Very long term history and people's history

Often William Blake and Isaac Newton are positioned as “opposites”: Newton the great systematizer, Blake the visionary artist. (Blake himself, in fact, seemed to have set up this direct opposition.) However, this opposition is perhaps too simple and overlooks the intricacies of each thinker's work. Further, this straightforward “opposition” fails to account for the pressure that scholarship itself, always occurring from a particular subjective position, applies to shape its objects of study; that is, it creates a useful “Newton” and a useful “Blake” with which to work. Here I employ spatial theorist Henri Lefebvre's technique of “critical thirding” (as Edward Soja has called it), or accounting for “an-Other” position in the dialectic of “Blake” and “Newton”. I consider where Blake and Newton were perhaps more similar than has been suggested in the scholarly literature, and, more crucially, how scholarship itself mobilizes (or indeed “creates”) its own, subjectively useful, “Blake” and “Newton” in order to make particular arguments.     

Ithaca transfer

Historiography has never been considered as a source of Veblen's thought. This essay draws on previously unknown archival evidence regarding Veblen's experience at Cornell, where he asked to be enrolled as a Ph.D. student in ‘History and Political Science’ in 1891, to shed light on his relationship with both British and American institutional historiography. It is argued that Veblen's studies at this university, under the influence of local historians, is crucial to understanding his later work, particularly his theory of the leisure class, for two fundamental reasons: (1) Cornell was unique for its tendency to combine the study of history with that of politics and society at a time when historiography tended to emancipate itself from the social sciences; (2) Cornell was one of the main epicentres for the diffusion of British historiography in America. Veblen's theory of the leisure class, to which he devoted his first article at Cornell, is thus presented as the fruit of his effort to reassess the historiographical idea of evolution, against its applications by philosophers, by insisting on the importance of path-dependent mentalities and by differentiating the evolutionary pattern followed by political and social institutions, on the one hand, from economic institutions on the other.     

Disorienting Rhythms: Gypsyness, “Authenticity” and Place on the Greek–Albanian Border

Against a located background—a focus that highlights the significance of place in the constitution of Gypsy identifications and runs counter to most of the assumptions shared by recent studies on Gypsies—the article tries to explore the tensions, ambiguities and contradictions generated by the involvement of the Gypsy musicians of Parakalamos, a village on the Greek–Albanian border, in issues concerning “tradition” and “authenticity”. More specifically, the article considers how Gypsy music playing practices initially allowed Gypsy practitioners to be included in the nation‐state project in a somewhat “dishevelled” form as local musicians; however, in the face of recent shifts in politics, culture and representation in Greece concerning multiculturalism and “cultural heritage”, Gypsy musicians find themselves in the position of being recognised as “musical outsiders” that should by implication adhere to their distinct musical tradition. In this respect, although it has hardly been admitted, such a move runs counter to what constitutes the core of Gypsy musicianship: their locatedness. The article argues that within such “identitying” practices lurks an occlusion of the ways Parakalamos Gypsyness has been, and continues to be, dependent on place and music, and not on a separate, distinct and self contained Gypsy identity, thereby casting doubts on assumptions about what constitutes identity as such.     

Above and Beyond: Zomia and the Ethnographic Challenge of/for Regional History

James Scott’s notion of Zomia proposes a new look at historical and social dynamics in a vast area of the Asian hinterlands, in terms of deliberate state‐avoidance that came to an end through the nation state’s superior techniques of control. Zomia is a concept metaphor that defines the social reality it purportedly only describes. My examination points to a pervasive problem with the historicization of highland regions in Europe as much as in Asia. Juxtaposing Scott’s case with two other definitions of Zomia, I call attention to the way concept metaphors define social landscapes and historical dynamics. Drawing on the work of several Europeanists, I suggest a model of rural–urban relations that does not privilege either a community or the state as the principle of society and history, which may overcome the separate disciplinary biases of anthropology, history and political science.     

(虎斤)簋考

(虎斤)簋是一件册命类型的铭文,作器者(虎斤)、师■及(虎斤)的父亲欨父,都是首次出现的人物,所赐的"銮■"也是前所未见的一种旗帜,对于研究西周史增添了不少新资料,特别是铭文的纪年,年、月、日、月相四要素俱全,这对于西周青铜器断代研究也有一定的意义。     

宿国地望及相关问题探析

本文从历代宿国地望诸说存在的诸多问题出发,结合晋侯苏钟铭文所见新线索,对宿国地望变迁及所反映的历史问题进行细致探析,指出周代曾存在南、北两宿并立的事实,其中《左传》僖公二十一年所载为北宿,故地在今山东东平东二十里之宿城镇;晋侯苏钟铭所见"宿夷"及春秋初年参与宋国会盟、后为宋人逼迁至宋境的为南宿,故地在今安徽宿州市附近。     

元代靳德茂墓地出土彩绘陶器的科学研究

本研究以焦作中站区靳德茂墓出土的彩绘陶器为研究对象,采用X射线衍射仪(XRD)、X射线荧光光谱仪(XRF)、激光拉曼光谱仪(RM)和偏光显微镜(PLM)对彩绘陶器、表面颜料、彩绘层次结构进行了分析研究,并用热膨胀仪对陶器的烧成温度、密度等物理性能指标进行测试,这些为文物保护修复工作提供了基础。     

再论日本出土的景初四年铭三角缘盘龙镜

据《三国志·魏书》记载,魏明帝死于景初三年,少帝继位后,仍称当年为景初三年,但次年则改称正始元年。"景初四年"的年号实际上并不存在。日本出土的三角缘盘龙镜为东渡的中国工匠在日本制作,因不能及时得知中国魏朝皇帝改年号之事,所以在铜镜的铭文中使用了"景初四年"的年号。     

辽宁朝阳市金代纪年墓葬的发掘

1998年9月中旬,北方航空公司朝阳飞行大队在基建施工过程中,发现一座古墓葬。施工人员揭开墓顶封石进入墓室,并取出了三件随葬品。朝阳市博物馆(现朝阳博物馆)闻讯后派人到现场调查,追回被取出的器物,并对该墓葬进行了抢救性发掘,编     

Oliver O'Donovan,The Ways of Judgment

Abstract

Investigating how Christians best understand their political role on the receiving side of political authority, the essay revisits the older "citizens versus subject" debate and presents exegetical, doctrinal and historical considerations that suggest keep this tension alive instead of seeking to dissolve it on either side. The author argues that the peculiar interweaving of "citizen" and "subject" traditions characterizes the Christian attitude towards political authority from the outset. This is demonstrated by a fresh reading of Romans 13 in which the arguably "conservative" origin of Christian political thought is shown to bear clear, albeit often overlooked, marks of a genuine "citizen" ethics. Extemporising on Luther's commentary on Romans 13, the essay demonstrates how the idea of a Christian as "subject-as-citizen" is rooted in a theological refusal to compartmentalize the human existence into separate spheres of authority As "embodied soul" the Christian responds to political authority in a way that engages the human being in all its faculties, simultaneously free and bound. The essay concludes by suggesting that the crucial shift in the more recent history of political thought can be explained more readily as a shift from this theologically motivated duality towards a monochrome political voluntarism that insisted a citizen's submission to political rule could be conceived as essentially submission to one's own will.