Philipp Otto Runge and the Semiotic Language of Nature and Patriotism

Philipp Otto Runge (1777–1810) was a leading German Romantic artist whose iconography represents a transition from the Neoclassical iconography of classical mythology and allegory to an abstract semiotic system of signs based on a mystical interpretation of nature. An admirer of Herder's theory of language, Runge's iconography was representative of a trend among Romantic artists to promote nationalism and cultural values through the implementation of formal epistemological systems in the medium of art. Runge's individual iconography reveals a synthesis of rational and mystical systems of knowledge that emphasizes Herder's concept of the German Volk as a unique cultural identity, and presents an analogy between the creation of the cosmos, the organic origins of language, and the conception of the German Volk. Runge's iconography expresses the nationalist sentiments and linguistic theory of Herder that formed the basis of German propaganda movements during the Wars of Liberation, 1807–1815.     

The Sheep Project (1): determining skeletal growth,timing of epiphyseal fusion and morphometric variation in unimproved Shetland sheep of known age,sex, castration status and nutrition

The Sheep Project was designed to investigate the effects of castration, breeding age and nutritional plane on bone growth, epiphyseal fusion, tooth eruption and tooth wear in sheep. The project investigates a population of 356 unimproved Shetland sheep skeletons evenly distributed between females bred at different ages, males and castrates, raised on either high or low nutritional planes. This first instalment focuses on two aspects of our larger study, namely bone growth and epiphyseal fusion as affected by sex, castration and nutrition. Nutrition, sex and castration are shown to influence bone growth in ways that are often element-dependant and not consistent through time. We demonstrate that metric variability (variance) is strongest in males, with little difference between females and castrates, and that, in our sample, nutrition has little influence on variance in any sex cohort. Of importance to the development of models of past animal management this study demonstrates that the standard epiphyseal fusion ranges used by zooarchaeologists are too narrow in most instances and do not account for the large variation between sexes or the lesser variation between planes of nutrition. We recommend methods for recognizing castration and the presence of more than one sheep breed, or type, within the zooarchaeological record.     

Tracing Medieval and Renaissance Alabaster Works of Art Back to Quarries: A Multi‐Isotope (Sr,S, O) Approach

Multi‐isotope fingerprinting (sulphur, oxygen and strontium isotopes) has been tested to study the provenances of medieval and Renaissance French and Swedish alabaster works of art. Isotope signatures of historical English, French and Spanish alabaster source quarries or areas are revealed to be highly specific, with a strong intra‐group homogeneity and strong inter‐group contrasts, especially for Sr and S isotopes. The chosen combination of isotope tracers is a good basis for forensic work on alabaster provenance, allowing verification of hypotheses about historical trade routes as well as identification of fakes and their origin. The applied analytical techniques of continuous flow isotope ratio mass spectrometry (CF–IRMS) and thermal ionization mass spectrometry (TIMS) only require micro‐samples in the low‐milligram range, thus minimizing the impact on the works of art.     

Tourists as colonizers in Quintana Roo,Mexico

Spatial appropriation is an age‐old strategy for domination by one group over another. In the context of national states, territorial expansion is a common manifestation of this. Spain's colonization process began in the Yucatan peninsula in Mexico in the sixteenth century but remained incomplete in this area. Independent Mexico's struggle for control over the Mayan landscape of the Yucatan continued through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It is my contention that the assault has continued in recent times. Today, it is not the conventional notion of nation state colonialism but a much more subtle invasion brought about by the ability of tourists from richer nations to travel south. Using the paradigm of settler colonization, this article proposes that relationships of power underlying this new infiltration parallel those of conventional colonialism, and that the tourist is, in fact, an unwitting colonizer. The case of Quintana Roo, Mexico illustrates how the tourist can be seen as a pawn in a larger political project. Exposure of this predatory nature of tourism reveals processes that have implications for other Native regions of the Americas and beyond that are suffering similar “invasions.”     

HAMMER TIME

Espen Hammer's exceptionally fine book explores modern temporality, its problems and prospects. Hammer claims that how people experience time is a cultural/historical phenomenon, and that there is a peculiarly modern way of experiencing time as a series of present moments each indefinitely leading to the next in an ordered way. Time as measured by the clock is the paradigmatic instance of this sense of time. In this perspective time is quantifiable and forward‐looking, and the present is dominated by the future. Hammer argues that this manner of experiencing time provides a way of living that brings with it not only the basis for great successes in technology, but also great costs—specifically, what he calls the problems of transience and of meaning. Hammer goes about his task by considering the ways some of the great modern philosophers have characterized present‐day temporality and have responded to the problems he has identified. Specifically, he considers what Kant, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, (early) Heidegger, Habermas, Bloch, and Adorno provide in response to our peculiarly modern predicaments. The book is remarkable for its clarity and perceptiveness, but in the process in crucial places it simplifies the matters at hand or fails to push its insights as far as it ought, and in the end promises more than it can deliver. In this it betrays a rationalist confidence in the power of reason that founders on what in many ways remains a mystery.