X-ray fluorescence analysis and intra-island exchange in the Society Island archipelago (Central Eastern Polynesia)

We apply X-ray fluorescence (XRF) geochemical analysis to a collection of 'Opunohu Valley lithic artifacts from Mo'orea island to investigate the local scale of raw material procurement, adze production, use, and exchange within the Society Island archipelago. We use these data to document the distribution of non-local versus local volcanic artifacts in 'Opunohu Valley house sites, ritual sites, and specialized sites, as a means for establishing intra-site production and consumption patterns, and access to exotic, possibly superior, stone resources, and how these two themes correlate with site function or household wealth and status. Overall, 30% of the artifacts analyzed via WDXRF derive from non-local sources, notably two other islands in the archipelago outside of the political boundaries of Moorean chiefdoms. Our case study thus provides the first direct material evidence of intra-archipelago trade and exchange in the Society Islands. Intra-archipelago trade in adzes was certainly in place by as early as A.D. 1350, if not earlier, and continued up until the time of European contact. In addition, our analyses have identified a local adze production locale in the Afareaitu district of Mo'orea island. The patterns of local versus non-local adze production and exchange strongly suggest that dual interaction spheres were involved. The correlation between adzes and adze-related debris produced from off-island sources and sites with specialized use, which were often reserved for the social, ritual, and political elites in Ma'ohi society suggests that some of the exotic adzes derived from gift exchange between Mo'orea and ruling elites in Tahiti and the Leeward Islands. These adzes from afar would have solidified socio-political and ideological alliances between elites in the Windward and Leeward sectors of the archipelago.     

THE SOCIAL BENEFITS OF URBAN CULTURAL AMENITIES*

ABSTRACT. This paper uses a two-stage hedonic wage approach to derive the benefits from improvement of five cultural amenities. It is argued that the hedonic approach permits valuation of both private and local public aspects of cultural goods since access to the amenity is an essential input in the production of the final service flow. Empirical estimates of willingness to pay suggest price and income elasticities are approximately unity. Lower-bound estimates of marginal benefits for a representative city range from $0.85 million for an additional theater to $57.9 million for an additional zoo facility.     

Does clean air increase the demand for the consumer city? Evidence from Beijing

Cities offer a large menu of possible employment and leisure opportunities. The gains from such consumer city leisure are likely to be lower on more polluted days. We study the association between daily consumption activity and outdoor air pollution in China and find evidence in favor of the hypothesis that clean air and leaving one's home for leisure trips are complements. Given the high levels of air pollution in cities in the developing world, regulation induced improvement in environmental quality is likely to further stimulate demand for the consumer city.     

Urban Centrality: A Simple Index

This study introduces a new measure of urban centrality. The proposed urban centrality index (UCI) constitutes an extension to the spatial separation index. Urban structure should be more accurately analyzed when considering a centrality scale (varying from extreme monocentricity to extreme polycentricity) than when considering a binary variable (monocentric or polycentric). The proposed index controls for differences in size and shape of the geographic areas for which data are available, and can be calculated using different variables such as employment and population densities, or trip generation rates. The properties of the index are illustrated with simulated artificial data sets and are compared with other similar measures proposed in the existing literature. The index is then applied to the urban structure of four metropolitan areas: Pittsburgh and Los Angeles in the United States; São Paulo, Brazil; and Paris, France. The index is compared with other traditional spatial agglomeration measures, such as global and local Moran's I, and density gradient estimations. El presente estudio introduce una nueva medida de centralidad. El índice de centralidad urbana propuesto (UCI, por sus siglas en inglés) es una extensión al índice de separación espacial (spatial separation index)(Midelfart‐Knarvik et al. 2000). El análisis de la estructura urbana resulta más preciso al usar el índice cuando se toma en cuenta una escala de continua de centralidad (que puede variar de un monocentrismo extremo a un policentrismo extremo) que cuando se considera una variable binaria (monocéntrica o policéntrica). El índex propuesto controla las diferencias de tamaño y forma de las áreas geográficas de las que se tienen datos, y puede ser calculada utilizando diferentes variables, como empleo y densidad poblacional, o tasas de generación de viajes. Las propiedades del índice se ilustran con conjuntos de datos artificiales simulados, y se comparan con otras mediciones similares en la literatura ya existente. Posteriormente, el índice es aplicado a la estructura urbana de cuatro áreas metropolitanas: Pittsburgh y Los Ángeles, en EEUU; San Pablo, en Brasil; y París, Francia. Finalmente, se compara el índice con otras mediciones tradicionales de aglomeración espacial, como el índice de Moran local y global, y estimaciones de gradiente de densidad. 本文介绍了一种度量城市中心性的新方法,提出的城市中心性指数（UCI）是对空间分离指数的扩展。当涉及到中心性规模（从极单中心到极多中心）,不仅仅是二元变量（单中心或多中心）,城市结构则需更加精确的测度。本文构建的指数可以通过数据可获取的不同大小和形状的地理单元控制,并通过不同变量（如就业与人口密度或者旅次产生率）测算得到。该指数的属性可以通过人工数据集的模拟示例说明,或者通过对比已有文献对相似指数的阐述加以说明。然后,通过将该指数应用于全球四个大都市区（美国匹兹堡和洛杉矶、巴西圣保罗和法国巴黎）的城市结构中进行检验。最后,将该指数与其他测度传统空间集聚指数如全局和局部Moran指数及密度梯度估计进行对比.     

Smog Reduction's Impact on California County Growth

Over the last twenty years, environmental regulation has sharply reduced pollution levels in the Los Angeles region. Population growth has soared in the Los Angeles suburbs that have experienced the largest pollution reductions. This paper posits that regulation has increased local quality of life which has encouraged in-migration. I explore alternative explanations for this growth.     

Book reviews

Tsuyoshi Kato. Matriliny and migration: evolving Minangkabau traditions in Indonesia. 267 pp. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1982. $28.10.

E. M. Beekman (tr.). The poison tree. Selected writings of Rimphius on the natural history of the Indies. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1981. (Library of the Indies.) $20.

Nigel Phillips. Sijobang: sung narrative poetry of West Sumatra, xi, 255 pp. Cambridge, etc: Cambridge University Press, 1981. (Cambridge Studies in Oral and Literate Culture, I.) £22.50.

Bernd Nothofer. Dialektatlas von Zentral‐Java. vi, 32 pp., 337 maps. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1981. DM 64.

Marlene van Doom and cthers (ed.). Improving access to Indonesian collections in the Netherlands: contributions to a survey of Dutch library and documentation activities in the field of Indonesian studies. Edited by Mavlene van Doorn, Irene Farjon, Ciska Pattipilohy, Gerard J Telkamp. [iv], 78 pp. Leiden: Centre for the History of European Expansion (University of Leiden) in cooperation with the Koninklijk Instituut voor de Tropen for the Contactgroep Documentatie Indonesie, 1981. (Intercon‐tinenta, No. 2.)

Leo Suryadinata. Eminent Indonesian Chinese: biographical sketches. Revised edition. 218 pp. Singapore: Gunung Agung, 1981.

A. Ed. Schmidgall‐Tellings and Alan M Stevens. Contemporary Indonesian‐English dictionary: a supplement to the standard Indonesian dictionaries with particular concentration on new words₃ expressions, and meanings, xv, 388 pp. Athens, Ohio, etc: Ohio University Press, [^C1981].

Peter B R Carey (tr.). Babad Dipanagara. An account of the outbreak of the Java War (1825–30). “ The Surdkarta court version of the Babad Dipanagara with translations into English and Indonesian Malay, lxxiii, 344 pp., front., 4 plates, map. Kuala Lumpur: printed for the Council of the M.B.R.A.S. by Art Printing Works Sdn. Bhd., 1981. (Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society. Monograph No. 9.) M$55.     

Tahiti: the ripples of a myth on the shores of the imagination

Influenced by Henri Lefebvre's ideas about the production of space as a continually evolving dialogic process, I trace the long post‐contact history of “Tahiti” as an entangled place where the production and product are continually intertwined. I examine more than two hundred years of historical twists and turns that result in a dialogic process of place making. Tahiti is generated when the imaginary place collides with the material existence, each reflecting and recasting the other. This intertwined history includes 18th‐century French imperialist philosophies and voyages of exploration; 19th‐century colonial intervention, romantic novels and Gauguin's colourful canvases; and 20th‐century French chocolates, Hollywood movies, French nuclear testing, postcards and more.     

Advances in Polynesian Prehistory: A Review and Assessment of the Past Decade (1993–2004)

The pace of archaeological research in Polynesia has intensified in recent years, resulting in more than 500 new literature citations over the past decade. Fieldwork has continued in such previously well-studied archipelagoes as Tonga and Samoa in Western Polynesia, and Hawai’i and New Zealand in Eastern Polynesia, and has expanded into previously neglected islands including Niue, the Equatorial Islands, the Austral Islands, and Mangareva. The emergence of Ancestral Polynesian culture out of its Eastern Lapita predecessor is increasingly well understood, and the chronology of Polynesian dispersal and expansion into Eastern Polynesia has engaged several researchers. Aside from these fundamental issues of origins and chronology, major research themes over the past decade include (1) defining the nature, extent, and timing of long-distance interaction spheres, particularly in Eastern Polynesia; (2) the impacts of human colonization and settlement on island ecosystems; (3) variation in Polynesian economic systems and their transformations over time; and (4) sociopolitical change, especially as viewed through the lens of household or microscale archaeology. Also noteworthy is the rapidly evolving nature of interactions between archaeologists and native communities, a critical aspect of archaeological practice in the region.