Good guys or bad? Middle class blacks and the black community

William Alan Muraskin. Middle Class Blacks in a White Society: Prince Hall Freemasonry in America. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975. 318 pp. $14.95.     

Paleoenvironmental reconstruction at Canyon del Muerto,Arizona, based on principal-component analysis

A multivariate statistical technique, principal-component analysis, is used to interpret pollen assemblages from archaeological context in terms of paleoenvironmental information. The pollen samples originate from an archaeological site in northeastern Arizona (Canyon del Muerto) covering the period between AD 700 and AD 1300. Through the use of principal-component analysis the percentage constraint in the pollen counts is removed and the data set effectively reduced to groups of co-varying taxa. Once these groups are ecologically defined as to the environment they represent, their changes of dominance through time can be analysed. This study has shown a correlation between a population expansion in Canyon del Muerto (AD 1050–1150) and the dominance of upland forest types suggesting slightly cooler and/or wetter conditions. The pollen data compare well with the tree-ring indices for this region. Local disturbance is reflected in the record during the period of greatest population. A shift to a shrubland vegetation during the peak construction phase indicates the clearing of cottonwood, fir, spruce and pine (all found within the site) by local inhabitants. Thus, the palynological evidence suggests both cultural and climatic factors are involved in the explanation of pollen deposition.     

On the Dialectics of Differencing: Disabled women,the state and housing issues

In this article, I discuss how neoliberal state policies and practices and processes of negative differencing have contributed to growing economic and housing insecurity for citizens in need, in particular disabled women in need of provincial income assistance in Ontario, Canada. I argue that their increasingly insecure relationships to housing and home can be explained as outcomes of dialectical processes of differencing through neoliberal regimes of state rule. A key advantage of this approach is that it emphasises how growing economic and housing security for more affluent citizens is linked causally to increasing insecurity and misery for others. I begin by discussing how diverse relations to housing and home can be conceptualised as outcomes of dialectical processes of differencing in advanced capitalist societies. Next, I illustrate this approach by discussing how changes in state regulation of housing and income assistance programmes in the province of Ontario have worked to advantage more affluent citizens at the expense of disabled and other citizens in need. This is followed by a detailed analysis of regulatory processes shaping how women receiving provincial income assistance are negatively differenced and situated in relation to housing and home. Here I draw on interviews with women receiving provincial income support through the ODSP (Ontario Disability Support Programme).

Las dialécticas de hacer diferencia: Mujeres discapacitados, el estados y asuntos de vivienda

En éste artículo, discuto como los procesos, practicas y políticas neoliberalistas estatales de la producción negativa de diferencia han contribuido al crecimiento de inseguridad económica y de vivienda para ciudadanos marginalizados, especialmente mujeres discapacitados que requieren asistencia económica provincial in Ontario, Canadá. Argumento que las relaciones cada vez más inseguro a vivienda y hogar para éstas mujeres se pueden explicar como consecuencias de procesos dialécticos de hacer diferencia a través de regimenes neoliberalistas del estado. Una ventaja de ésta enfoque es que enfatiza como la aumentación de seguridad económica y de la vivienda para ciudadanos afluentes está entrelazado con indiferencia al crecimiento de inseguridad y desesperación para otra gente. Empiezo discutiendo como las diversas relaciones a viviendas y hogares se pueden conceptualizar como consecuencias de procesos de hacer diferencia en sociedades capitalistas avanzadas. Luego discuto, ilustrando ésta enfoque, como los cambios de reglas estatales de viviendas y programas de asistencia económica in la provincia de Ontario han ayudado más los ciudadanos afluentes a costa de los ciudadanos discapacitados y en necesidad de ayuda. Ésta discusión se sigue por un análisis detallado de los procesos que determinan como las mujeres que reciben asistencia económica se hacen diferente negativamente y se sitúan in relación a vivienda y hogar. Aquí utilizo entrevistas con mujeres que reciban asistencia provincial económica por el ODSP (Ontario Disability Support Program, Programa de Asistencia para Discapacitados de Ontario).     

Poor,ill, and sometimes abandoned: tubercular children in Buenos Aires, 1880-1920

Ill children with chronic diseases, such as tuberculosis, have faced difficult lives. Poverty proved a factor in their susceptibility to disease, their abandonment, and their treatment. When public health policies in Buenos Aires shifted from ignoring children to viewing them as victims who needed protection, government agencies, charitable organizations, public schools, and hospitals developed special programs that emphasized both prevention and cure of childhood tuberculosis. Argentine physicians and hygienists supported programs that were similar to those in Europe and the United States. Despite efforts, from 1880 to 1920, diagnosis of tuberculosis remained problematic, health professionals failed to prevent tuberculosis in children, and physicians were unable to cure the disease.     

Precarious Lives in the Global South: On Being Disabled in Guyana

Most of what is known about disabled women's and men's lives is based on research conducted in the global North despite the fact that 80% of the world's one billion disabled people live in countries of the global South. This article addresses this gap in our understanding of disabled people's lives by examining impairment and disability as outcomes of processes of social embodiment that unfold in an unequal global capitalist order. Drawing on 87 interviews conducted with disabled women and men in Guyana, the article illustrates how colonial and neo‐colonial relations of power and processes of development give rise to material conditions of life such as extreme poverty and male violence that contribute to impairment and disability. The article concludes by discussing the article's contributions, challenges in developing southern perspectives on impairment and disability, and the need to address socio‐spatial injustices experienced by disabled people in the global South.