Scientific Discourse and Local Discourses: The Case of African Archaeology

To the extent that knowledge is the product of a complex construction of Nature-Culture facts more or less perpetuated, the challenge, for archaeology as science discovering and explaining the pasts for developees, is to learn how to manage: (1) its scientific “facts” more or less stabilized or hardened in function of precise, reproducible, universal “buildings of facts,” these facts being combined in networks and allied to specific societal facts, according to a dichotomy between Nature and Culture positioned as incommunicable poles of the world, and (2) traditional, ordinary, daily “facts,” local, contextual“facts” encountered during our activities, publications, lectures, and exchanges with everybody. These facts link approximately or unconsciously Nature and Culture, two poles we moderns have created and separated ontologically. How to produce a legitimate cooperation between these two conflicting discourses during the applications and the improvement of the processes which form, even in the case of archaeology, what is currently termed “development.”Pour l’archéologie en tant que science découvrant et expliquant les passés des peuples en voie de développement, le savoir étant le produit, selon les cultures, de fabrications complexes de faits de Nature-Culture plus ou moins pérennisés, le défi consiste à apprendre à gérer ensemble: (1) ses “faits” scientifiques, plus ou moins stabilisés ou durcis selon des “mises en fait” précises, répétables, universelles, ces faits étant établis en réseau et alliés à tel ou tel secteur de la société en question selon une dichotomie établissant la Nature et la Culture comme pôles incommunicants du monde; et (2) les “faits” de savoirs traditionnels, ordinaires, quotidiens, faits locaux, contextuels rencontrés durant nos activités, publications, cours et échanges avec tout le monde. Ces faits lient approximativement ou inconsciemment la Nature et la Culture, ces deux pôles que nous, modernes, avons créés et ontologiquement séparés. Comment légitimement, même en Archéologie, faire collaborer ces deux discours, en conflit lors des applications et améliorations des processus relevant de qu’on appelle couramment le Développement?     

Pension Exclusion in Grey Capitalism: Mapping the Pensions Gap in Britain

The switch in Britain's pension policy towards private funded schemes and a liberal style of state regulation have exposed variations in individuals' ability and willingness to undertake pensions saving. This paper focuses on the patterns of exclusion and the geographies of pension consumption created by this reform. It argues that there are new patterns of pension provision which have important but neglected spatial dimensions. First, it shows that widening inequality among current pensioners involves a North-South divide in income and benefit take-up. Second, private second tier pension coverage, especially the take-up of personal policies, is found to be lower in areas with lower levels of income among existing pensioners. The paper considers whether the Government's new stakeholder pensions are likely to be able to fill this pensions gap.     

陕西文化区划及其机制分析

本文以总结陕西文化区域差异为目的,从形式文化区的角度将陕西全省划分为三个文化区和八个文化亚区。在全面分析了陕西文化区形成的历史、人文过程后,笔者认为自然环境、经济发展水平与土地利用方式、政区、交通条件和移民等是陕西文化区形成的主要机制。     

会展旅游发展研究

会展旅游在区域和城市经济发展中具有重要作用,它是区域和城市经济发展的助推器,区域和城市形象的塑造器与显示器,区域和城市相关产业的辐射器,区域和城市就业人员的接收器等。但它的健康发展需要一定的条件,包括优越的地理位置、便利的交通条件、发达的区域和城市经济、良好的会展设施、政府的支持和正确引导等。对其开发和管理要从条件分析、软硬件建设、人才培养、名牌培育、管理机构的建立、宣传促销等方面入手。     

铁路枢纽客运构成与旅游关系的初步研究——铁道部上海客运站旅客调查问卷分析

本文以上海站为案例,采用问卷调查的方法,着重探讨了铁路车站客运构成与开发旅游功能的关系,涉及旅客职业、收入、性别、年龄和住地等背景,以及旅客对车站吃、住、行、购、娱、游等游憩活动的直观体验评价;进而提出旅游服务思想和车站多功能的综合开发相结合,是社会经济发展的一种必然趋势,也将是今后提高车站窗口作用的重要途径。     

Economic fears of mass migration from southern Italy in early twentieth century America

ABSTRACT

Economic fears in the early twentieth century America about Italian immigration united trade unions and white collar workers and were motivated by reasons that ranged from the belief that migrants were disrupting the labour market and were temporary opportunist earners, unwilling to integrate and living in isolated communities, to the idea that southern Italians did not offer sufficient human capital: they were mainly illiterate, and had high dropout rates in schools, and were widely believed to have children with mental disabilities. These American fears were wildly overstated, however. First, Southern Italian migrants had to undergo a two-stage positive selection for literacy, while, secondly only 28.4 per cent of the massive incoming flow of Italians decided to stay; most Italian immigrants chose to return to their country of origin and the minority who remained did not delay long to join in the American melting pot.     

The European Alps – an exceptional range of mountains? Braudel’s argument put to the test

In his classic work about the Mediterranean in the period of Philipp II, French historian Fernand Braudel designates the European Alps an ‘exceptional range of mountains’ and offers several reasons therefor. In contrast to other parts of Braudel’s work, this argument has gone largely unnoticed in scholarship. This article intends to put it to the test in light of recent publications on the Alps. The first two sections give an outline of Braudel’s dealings with mountain regions and of historical research on the Alps from the 1970s onwards. The third section comments on the suitability of Braudel’s criteria for empirical assessments in a comparative perspective. In the conclusions it is argued that Braudel’s general intuition is still valid to some degree. It is less certain, however, that all the criteria are pertinent. More importantly, the findings emphasize the fact that the history of the Alps cannot be studied without paying close attention to their links with the surrounding lowlands. Thus the question of alpine exceptionality raises the question of the special trajectory of these lowland regions within the larger history of Europe.     

Mapping an invisible population: the uneven geography of second-home tourism

Second-home tourism is a very popular form of tourism in many countries, particularly in the Nordic countries. More than half of the Swedish population have access to second homes. Previous studies have revealed that there is great variation between different second homes. Examples range from rustic Australian shacks, lonely cabins in the Norwegian mountains, spacious Swedish archipelago villas and palatial Russian dachas. Still, second homes are often seen and analysed as a unitary category – a perspective that obscures the considerable heterogeneity within the category as well as spatial differences in the impact of second-home tourism. Using a second-home typology from previous research and data on about 660,000 second homes, we analyse the heterogeneity of second homes by mapping the composition of the Swedish second-home stock. Results show the uneven geography of second-home tourism, revealing significant and sometimes steep differences between peripheral areas and urban hinterlands, tourism hot-spots, and areas in decline. Based on these results, we assert that there is good cause to move away from using second homes as a unitary category. Instead, we argue for viewing second homes as an umbrella concept with dwelling use in focus. This enables a greater sensibility to place and more accurate analyses of the uneven impacts of second-home tourism. The results also give greater insights into the impact of the ‘invisible population’ of second-home owners from a public planning perspective.     

What drives the spatial wage premium in formal and informal labor markets? The case of Ecuador

This article investigates the incidence of agglomeration externalities in Ecuador, a small-sized, middle-income developing country. In particular, we analyze the role of the informal sector within these relations, since informal employment accounts for a significant part of total employment in the developing countries. Using individual level data and instrumental variable techniques, we investigate the impact of spatial externalities, in terms of population density, local specialization and urban size, on the wages of workers in Ecuadorian cities. The results show that spatial externalities matter also for a small developing country. Moreover, analysis of the interaction between spatial externalities and informality shows that, on average, workers employed in the informal sector do not enjoy significant benefits from agglomeration externalities. Finally, by investigating the possible channels behind spatial agglomeration gains we show that the advantages from agglomeration for formal sector workers may well be accounted for by better job-quality matches and, to a lesser extent, by learning externalities. For informal sector workers, our findings also suggest possible gains from job changes, which offset a penalty for remaining employed in the same occupation.     

《中国行政区划通史·隋代卷》河南政区商榷三则

《中国行政区划通史·隋代卷》中的河南三地有值得商榷之处。隋代洛州堙阳县曾经移治,郑州内牟、圃田、郏城三县因移治而关系复杂,陕州阌乡、湖城县的合并也伴随着移治现象。