳定振动状态,但顶部位置加速度峰值偏大。另风压作用下,砌体结构部分位置的抗拉强度不足,应在日常维护中予以重视;钢结构部分由于材料强度大,因而不会出现强度破坏。     

Experiencing Ancient Buildings from a 3D GIS Perspective: a Case Drawn from the Swedish Pompeii Project

In recent times, archaeological documentation strategies have been considerably improved by the use of advanced 3D acquisition systems. Laser scanning, photogrammetry and computer vision techniques provide archaeologists with new opportunities to investigate and document the archaeological record. In spite of this, the amount of data collected and the geometrical complexity of the models resulting from such acquisition processes have always prevented their systematic integration into a geographic information systems (GIS) environment. Recent technological advances occurred in the visualization of 3D contents, led us to overcome the aforementioned limitations and set up a work pipeline in which was possible to put the 3D models not only in the context of data visualization but also in the frame of spatial analysis. The case study described is a part of the Swedish Pompeii Project, a research and fieldwork activity started in 2000 with the purpose of recording and investigating an entire Pompeian city block, Insula V 1. As an additional part of the research, a laser scanning acquisition campaign was conducted in the last few years. The resulting models were thus meant to be used to develop further research lines: Among these, a 3D GIS system was expected to be set up with the purpose to (i) collect in the same geo-referenced environment, different typologies of documentation gathered in the context of the Swedish Pompeii Project; (ii) inter-connect 3D models with the project website; (iii) use the third dimension as a further analytical field of investigation, in the form of spatial analysis and cognitive simulation.     

Intimate Oral Histories: Intercultural Romantic Relationships in Postwar Australia

This article examines the experiences of individuals in romantic relationships that crossed ethnic, religious or racial lines in post-World War II Australia. Using interviews from the Australian Generations Oral History Project, supplemented by archival and newspaper material, this article examines how broader changes in immigration and the cultural make-up of Australia in the second half of the twentieth century impacted individual Australians, influencing who they could desire, court and love. Through the narration of intimate life stories, this article attempts to capture the emotional experience of individuals whose relationships, while made possible by national policy decisions, still tested and breached social norms and cultural expectations at the personal and familial level.     

Complex Contagions and the Diffusion of Innovations: Evidence from a Small-N Study

The recent literature on “complex contagions” challenges Granovetter’s classic hypothesis on the strength of weak ties and argues that, when the actors’ choice requires reinforcement from several sources, it is the structure of strong ties that really matters to sustain rapid and wide diffusion. The paper contributes to this debate by reporting on a small-N study that relies on a unique combination of ethnographic data, social network analysis, and computational models. In particular, we investigate two rural populations of Indian and Kenyan potters who have to decide whether to adopt new, objectively more efficient and economically more attractive, technical/stylistic options. Qualitative field data show that religious sub-communities within the Indian and Kenyan populations exhibit markedly different diffusion rates and speed over the last thirty years. To account for these differences, we first analyze empirically observed kinship networks and advice networks, and, then, we recreate the actual aggregate diffusion curves through a series of empirically calibrated agent-based simulations. Combining the two methods, we show that, while single exposure through heterophilious weak ties were sufficient to initiate the diffusion process, large bridges made of strong ties can in fact lead to faster or slower diffusion depending on the type of signals circulating in the network. We conclude that, even in presence of “complex contagions,” dense local ties cannot be regarded as a sufficient condition for faster diffusion.     

New Indices for the Existing City-Centers Streets Network Reliability and Availability Assessment in Earthquake Emergency

During earthquake emergencies in existing city-centers, streets network permits inhabitants to reach safe areas, and rescuers to access damaged zones and help population. However, the network can suffer from blocks due to debris of collapsed or heavily damaged buildings. Understanding urban fabric modifications and classifying elements vulnerability are fundamental steps while dealing with risk-assessment and risk-reduction strategies. This article offers a first quick approach for assessing seismic vulnerability of paths network by considering interferences with building heritage damages. Quick data about existing urban fabric (e.g., buildings typology; streets and buildings geometries) are combined for developing new vulnerability indices for streets network. The earthquake macroseismic intensity is introduced for evaluating probable street blockages and summarizing the overall rating of risks in critical network locations, thus intensity that is not included in other current quick methods for streets-building interference is here taken into account. Risk-reduction strategies based on the proposed indices could minimize the interventions on architectural heritage, maximizing the safety of evacuees. These new indices could be combined with traditional assessment of buildings vulnerability, and evaluations on pedestrians’ and vehicles evacuation flows, for evaluating management strategies.     

Palestine,Israel, Gaza,and the West Bank: the muddled mental maps of French and Israeli students

ABSTRACT

The Palestinian–Israeli Conflict is perceived by many – observers and parties to the conflict alike – as a struggle of two peoples over the same land. Yet, through this century-long conflict (and more so as Israel has expanded and deepened its occupation), what was once, perhaps, imagined as a single land has become an assortment of territories. These territories bear multiple names and different legal statuses, and their boundaries are often blurred. In light of the jumbled patchwork that Palestine–Israel has become, we examine the ways that the conflict’s territorial dimensions are imagined and represented. We study the mental maps of the region held by higher education students from Israel, both Jewish and Arab-Palestinian, as well as with university students from Montpellier, France. The representations indicate that while the French students were almost completely at a loss regarding the conflict’s spatial dimensions, the students from Israel were also confused, especially regarding the Occupied Palestinian Territories. We argue that these findings stem from a wider process of deterritorialization, linked to the conflicting relations between state and nation and intensified by a policy of chaotic spatial arrangements.     

Decolonial encounters in Ciro Guerra’s El abrazo de la serpiente: indigeneity,coevalness and intercultural dialogue

This article analyses the politics and aesthetics of the depiction of the encounter between the West and the non-West in Ciro Guerra’s film El abrazo de la serpiente, examining how the film deconstructs colonialist imagery and discourses, and engages with the notion and cinematic representation of indigeneity. Through an interdisciplinary approach, the article identifies and discusses the strategies employed in the film to decolonise the category of the ‘Indian’: challenging the colonial linguistic of domination and undermining the tropes of imperialist representations; staging and re-enacting colonial encounters; and subverting the power relations embedded in colonialist ethnography. The article argues that El abrazo de la serpiente acts as an instrument of political and cultural inquiry into the past and the present, and that it both proposes and enacts interculturalidad and intercultural dialogue as a cinematic approach to native culture. While the notion of indigeneity at play is not unproblematic, the film succeeds in foregrounding Indigenous points of view and ‘points of hearing’, challenging a Eurocentric politics of recognition and evolutionary epistemology in favour of a ‘coevalness’ of the native.