The Archaeology of War: A North American Perspective

This article reviews recent archaeological research on warfare in prestate societies of native North America. This survey comprises six regions: Arctic/Subarctic, Northwest Coast, California, Southwest/Great Basin, Great Plains, and Eastern Woodlands. Two lines of evidence, defensive settlement behavior and injuries in human skeletal remains, figure prominently in archaeological reconstructions of violence and warfare in these regions. Burning of sites and settlements also has been important for identifying the consequences of war and investigating more subtle aspects of strategy and directionality. Weaponry and iconography have to date provided important but more limited insights. Although considerable disparities exist between regions in the archaeological evidence for intra- and intergroup violence, all regions show a marked increase after A.D. 1000. These findings suggest that larger forces may have been responsible for escalating violence throughout North America at this time.     

Class Interests in Brazilian Archaeology

Archaeology is a practice that exists within various social contexts. As such, the way it is practiced is dependent upon the class interests of those who fund and undertake archaeological investigations. These interests in turn can be influenced by existing political regimes. In this article, I discuss how class interests have influenced the direction of Brazilian archaeology for the past century and a half.     

A new temnospondyl amphibian from the Lower Triassic of South America

A new temnospondyl from the Early Triassic Buena Vista Formation (Paraná Basin) in Uruguay is described. The specimen is represented by a skull table fragment which includes the left orbit, and, although fairly incomplete, shows close affinities with the basal temnospondyl clade (Dvinosaurus + Tupilakosauridae). Previously, members of this clade were only known from Upper Permian and Lower Triassic deposits from the Northern Hemisphere. The new specimen described herein together with a recent record from the Lower Triassic of South Africa (Karoo Basin), support the hypothesis of an invasion of members of the basal (Dvinosaurus + Tupilakosauridae) clade into Gondwana as early as the Late Permian.     

Studies on Amerindian dogs, 2: Variation in early peruvian dogs

Remains of dogs have been discovered in Peru for over a hundred years, but relatively little information is available on them. Dating evidence, especially by the radiocarbon method, suggests that the skulls of dogs considered in detail here range from 1030 BC to 1324 AD, with the majority belonging to the past two millennia. Craniometric information is presented on a series of early Peruvian specimens now preserved in Lima and London, representing the majority of material as yet unpublished, and the largest sample so far studied. Additional Peruvian data were also collected from the literature, as well as comparable information on some other Amerindian dog series. It has been possible to indicate that two distinct forms are represented in the Peruvian material.     

生存、适应与融合：牙买加华人社区的形成与发展（1854—1962）

本文对牙买加华人社会的生存和发展进行了历史的概览。作者对有关牙买加华人的外文研究状况进行了评述 ,试图利用至今尚无人利用的牙买加发行的华文报纸对当地华人的历史进行梳理 ,描述了 1 0 0多年来牙买加华人社区的的起源、适应、融合与身份认同变化的过程 ,特别对华人的组织、华人的经济社会活动及其参政态度的变化进行了分析。作者认为 ,华人在牙买加经历了从农业工人到商人的转变 ,他们依靠自己的组织———中华会馆在逆境中谋生存、求发展。一些社团领袖以特有的敏感积极投身于当地的政治活动。华人与当地社会的融合过程在牙买加独立时期已经接近完成。     

美国华侨对保皇会的支持与贡献

戊戌政变后,康梁等保皇领袖曾在全世界华侨社会中建立了庞大的保皇组织,美国华侨社会成为海外保皇势力的中心。美国华侨在组织上和财力上对保皇派做出了重大贡献,保皇党人在开启华侨民智,推动华侨对祖国的关注和认同,进而促进华侨爱国主义思想和民族主义的产生和发展方面发挥了巨大作用。保皇派的活动对华侨政治认同有积极的影响。     

1961年美蒋关于外蒙古联合国代表权问题的争论

20世纪60年代,国际社会支持中国恢复联合国席位的力量日益增加,为了阻止中国进入联合国,美国搬出外蒙古问题,企图通过让外蒙古进入联合国这一“迂回”手法,达到保护国民党席位的目的。在策划该计划的过程中,美蒋发生了激烈争吵。经过数轮讨价还价,美蒋最终达成妥协,从而为外蒙古进入联合国打开了方便之门。     

The fish of Lake Titicaca: implications for archaeology and changing ecology through stable isotope analysis

Research on past human diets in the southern Lake Titicaca Basin has directed us to investigate the carbon and nitrogen stable isotopes of an important dietary element, fish. By completing a range of analyses on modern and archaeological fish remains, we contribute to two related issues regarding the application of stable isotope analysis of archaeological fish remains and in turn their place within human diet. The first issue is the potential carbon and nitrogen isotope values of prehistoric fish (and how these would impact human dietary isotopic data), and the second is the observed changes in the fish isotopes through time. Out of this work we provide quantitative isotope relationships between fish tissues with and without lipid extraction, and a qualitative analysis of the isotopic relationships between fish tissues, allowing archaeologists to understand these relationships and how these values can be applied in future research. We test a mathematical lipid normalization equation to examine whether future researchers will need to perform lipid extraction procedures for Lake Titicaca fish. We also analyze a number of aquatic plants to better understand the range of isotopic signatures of the Lake Titicaca ecosystem. We use these data to better understand prehistoric human diet and the role that fish may have played in the past as well as potential changes in local lake ecology through time.     

Plant processing strategies and their affect upon starch grain survival when rendering Peltandra virginica (L.) Kunth,Araceae edible

There is a long history of human interaction with plants of the Aroideae subfamily (Araceae). Despite these plants' chemical defenses against animal and vegetal predation, humans have targeted their starchy corms, tubers and rhizomes for dietary purposes. In the Eastern Woodlands of North America, early Europeans described the Native population as utilizing the highly acridic Peltandra virginica (arrow arum) for subsistence needs. In order to render this resource edible, however, the acridic principle first needs to be eliminated. Our study investigates the affect these processing activities have on the integrity of arrow arum starch grains. Findings from this study demonstrate that environmental variables specific to individual processing procedures may be more influential on starch grain survival than simply the temperatures reached during cooking.