The Queensland Difference

Allan Patience (ed.), The Bjelke‐Petersen Premiership 1968–1983: Issues in Public Policy, Melbourne, Longman Cheshire, 1985, pp. 286, $18.95 (paper)     

Vegetal politics: belonging,practices and places

Cultural geography has a long and proud tradition of research into human–plant relations. However, until recently, that tradition has been somewhat disconnected from conceptual advances in the social sciences, even those to which cultural geographers have made significant contributions. With a number of important exceptions, plant studies have been less explicitly part of more-than-human geographies than have animal studies. This special issue aims to redress this gap, recognising plants and their multiple engagements with and beyond humans. Plants are not only fundamental to human survival, they play a key role in many of the most important environmental political issues of the century, including biofuels, carbon economies and food security. In this introduction, we explore themes of belonging, practices and places, as discussed in the contributing papers. Together, the papers suggest new kinds of ‘vegetal politics’, documenting both collaborative and conflictual relations between humans, plants and others. They open up new spaces of political action and subjectivity, challenging political frames that are confined to humans. The papers also raise methodological questions and challenges for future research. This special issue grew out of sessions we organised at the Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting in New York in 2012.     

Mark as a Roman Document from the Year 69: Testing Martin Hengel's Thesis

This paper explores Martin Hengel's thesis that the Gospel of Mark was written in Rome in the year 69. Hengel was convinced that more should be made of the Year of Four Emperors, a period of civic chaos and warfare that ensued on the death of Nero. The paper analyses the role of the emperor as a potent force in the religious, civic, political, and military unity that is Rome and her gods; the all-pervasive Jerusalem Temple; and Josephus's return to Rome in 71 and the publication of The Jewish War. The paper shows that these themes overlap with this Gospel and are at least consistently supportive of the claim that Rome is the place of composition. The paper refers positively to a recent publication by Brian Incigneri that stresses the critical role of the Triumph of Vespasian and Titus in 71 as the catalytic event for Mark.     

DETECTION OF LOCAL INTERACTIONS FROM THE SPATIAL PATTERN OF NAMES IN FRANCE*

ABSTRACT Using data on the geographic distribution of names in France, we investigate the social transmission of parental preferences. Drawing on recent work on nonmarket interactions, we develop a linear discrete choice model that relates choices made in one location to those made in nearby areas. We explain the shares of parents that give their children Saint, Arabic, and American‐type names. We also examine the effect of distance between locations on differences in naming patterns. We find that the importance of geographic distance is declining over time while differences in class and national origins have increasing explanatory power.     

Irrigator relations with water in the Sunraysia region,northwestern Victoria

Irrigated agriculture faces significant challenges under climate change, and may not be feasible in parts of the Murray‐Darling Basin beyond 2050. Recent research into the cultural politics of water has paid limited attention to the water cultures and relations of irrigators in Minority World countries. We analyse the water relations of grape farm irrigators in the Sunraysia region of Victoria using interviews and farm tours undertaken between 2014 and 2016. Findings are summarised under five themes: (1) the sociality of irrigation water, (2) temporal and spatial relations, (3) the risk of rain, (4) the micro‐scale of water knowledge, and (5) environment as actor. These themes shed light on the diverse relations that constitute both environmental and irrigation water. Irrigators are embedded in these relations at multiple scales, local and distant, mediated by technology and infrastructure. The scale of our focus makes visible water and other forms of environmental knowledge that often go unnoticed in broader debates over irrigation. The concept of “the environment”, understood as an embodied actor in policy discourse and by irrigators, is an emergent trend that warrants ongoing research attention.