Hunter-gatherer burials and the creation of persistent places in southeastern Australia

One of the difficulties in interpreting hunter-gatherer mortuary practices is that many mortuary theories are derived from sedentary societies and rely upon an excavated record. This paper is an analysis of both historical and archaeological evidence of Aboriginal burial practices in the Murray River region of southeastern Australia. The archaeological data relies primarily upon analysis of burials exposed through erosion rather than systematic excavations which limits the range of burial characteristics that may be recorded and interpreted. The mortuary practices identified are highly patterned but regionally and locally variable. It is argued that the evidence demonstrates the persistence of place for Aboriginal people. The existence of persistent places is further related to a potentially fluid but structured connection between people and land.     

Feeding Management Strategies among the Early Neolithic Pigs in the NE of the Iberian Peninsula

The socio‐economic relevance of domesticated animals during the Early Neolithic in the Iberian Peninsula is indisputable, yet we essentially know little about the way they were managed. Among domesticated animals, pig (Sus domesticus ) was a common food source, and previous studies have shown the potential of stable isotopes for assessing variability in pig diet in relation to husbandry practices. Nevertheless, this approach has never been applied to the earliest pigs in the Iberian Peninsula. We analysed the carbon and nitrogen stable isotope composition of pig bone collagen from several Early Neolithic sites in the NE Iberian Peninsula. While pig δ¹³C values were similar across different populations, there were significant differences in δ¹⁵N values between sites. These are attributed to different pig husbandry systems, which may reflect distinct social and spatial organisation and interaction with environmental conditions during the Early Neolithic in this region. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

What is ‘needed’ to keep remembering? War‐specific communication,parental exemplar behaviour and participation in national commemorations

Given the abundance of literature on collective memory practices, there is relatively little empirical research on the socialization processes explaining the transmission of such practices. This article examines to what extent war‐specific communication and parental exemplar behaviour function as a link between the collected memories of individuals and society's collective memory. Utilizing data from an online survey conducted in 2014, we focus on participation in the activities organized on Remembrance Day and Liberation Day in the Netherlands in remembrance of the Second World War. We distinguish between public and private practices. Our findings highlight that different forms of socialization substitute for one another. Whereas communication with non‐relatives is particularly relevant for those communicating less frequently with parents about past war experiences, parental exemplar behaviour, such as participating in the two‐minute silence on Remembrance Day, plays a bigger role amongst those with lower levels of communication with either relatives or non‐relatives.     

HETEROTEMPORALITY,THE ISLAMIC TRADITION,AND THE POLITICAL: LAROUI'S CONCEPT OF THE ANTINOMY OF HISTORY1

If tradition has often figured as modernity's other, the Islamic tradition has long played the role of the modern constitutive other par excellence. Modern secularizing practices of timing and spacing feed this grounding of the political beyond the conceptual grip of tradition. The works by the Moroccan historian and philosopher Abdallah Laroui (b. 1933) put forward a concept of heterotemporality that distances itself from secularizing practices of timing and spacing, and, importantly, also from theological ones. His critique enables us to understand each of these practices as viewing heterotemporality through one master temporality, a view that represents temporality as, in Laroui's words, “absolute” time. First, this privileged temporality is the homogeneous time of secular progress, and second, it is the homogeneous time of theological truth. Laroui unsettles both practices of timing and spacing by discussing heterotemporality as governed by what he calls the antinomy of the concept of history. For Laroui, this antinomy refers to a specific temporal dynamic that results from the tension between the fundamental discontinuity and incoherence of history, on the one hand, and the production of continuity and coherence through human observers, on the other. Laroui thus reveals that the claims about continuity and coherence that sustain groundings of the political within homogeneous time—either secular or theological—must always be understood in relation to their position within the temporal dynamic of the antinomy of the concept of history. In revealing the temporal dynamic of this antinomy within the Islamic tradition, Laroui reworks the architecture of difference that keeps the secular modern and the Islamic theological conceptually separated from each other.     

Sharks in the lagoon? Fishing exploitation at the Neolithic site of Suwayh 1 (Ash Sharqiyah region,Arabian Sea,Sultanate of Oman)

The study of the fish bones from the Neolithic shell midden of Suwayh 1, excavated in the 2000s, identified a total of 1060 identifiable fish bones, from 23 families, 33 genera and 28 different species. Radiocarbon dating demonstrates that the sites date to the early 6th to mid 5th millennium BC. The results follow an eight-phase chronology highlighted by an earlier malacological study. The most important taxa were the Carcharhinidae (requiem shark), Rhinopteridae (cownose rays), Sparoidea (Sparidae and Lethrinidae: sea breams and emperors) and Ariidae (sea catfishes). The results of the fish study show that the Suwayh lagoon must have gradually opened up to the sea and been populated with mangroves. The unique presence of so many sharks at this site seems to indicate that the inhabitants had a special interest in shark fishing and that their location was ideal for this specialised activity. Two types of fishing nets and hooks have been discovered, which require the use of different fishing techniques.     

Glass Beads from 15th–17th Century CE Jar Burial Sites in Cambodia's Cardamom Mountains

A total of 74 glass beads, included as grave goods in 15th–17th century CE jar burials from Cambodia's Cardamom Mountains, were analysed using laser ablation – inductively coupled plasma – mass spectrometry (LA–ICP–MS). Several glass types were identified, including two subtypes of high‐alumina mineral soda glass, and lead–potash glass. The final glass type represents a newly discovered and previously unidentified type of high‐alumina soda glass, with high magnesia (m‐Na–Al Mg>). This study represents the first glass data from the mid‐second millennium CE from Cambodia and sheds light on the multiple long‐distance maritime exchange networks in which the upland people buried in the jars were participating.     

EMOTIONAL TRANSLATIONS: CONCEPTUAL HISTORY BEYOND LANGUAGE

Conceptual history is a useful tool for writing the history of emotions. The investigation of how a community used emotion words at certain times and in certain places allows us to understand specific emotion knowledge without being trapped by universalism. But conceptual history is also an inadequate tool for writing the history of emotions. Its exclusive focus on language fails to capture the meanings that can be derived from emotional expressions in other media such as painting, music, architecture, film, or even food. Here emotion history can contribute to a rethinking of conceptual history, bringing the body and the senses back in. This article proposes a theoretical model to expand conceptual history beyond language by exploring three processes of emotional translation: First, how the translation between reality and its interpretation is mediated by the body and the senses. Second, how translations between different media and sign systems shape and change the meanings of concepts. Third, how concepts translate into practices that have an impact on reality. The applicability of the model is not limited to the research on concepts of emotion; the article argues that emotions have a crucial role in all processes of conceptual change. The article further suggests that historicizing concepts can best be achieved by reconstructing the relations that actors have created between elements within multimedial semantic nets. The approach will be exemplified by looking at the South Asian concept of the monsoon and the emotional translations between rain and experiences of love and romance.     

A sea of potential: The politics of global ocean observations

The Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS) is creating a new understanding of the world ocean. With a vast and heterogeneous network of sensors, it converts the ocean's properties into flows of information, creating a “data double” of a dynamic sea. This view of the ocean underlies not only international geopolitics but also more broadly emergent modes of government. This paper analyzes changing strategies for governing global ocean observations to better understand the shifting coconstitution of nature, technology, and politics. In particular, I inquire into the GOOS's recent developments, which indicate a new conception of the ocean as a space of potentiality. I argue that this emergent understanding poses problems for our conventional political analytics, particularly that of biopolitics. To account for this shift, I draw on and extend Elizabeth Povinelli's offering of geontopolitics, which identifies a departure from the fundamental distinctions between life and nonlife made by biopolitics, seeing instead the potential for unpredictable changes not only in human subjects but also in geophysical systems and the contemporary planetary environmental conditions they shape. Emphasizing how geontopolitics both names a new mode of government and signifes its limits, Povinelli suggests three figures, following Foucault's four figures of biopolitics. I conclude by suggesting the world ocean as a fourth figure of geonotopolitics, as that which is so imbricated with life as to be indistinct from it. Throughout, I maintain that like Foucault's figures of biopolitics, the world ocean must be understood as inseparable from the knowledge relations that make it legible.     

‘You just have to be smart’: spatial practices and subjectivity among women in sex work in London,Ontario

Social science research on the relationship between space and sex work, specifically among women in street-based settings, demonstrates the spatialized nature of risk and how different forms of civic and legal governance contribute to their socio-economic marginalization. However, these studies rarely consider the women’s spatial practices and gendered subjectivities beyond the sex trade, which is problematic because sex work is not their singular life activity or the only impetus for their spatial movements through the urban landscape. Using social mapping and interview data from 33 women in sex work in London, Ontario, this article explores how our participants navigate the spaces where they work and live alongside those regarding health care, social services, violence and places they avoid. Findings reveal that the women traverse diverse spaces as they access health services, especially for crisis issues that necessitate travel to hospitals located beyond the inner city. The spaces used to access social services and those they avoid (i.e. to not be emotionally triggered or under police surveillance) overlap significantly, which presents unique challenges for our participants who depend upon these services for their socio-economic survival. The theoretical contributions these data make to the feminist geography literature on gender and space are discussed, particularly with respect to the issues of nomadic subjectivity and the relationality between city spaces and marginalized bodies.     

The complex landscape of contemporary fathering in the UK

Distinguishing between fatherhood as a social construction and fathering as a social practice, this paper presents empirical evidence from the UK concerning the complex landscape of contemporary fathering. The paper focuses on the spatial and temporal dynamics of fathering, particularly following moments of rupture and transition such as family break-up or bereavement. Based on narrative interviews and ethnographic observation, including the co-production and analysis of video data, the paper identifies three key issues: the diversity of contemporary fathering practices, the complex emotional geographies of lone fathering and the relationality of fathering both in terms of the research participants and their female partners (as fathers and mothers) and inter-generationally (between the research participants and their own fathers). The study supports previous research on the ‘awkward spaces’ of fathering with a particular emphasis on moments of transition and their complex social and emotional geographies.