Suppressing the Mad Elephant: Missionaries,Lamas, and the Mediation of Sacred Historiographies in the Tibetan Borderlands

The late-nineteenth century was a time of Protestant missionary enthusiasm for the “great closed land” of Tibet. Their prodigious, oftentimes proto-ethnographic, writings continue to provide scholars with archives that document missionary perspectives on Inner Asian society and religion, but few sources have yet emerged that allow for these to be read alongside Tibetan accounts of Christian-Buddhist encounters. This article undertakes such a parallel reading of four accounts of an unsuccessful attempt by the British missionary Cecil Polhill to convert an eastern Tibetan Buddhist abbot, Māyang Pa??ita, in late 1889. Understanding these texts as conflicting sacred historiographies, we note that these Christian and Buddhist writers shared a commitment to writing and to particular modes of emotional, material, and logical mediation as the “correct” path to religious certainty. Differences in genre, however, lead more to mockery and misunderstanding than to each side’s desired transformation of the other..     

Moving peoples,changing diets: isotopic differences highlight migration and subsistence changes in the Upper Mun River Valley,Thailand

The dramatic growth of dietary isotope studies in archaeological literature attests to the significant potential this technique has for shedding light on past societies. Human diet reflects complex, inter-linked factors such as status, cultural preferences or environmental constraints on food production. In this study dietary isotope analysis is used to examine the human skeletal remains from Ban Non Wat, northeast Thailand. The study aims to use isotopic data to give insight into patterns of migration and subsistence strategy during prehistory. Ban Non Wat is the most comprehensively excavated site in the Upper Mun River Valley (UMRV), and understanding of prehistoric society in this area is crucial to answering questions of how social complexity arose in the region. Carbon isotope analysis has highlighted migrant individuals invisible to strontium isotope analysis and shown links between unusual burial practice and differences in diet. Results also indicate that diet changed substantially through time, with more reliance on rice in the Bronze Age, correlated with an increase in social differentiation. There is a move away from reliance on rice agriculture in the Iron Age, a time when oxygen isotopes show that environmental conditions were becoming drier, possibly resulting in rice agriculture becoming less viable.     

Preliminary geochemical assessment of limestone resources and stone use at Maya sites in the Three Rivers Region,Belize

The carbonate bedrock of northwestern Belize is poorly understood from the standpoint of both geochemistry and the use of stone in prehispanic Maya sites for buildings and monuments. The friable nature of the rock in this topographically rugged area makes it especially difficult to distinguish monuments from bedrock spall, as little carving, if any, survives, and identification rests on location and positioning. The research presented here analyzed 63 limestone samples collected from two sites in the Three Rivers Region of Belize. ICP-MS and ICP-AES were used to characterize the major, minor, and trace element chemistry of the limestone bedrock of the region and determine the amount of geochemical variability. Another important objective was attempting to trace the movement of monument stone and determining whether it was imported from outside of the sites. Bedrock, quarries, and possible monuments were all sampled for these purposes. Bedrock proved to be similar across wide areas. However, at Chawak But'o'ob, along the flank of the Rio Bravo, changes downslope in Mg concentration suggest a leaching of the bedrock by meteoric waters based on differences in porosity. At Maax Na, a hilltop site, in contrast, such leaching is not as apparent. Many monuments at both sites were found to be composed of stone similar in chemistry to the local bedrock, including several of the identifiable stelae. However, our analyses also revealed that a few monuments at Maax Na were made of material with a different chemical composition, apparently from stone imported to the site. These results suggest that the Maya deliberately selected certain types of limestone for certain purposes, and may even have traded in non-local rock. Overall, the methods used in this pilot study indicate there is real potential in more intensive, regional assessments of the materials used at archaeological sites, even in areas where the local stone does not have a distinctive geochemical signature.     

Skeletal age at death: an evaluation of the miles method of ageing

The accuracy of Miles' method of ageing individuals within a population, based upon an analysis of the rate of dental wear, was evaluated in a sample of 202 living Lengua Indians from the Chaco area of Paraguay. The preliterate and culturally isolated status of the Lengua provided a useful base for comparison with populations that are likely to be encountered by archaeologists. The independent age estimates from maxillae and mandibles of the same individuals were found to be highly correlated with each other and to the actual ages of those individuals (Spearman rank-correlation test maxillae r_s = 0·58, mandibles r_s = 0·95, medians of populations rank-sum R = 99·5 > 95). No significant differences (P > 0·05) were found between the mean ages of any of the Miles subgroups, as indicated by the t-test for paired comparisons. The present study provides evidence of the reliability of the Miles method of ageing archaeological populations on the basis of occlusal wear. These findings are evaluated in the light of the sources of error inherent in the Miles system of analysis.     

Placing the second generation: A case study of Toronto

We examine the social mobility of the second generation in the Toronto metropolitan area by analyzing whether the adult children of immigrants live in more affluent and desirable neighbourhoods than the first generation. Using 2016 census microdata, we compare the social characteristics of census tracts where immigrants and the second and third-plus (3+) generations concentrate. The index of dissimilarity indicates the degree of residential separation among generations and for five ethno-racial second-generation groups: Chinese, South Asian, Black, Southern European, and Northern and Western European. The empirical findings show that the neighbourhoods where the first generation is over-represented are less affluent than those where the second and 3+ generations concentrate, with the largest improvements in social status occurring between the first and second generations. Although they frequently live in more distant suburban neighbourhoods than the first generation, the second generation still tends to live in inner and outer suburbs more than the exurban 3+ generation. For the second generation, the degree of residential concentration varies across ethno-racial groups with persistent segregation marking the residential locations of racial minorities. The findings highlight the variegated geographies and social mobility of the second generation in Canada's largest metropolitan area.