The Australian National University—Vanuatu Cultural Centre Archaeology Project, 1994–97: Aims and Results

Despite an intensive period of research in Vanuatu during the 1960s and 1970s, a number of basic questions regarding the archaeology of the islands remained largely unanswered. The Australian National University—Vanuatu Cultural Centre Archaeological Project began in 1994, and was established in an attempt to address some of these questions. Research has been carried out on the islands of Malakula, Efate and Erromango, and has concentrated on establishing cultural sequences for the different islands. The evidence collected thus far overwhelmingly indicates that the islands were initially colonised some 3000 years ago by Lapita settlers. Dentate-stamped Lapita ceramics arrived with the initial colonisers and the ceramic traditions that followed evolved from the Lapita tradition. A more technical report on the 1994–97 work has recently been published (Bedford et al. 1998) and includes full reporting of radiocarbon dates on which the chronologies presented here are based. The project has also included intensive archaeological field-training of Cultural Centre staff and fieldworkers. This has proved invaluable where fieldworkers are able to heighten local awareness and understanding of archaeological remains.     

Consumption Strategies and Social Implications in Two Danish Towns in the 13th–16th Centuries

THIS ARTICLE PRESENTS a new contextual model to study the social implications of consumption strategies in an archaeological context. The model can be used to establish a baseline of consumption, against which other consumption strategies can be measured. By analysing and comparing finds from two different urban locations in medieval Denmark, we examine how these urban environments facilitated different consumption strategies, and how these strategies changed over time. We also discuss how the archaeological record can contribute to analysing the negotiation of social identities through consumption patterns and consumer choices as reflected in artefact assemblages. The analysis demonstrates that consumption strategies depend on and are related to the characteristics and social complexity of the town in terms of demographics and networks.     

1. CONSTRUCTING A SELECTIONIST PARADIGM

In his latest contribution to the application of Darwinian evolutionary thinking to the social sciences, W. G. Runciman conceives of human behavior as resulting from three levels of selection—biological, cultural, and social. These give rise, respectively, to evoked, acquired, and imposed patterns of behavior. The biological level is hardly controversial, but to draw a distinction between separate cultural and social selective processes is more problematic. Runciman takes memes to be the variants competitively selected at the cultural level and the practices constituting rule‐governed roles to be the variants competitively selected at the social level—thus preserving separate spheres of research for anthropology and sociology. It is not clear, however, what drives cultural and social evolution. Nor are the three levels theoretically well integrated. The book's strength lies in the numerous examples provided of how the application of selectionist theory illuminates and enriches sociological and historical explanations and contributes to the construction of historical narrative.     

Housing Regeneration and the Private Finance Initiative in England: Unstitching the Neoliberal Urban Straitjacket

Abstract: This paper responds to recent debates in human geography about ideal‐type versus contingent neoliberalism, or what Gibson‐Graham conceptualises as “strong” vs “weak” theory, by offering some reflections from an in‐depth study of the private finance initiative (PFI) in England. It first introduces the history and purpose of the PFI as the Labour government's flagship public–private partnership (PPP) approach to public infrastructure modernisation. It then critically analyses its use in inner‐city regeneration through a case study of a PFI housing scheme in the northern English city of Leeds. The paper argues that, when seen through the lens of “strong theory”, a PFI appears to be a consciously designed “neoliberal straitjacket” intended to lock‐in gentrification‐based regeneration at the neighbourhood level, guarantee long‐term profits to (finance) capital, and create powerful privatising and marketising pressures across the local public sphere. However, it is equally possible to construct a preliminary “weak theory” of the PFI that unhides its inherent contradictions and shows how everyday activism by local community actors can successfully influence and contest how neoliberalism is rolled out on the ground.     

On the Life and Death of Earl GodwineGodwine During the Reign of Harold the First and Harthacnut

This report reviews and updates the evidence from the Roman temple site of Pagans Hill, Chew Stoke, North Somerset, which was partly excavated between 1949 and 1953. This includes a revised terminus post quem for the initial building of the temple complex of c. A.D. 262 and an emphasis of the importance of the location of the well on the axis of a planned layout. This is accompanied by a resumé of a reassessment by George Boon of the sculpture of the torso of a dog found in the well in 1951; this was formerly dated to the sixteenth century, but is now redated to the Roman period, and assigned to a group of temple sculpture. This has also stimulated discussion about the dedication of the temple, possibly to Apollo Cunomaglus. There is also a new review by Professor Vera Evison of the Anglo-Saxon glass jar from the temple well and other comparable vessels.

A further excavation in 1986 clarified certain ambiguous points in the earlier work, and added some new data, notably of prehistoric (Neolithic/Early Bronze Age and? Iron Age) use of the site, and of the construction of the Roman well. Finds reports include details of a collection of flints, prehistoric pottery, and industrial refuse; a review of the consolidated coin evidence, the first assessment of any faunal remains from the site and details of objects found by metal-detecting, the latter including a note on a rare coin of Edward the Confessor.