Beyond identifying elites: Feasting as a means to understand early Middle Formative society on the Pacific Coast of Mexico

Feasts provide a public forum where social statuses can be affirmed or challenged among pre-state societies. Documenting feasting behavior thus provides insight into the construction of prehistoric political power. This paper presents expected material patterns of feasting by focusing on intra-site variability in food preparation, presentation, and consumption. Expectations are evaluated by comparing ceramic, ground stone, obsidian, and faunal data recovered from Conchas phase (900–800 BCE) elite and village midden deposits at Cuauhtémoc in the Soconusco region of southern Mexico. I argue that elite feasting at Cuauhtémoc created political cohesion between elite and non-elite segments of society during the Conchas phase as a new polity emerged that was more socially stratified and politically hierarchical than anything previously known in the region.     

Platform cache encampments: Implications for mobility strategies and the earliest ancestral Apaches

Abstract

The Hormiguero site is a large mountainside Apache residential site in the Peloncillo Mountains of southern Arizona that lies in the heart of historically documented Chiricahua Apache territory. It represents an encampment at an important caching location, a category of residential site that has not been previously described archaeologically. Ethnographic data are enlisted to understand this unique type of Apache residential site and a previously unknown cache form—the platform cache. Archaeological evidence is combined from a number of sites with caches like those at Hormiguero to interpret aspects of cultural identity and chronology including the presence of ancestral Apaches in southern Arizona as early as the 14th century a.d.     

Adaptation and foraging from the Terminal Pleistocene to the Early Holocene: Excavation at Bubog on Ilin Island,Philippines

Abstract

The recently discovered human remains from Callao Cave, northern Luzon, Philippines securely date the migration of hominins into the Philippines to ca. 70 kya (thousands of years ago). The direct route to reach Luzon from the Asian mainland is via Borneo, Palawan, through Mindoro and into Luzon. Our research focuses on Mindoro Island as a potential stepping stone to the main Philippine Archipelago. While Palawan and Luzon have produced evidence for early human occupation, no systematic research on the prehistory of Mindoro has been conducted until now. We report on recent archaeological investigations at the Bubog rockshelter sites on the small island of Ilin just off the coast of Mindoro. The excavations produced evidence of stratified sequences of human habitation at the two rockshelter sites in the form of dense shell middens that date to ca. 11 kya onwards. They provide direct evidence on how variability in landscape formation, sea levels, and landmass during the terminal Pleistocene and early Holocene influenced the behavior of early human populations. Numerous species of molluscs were recorded and provisional results indicate variations in the invertebrate faunas throughout the stratigraphic sequences, resulting from sea level rise and the establishment of coral reefs between Ilin and Mindoro at the end of the Pleistocene. Our results contribute substantially to our understanding of the processes of human island adaptation, complement ongoing research into Island Southeast Asia’s paleogeography, and enhance current knowledge of prehistoric subsistence strategies across the region.     

Difficulties and Strategies in the Teaching of CET-3 English Writing for Vocational Colleges

CET-3 (College English Test Band 3) in Zhejiang Province adds English writing part to the new syllabus and therefore to develop strong English writing skills in vocational colleges students becomes one of the important tasks of vocational colleges in English teaching.This paper analyzes the difficulties in the teaching of CET-3 English writing at vocational colleges and proposes teaching strategies to improve students’ level of English writing.     

Wari’s imperial influence on local Nasca diet: The stable isotope evidence

The highland Wari Empire established a presence within the Nasca region of south coastal Peru during the Middle Horizon period. To clarify the nature of this interaction, we analyzed stable carbon and nitrogen isotope ratios of human bone collagen from individuals living in the Southern Nasca Region (SNR) before (1–750 AD) and during (750–1000 AD) imperial influence. The stable isotope data do not indicate that the Wari Empire transformed maize agricultural labor in the Las Trancas Valley of the SNR. In fact, during both time periods, Nasca people had access to a wide range of food items.     

Measuring prehistoric mobility strategies based on obsidian geochemical and technological signatures in the Owens Valley,California

We compare the organization of obsidian flaked stone technologies in two different time periods at CA-INY-30, a village site in southern Owens Valley, eastern California. Previous archaeological studies suggest a reorganization in settlement patterns between the Newberry (ca. 3500–1500 BP) and Marana (ca. 650-contact) periods, from a highly mobile to a more residentially sedentary one. New geochemical data, based on laser ablation-inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS) analyses of obsidian artifacts associated with discrete house floors, support this basic settlement model, but reveal new detail in how people moved across the landscape and accessed, extracted, reduced and used obsidian resources. In the earlier Newberry period, there is no relationship between flake size and distance-to-source, and the falloff curve relating frequency of obsidian against distance is more gradual, as expected, but contrary to our expectations, source diversity is not higher. These factors suggest extremely high mobility, but also selective extraction of particular sources. Newberry obsidian may have been acquired by groups of hunters who embedded quarrying within long-distance trips to distant hunting grounds, and subsequently transported bifacial cores to base camps. By contrast, Marana patterns show strong relationships between flake size and distance from source and steeper fall-off curves, suggesting groups acquired their obsidian primarily from closer sources, likely via exchange networks. At the same time, geochemical diversity, especially among smaller resharpening flakes, is higher in the Marana period, highlighting the wide-ranging conveyance systems through which obsidian moved.     

Political economic reorganization among non-state societies: A case study using Middle Holocene mortuary data from the Cis-Baikal,Russia

The extraordinary record of prehistoric funeral activities in Russia’s Cis-Baikal region provides an opportunity to study changes in political strategies that boreal forest hunter–gatherers employed at these events in the Middle Holocene. I use published data on burial treatments (quantities of grave goods, presence of exotic materials, burial layouts) from 10 Late Neolithic (henceforth referred to as “LN,” 4000–3000 BC) and 11 Early Bronze Age (“EBA,” 3000–2000 BC) cemeteries to explore important and previously undetected shifts in the ways that funerals during these periods articulated with political life. LN groups used funerals to emphasize affiliation with corporate institutions, while EBA funeral participants employed political strategies focused on displaying wealth. Current evidence indicates that groups on the western peripheries of the Cis-Baikal started employing semi-nomadic pastoral subsistence practices at the time of the LN-EBA transition, and I suggest that these groups presented new opportunities for Cis-Baikal inhabitants. Interactions with mobile, food-producing groups may have indirectly stimulated indigenous populations to redefine funeral gatherings as venues appropriate for cultivating long-distance economic and political support through competitive displays of wealth.     

改革开放以来中国县级以上政区名称变更及其问题探讨

自1978年始,为了发挥中心城市带动周围农村的作用,国家行政体制作出了重要改革,实行市领导县体制。随之各级行政区的数量、名称和范围发生了较大的变化。本文以1978-2007年国家民政部统计数字为准,对改革开放30年来,中国县级以上行政区域名称的变更进行了统计分析与研究,揭示了政区通名和专名的变更特点及影响因素,指出更名中存在的主要问题,最后提出县级以上行政区域名称的变更的对策和建议。     

我国区域发展战略的回顾、评价与启示

建国以来,我国区域发展战略经历了均衡发展、非均衡发展和协调发展三个阶段。区域发展战略的演变呈显出主体多元化、内容多维度化、机制市场化和战略空间细化的趋势。与此同时,现行区域发展战略存在若干不足,有追求政策优惠忽视制度创新的倾向,区域发展战略之间缺乏宏观整体性衔接,阻碍区域协调发展的瓶颈远未取得突破,区域发展战略仍过于强调效率目标,对不发达地区关注不足。因而,未来区域发展战略的制定,不应追求数量,要注重是否真正有利于实现区域的改革创新;亟需制定一个全局性区域连接发展规划,或者以整合发展的理念对现有的区域发展战略规划进行统筹管理;中央应制定和出台针对性的法律法规保障要素的自由流动和区际自由公平贸易;国家级区域发展战略的地区选择应更注重公平目标。     

台资企业台籍人员职业倦怠、休闲调适策略与休闲知觉自由关系之研究

本文以广州市台资企业台籍人员为例,通过实证研究探讨职业倦怠、休闲调适策略与休闲知觉自由三者间的关系及不同产业型态受试者程度表现的差异性。研究主要结果表明,职业倦怠与休闲知觉自由呈显著负相关;职业倦怠与休闲调适策略呈显著正相关;休闲调适策略除与休闲知觉自由呈显著正相关外,同时对职业倦怠与休闲知觉自由的影响关系具有显著的中介调节效果。此外,技术制度企业群聚区台籍人员的职业倦怠与休闲调适程度相对低于传统劳力企业群聚区台籍人员,而在休闲知觉自由程度方面则相对高于传统劳力企业群聚区台籍人员。研究成果对于台资企业健全台籍人员工作与休闲生活管理机制具有一定的参考价值。