New maps

Yu KUNG, the earliest geographical work, is Chinese ; modern geography in China may be considered to have begun after the Revolution of 1911. The progress of geography during the following twenty years was reviewed by Professor Chi‐Yun Chang in the Journal of the Geographical Society of China (1935, 1936). The present survey¹ of Chinese contributions to geography since 1935 is, roughly, a sequel, though the approach is not quite the same. For convenience, the paper is divided into two parts : the first, accompanied by 48 references, dealing with physical aspects, and the second, referring to 53 publications, with human aspects. A much longer paper, in Chinese, with the same title has been contributed by the author to the above‐mentioned periodical. Assistance by C. Y. Wu, H. C. Kuo, and G. C. Dunn is gratefully acknowledged.     

Monumentality in Urban Design: The Case of Russia

A prominent American urban geographer and observer of the Russian urban scene provides an overview of grand planning and monumental urban design in Russia and the former Soviet Union through the lens of four themes outlined in a previous paper by Larry Ford (2008). In the process, he adds two more themes relevant to Russia and the former USSR: town building and architecture intended to define and legitimize state power, and the shaping or remodeling of society to reflect a regime's ideology. Noting the obstacles in the West to getting large urban projects planned, accepted, and completed, he argues that monumental urban landscapes appear to demand some degree of sustained, centralized, authoritarian leadership. The latter has been present in Russia and the USSR during much of the past millennium, including the present, but the emergence of new commercial/corporate forces in urban land development also bears scrutiny in studies of the processes promoting urban monumentality. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: O18, R14, R52. 10 figures, 44 references.     

Commercial Liberties and Nuclear Anxieties: The US-German Feud over Brazil, 1975–7

In June 1975, Helmut Schmidt's government in West Germany sanctioned the sale of a complete nuclear fuel cycle to Brazil, including uranium enrichment and reprocessing technology. US observers in Congress, government, and the media reacted with alarm to this apparent setback to global non-proliferation efforts as spearheaded by the Nuclear Suppliers Group. Using material from US, British, and German archives, this article examines how structural disparities in the US-German relationship augmented mutual suspicions and led both parties to behave uncooperatively.

Focused narrowly on commercial rivalry with the US, politicians and industry representatives in Bonn brushed aside the concerns of non-proliferation experts, who had a weak institutional base. Jimmy Carter came to office in 1977 determined to block the consummation of the Brazil deal; he also pressed the G-7 to discontinue nuclear fuel reprocessing. Carter's abrupt unilateralism offended US allies, but together the US and France put pressure on West Germany to renounce sensitive nuclear exports. Schmidt grudgingly agreed to show more caution, but few lessons were learned; many Germans came away feeling that US-led export restrictions were overbearing, hypocritical and self-serving. While cooperative within NATO and European frameworks, West Germans remained ambivalent on global problems of proliferation until the 1990s.     

The Machines of War: Western Military Technology 1850–2000

From the standpoint of military technology, the 20th century divides between two eras. The first half of the century saw the culmination of the mechanization of armed forces that had begun midway through the previous century. During most of this period, European innovations dictated the pace and direction of change. World War II changed all that. Europeans became followers of military change driven by the arms race between the USA and the Soviet Union. Two innovations, both largely products of World War II, dominated the second half of the century but proceeded with surprisingly little interaction. One was the elaboration of nuclear arsenals and their delivery systems. The other was the radical reconstruction of conventional warfare through applied electronics, especially from the 1960s onward.     

On Classic Maya political economies

Lowland Maya political economies are cosmopolitical economies, with “authoritative resources”—knowledge (“symbolic capital”), especially astro-calendrical knowledge, and ostensible control of time—evolving as the basis for Classic wealth, power, and dynastic legitimacy. Within a system of rotating geopolitical capitals, elite economic activities of production, consumption, and distribution were directed toward control of luxury goods and ritual performances emphasizing privileged interactions with the cosmos and ancestors. Examples include a “ritual mode of production” focused in a palace economy, consumption manifest in lavish public rituals and feasting, and goods circulating through tribute and periodic markets. In the dispersed lowland Maya settlement system, this decentralized economy retained some features more characteristic of stateless societies.     

Soil fertility and slope processes in the Western Cumberland Escarpment of Kentucky: influences on the development of horticulture in the Eastern Woodlands

The archaeological record of dry rockshelters in the Red River Valley of eastern Kentucky contains botanical remains of several weedy annual seed-bearing plants that point to the independent development of agriculture during the Late Archaic and Early Woodland Period. The objective of this study is to gather quantitative data through the chemical and physical analysis of soils collected within a valley transect to gain insights into landscape processes and soil fertility that may have played a role in the early development of plant domestication and the location of garden plots in relation to rock shelter sites in the upper Cumberland Plateau region of eastern Kentucky. Soils on upland benches formed in limestones have soil fertility values that are comparable to fertile floodplain soils. Upslope outcrops of calcareous bedrock are contributing basic cations to these bench soils. Additionally, in comparison to other landscape positions these upland soils have high levels of organic carbon, available P and greater C:N ratios. Soil morphology, radiocarbon dates, and archaeological evidence indicate that many of the numerous earthflows and debris flows within the region are Early to Middle Holocene in age. These slides were likely generated by Mid-Holocene climatic shifts in which the frequency and intensity of summer precipitation increased across the southeastern United States. These slope failures may have contributed to the development of plant domestication by creating forest canopy gaps and disturbed soils in which weedy plants thrived.     

Using plant microfossils from dental calculus to recover human diet: a case study from Tell al-Raqā'i,Syria

Dietary reconstructions based on plant microfossils, such as starch grains and phytoliths, have been useful in increasing our understanding of past human populations. Microfossils have been recovered from sediments, stone tools, and, more recently, dental calculus. Methods for recovering microfossils from dental calculus have yet to be firmly established and there is some question about potential damage to the teeth. Using a sample of teeth from the middle Holocene site of Tell al-Raqā'i, Syria, we tested using a dental pick to sample the calculus. ESEM images taken before and after sampling show no damage to the enamel surface, and examination of the recovered microfossils show that this method provides ample material for study, even when not all of the calculus is removed from the tooth. Preliminary identification of the plant microfossils suggests that these individuals were consuming a variety of plant foods, but that domesticated cereals such as wheat and barley made up a surprisingly small portion of their diet.     

南朝刘宋免官制度初探

免官是刘宋政权处罚罪吏的一种常用手段。刘宋政权在政治运作中广泛采用免官手段处罚直接威胁封建专制政权的犯罪、职务犯罪、军事犯罪、妨害社会管理秩序的犯罪、违礼犯罪等,且犹以惩罚直接威胁封建专制政权的犯罪和职务犯罪两大类为主。刘宋皇帝控制了免官起复权,但刘宋时期对罪吏免官后再叙的期限是没有严格规定的。刘宋免官制度对于强化皇权、整饬吏治、提高行政效率有着积极作用。     

The Abeng’s Call: The Articulation of Place and the International in Black Power Print Production

This article engages with radical Black Power print production in order to examine the articulation of Black practices of place-making and Black internationalist spatial politics. These spatial politics and practices are developed through engagement with the Jamaican Black Power newspaper Abeng which was produced at the height of Black Power activity on the island in 1969. The paper draws on Black Geographies scholarship to demonstrate that Abeng represented a material and discursive means through which subaltern practices and places of resistance in Jamaica were enacted in opposition to and excess of plantation spatialities and regimes on the island. The carving out of such subaltern places allowed for the articulation of transnational imaginaries and translocal solidarities with similarly aligned communities and struggles across the diasporic world. The Abeng newspaper was again central in crafting these imagined Black internationalist geographies and coeval praxes of transnational solidarity.