Trends in pig product processing at British Neolithic Grooved Ware sites traced through organic residues in potsherds

Gas chromatography (GC), GC-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) and GC-combustion-isotope ratio MS (GC-C-IRMS) analyses of absorbed and surface lipid residues preserved in potsherds were used to explore the extent of pig product processing exploitation in the later British Neolithic Grooved Ware tradition. Assessments were made regarding whether porcine lipids were associated with specific Grooved Ware traits, i.e. decoration, substyle, geographical area and type of site. Two hundred and twenty-two Grooved Ware potsherds were analysed, 70% of which contained lipid concentrations considered significant (>5 μg g⁻¹). All the lipid residues were dominated by animal fats, although plant and beeswax were also detected in a small number of extracts. δ¹³C values of the major fatty acid components of degraded animal fats (C_16:0 and C_18:0) were determined for 126 extracts and used to assign ruminant or porcine origins to the residues; 16% of these were found to have a predominantly porcine isotope signature. Statistical associations with pig exploitation were shown to exist with substyle, geographical area and site type, whereas, no relationship was seen between decoration and the type of commodity processed. Intact triacylglycerols were preserved in 19% of the sherds; half of these had distributions consistent with the identifications based on δ¹³C values, the remainder differed either due to the presence of mixed commodities or because lower molecular weight homologues had been lost due to degradation. In addition to the detection of pig exploitation, results from lipid residue analysis showed a good correlation with faunal assemblages, suggesting that stable isotope analysis may be used as a proxy for animal exploitation at sites where bones have not survived.     

‘Everything is made of atoms’: the reprogramming of space and time in post-war London

From the middle of the Second World War until the early 1950s, architects, planners and designers in Britain made an unprecedented investment in reforming the built environment as a means to ensure a stable and secure post-war society. This essay considers the importance of movement, trajectory and repetition within this reconstruction vision and how the organisation of these things provided a basis for imagining a new form of consensual urban community. The essay begins by exploring how the County of London Plan (Abercrombie and Forshaw, 1943) and the Greater London Plan (Abercrombie, 1945) articulated a set of spatio-temporal logics, based on the prescribed trajectory of the individual embedded within a programme of quotidian repetitions. These logics suggested that urban space could be built to foreclose the possibility of historical conflict. The essay then explores the material design of two post-war exhibitions, Britain Can Make It (1946) and the Festival of Britain's South Bank Exhibition (1951), which offered visitors an experiential taster of what these new urban choreographies would feel like. To end, the essay explores the recurrent figure of the atom within post-war public pedagogy. Within this briefly ubiquitous mechanistic image lay an unacknowledged assurance about how hierarchical structures of movement and repetition sustained the material world, just as these things were being invoked to secure London's position across a range of scales from the local urban neighbourhood to the post-war Commonwealth.     

New ages for the post-Howiesons Poort,late and final Middle Stone Age at Sibudu,South Africa

Optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) measurements are reported for single grains of quartz from deposits within Sibudu rock shelter. Such measurements enable rejection of unrepresentative grains and application of the finite mixture and central age models to obtain the most reliable age estimates. Three types of single-grain equivalent dose (D_e) distributions were observed: one sample represented a single dose population, three samples indicated mixing between Iron Age (IA) and Middle Stone Age (MSA) deposits, and 10 samples (in addition to the three mixed samples) showed scattered distributions. The latter type resulted from differences in the beta dose received by individual grains. For these samples, the beta doses were modelled and adjusted accordingly. Ages for the 14 samples collected from MSA deposits post-dating the Howiesons Poort (HP) resulted in three age clusters, which are stratigraphically consistent with the three informally named cultural phases at Sibudu: namely, the post-HP, late MSA and final MSA. Weighted mean ages of 58.5 ± 1.4 ka, 47.7 ± 1.4 ka and 38.6 ± 1.9 ka were calculated for these phases, respectively. The three phases were separated by two occupational hiatuses with durations of 10.8 ± 1.3 ka and 9.1 ± 3.6 ka. We hypothesise that the punctuated presence of humans at Sibudu was determined by large-scale fluctuations in climate during oxygen isotope stage (OIS) 3, which resulted in alternating wet and dry periods. Phases of occupation correspond to wet periods when fresh water was available in the Tongati River, whereas intervals of site abandonment correspond to dry periods when people were forced to migrate in search of a reliable source of fresh water. Where people migrated to, remains unresolved.     

Dilemmas of Counter‐Mapping Community Resources in Tanzania

Recent work has celebrated the political potential of ‘counter‐mapping’, that is, mapping against dominant power structures, to further seemingly progressive goals. This article briefly reviews the counter‐mapping literature, and compares four counter‐mapping projects from Maasai areas in Tanzania to explore some potential pitfalls in such efforts. The cases, which involve community‐based initiatives led by a church‐based NGO, ecotourism companies, the Tanzanian National Parks Authority, and grassroots pastoralist rights advocacy groups, illustrate the broad range of activities grouped under the heading of counter‐mapping. They also present a series of political dilemmas that are typical of many counter‐mapping efforts: conflicts inherent in conservation efforts involving territorialization, privatization, integration and indigenization; problems associated with the theory and practice of ‘community‐level’ political engagement; the need to combine mapping efforts with broader legal and political strategies; and critical questions involving the agency of ‘external’ actors such as conservation and development donors, the state and private business interests.     

A Falling Out: The Relationship Between Oliver Wendell Holmes and Theodore Roosevelt

Theodore Roosevelt is often credited with founding and shaping the modern American presidency. With his appointment of Oliver Wendell Holmes to the Supreme Court of the United States, Roosevelt also set in motion a force that would transform the judiciary. However, it did not go as Roosevelt had planned. Holmes' refusal to conform to Roosevelt's desires in Northern Securities Co. v. United States demonstrated that Holmes was his own man and not Roosevelt's instrument. The decision brought an abrupt halt to what had been becoming a close friendship between the two men. Over the years the rift deepened. The bitterness that grew between them reflected more than a difference of opinion over law and economic principles; it reflected the type of disillusionment that comes only when a friend fails to live up to expectations.     

Bohemia and economic geography

This paper examines the geography of bohemia and the relationshipsbetween it, human capital, and high-technology industries. Theunderlying hypothesis is that the presence and concentrationof bohemians in an area creates an environment or milieu thatattracts other types of talented or high human capital individuals.The presence of such human capital in turn attracts and generatesinnovative, technology-based industries. To explore these factors,this paper introduces a new measure—the bohemian index—thatdirectly measures the bohemian population at the MSA level.Statistical research examines the relationships between geographicconcentrations of bohemians, human capital, and high-technologyindustry concentration. The findings support this hypothesis.The geography of bohemia is highly concentrated. The resultsindicate positive and significant relationships between thebohemian index and concentrations of high human capital individualsand between the bohemian index and concentrations of high-technologyindustry. The relationship between the bohemian index and high-technologyconcentrations is particularly strong.     

Identifying Subareas That Comprise A Greater Metropolitan Area: The Criterion of County Relative Efficiency

Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) is used to rank the relative efficiency of thirty–two counties comprising the Greater Minneapolis–St. Paul Metropolitan Region and finds that the greatest external economies originate in the urban core and decline toward the periphery. By employing 1993 IMPLAN input–output database and county estimates of final payments (inputs) and final demands (outputs), DEA classifies efficient and inefficient counties that produce maximum output using minimum input, and a sensitivity analysis ranks counties according to robustness of the efficiency classifications. Efficiency differences between three groups identify the metropolitan core, transitional region, and peripheral region. Dominant industries in the three regions are identified and contrasted using location quotients. This study adopts the various analytical techniques into an urban regional systems approach for policy analysis and implementation.