‘A Rather Undefined Social Position and Public Recognition’: Professionalisation,Status and Masculinity in Provincial Museums,c.1870–1930

This article examines the background, careers and self-presentation of the first generation of British museum curators in local government-funded provincial museums, c.1900, to explore the issue of masculinity among the lower-middle classes. It argues that while such men were sometimes mocked for the lack of masculinity they showed in their domestic lives, a focus on their professional lives reveals a different set of problems facing them as they attempted to be manly men; curatorial roles, like others available to the lower-middle classes, involved a dependence on local elites, and required many of the skills and attributes which were being colonised by new women professionals. The study then examines the tactics used, with some success, by such men to assert a professional masculinity, focusing on their identification with their museum, their development of a professional body and their investment in manly physical activities.     

The Pre-Settlement Vegatation of the Western and Central Wimmera Plains of Victoria,Australia

Historical records indicate that the fertile soils of the western and central Wimmera Plains of Victoria, Australia formerly supported grassy woodlands on rises and flats, and grasslands on shallow depressions and clay plains. Soil type and micro-relief appear to have been the major factors that determined the distribution of these communities. Burning of the woodlands by Aborigines may have contributed to their open grassy nature. The few ungrazed remnants of Buloke (Allocasuarina luehmannii) woodland support a suite of species that are absent from or uncommon in other Buloke woodland remnants in the region. This work demonstrates that in districts where little intact native vegetation remains, investigation of the distribution and floristic composition of the pre-settlement vegetation can provide useful information for the maintenance and restoration of remnant vegetation.     

The (Pregnant) Mouse Freed from the Gallows: A Ballad Parallel for the Conclusion of Manawydan fab Llŷr

In the concluding episode of the Third Branch of the Mabinogi, the Welsh nobleman Manawydan takes the (pregnant) mouse that he has captured to the magically significant site Gorsedd Arberth and prepares to hang her for theft, according to the law. As he prepares the gallows, various figures attempt to intervene until finally a ‘bishop’ redeems his transformed wife by disenchanting the land, freeing Manawydan’s companions, and swearing not to take vengeance. We argue that this scene is strikingly similar to the famous ballad widely attested all over Europe, ‘The Maid Freed from the Gallows’, a parallel which not only illuminates this episode in the Mabinogi, but also suggests how the Welsh storyteller used traditional material in shaping these narratives.     

A postcolonial framing of Indian commercial surrogacy: issues,representations, and orientalisms

Although only legalised in 2002, Indian commercial gestational surrogacy (CGS) is an industry worth an estimated 2.3 billion USD to India at its height. Not only has this contentious topic been researched extensively from a spectrum of academic angles, representations of Indian CGS abound in both the Indian and Western popular media (novels, documentaries, films, etc.), and increasingly online, particularly in CGS websites, advertisements, and (personal) blogs. Popular media representations as well as commercial ones can often be inclined towards the sentimental and even sanctimonious, but are immensely influential in shaping public perception. This article seeks to position the discourse and representation of transnational Indian CGS more explicitly within the postcolonial framework. Thus, it addresses a theoretical gap in explicitly connecting the problematic issues of power and ethics in CGS within the paradigms of postcolonial studies, drawing also on gender and feminist frameworks. The neo-colonisation of the body has been already considered to some extent – mostly in neo-liberalist contexts – but the industry’s systemically orientalistic set up and structure has been surprisingly little mentioned, particularly where transnational surrogacy is involved, with little framing of the imperialistic hangovers and undertones dogging these particular sets of international contracts. This article maps the orientalisms (and sometimes re-orientalisms) at play in this already fraught and contentious context, positioning transnational surrogacy as another instance of imperialism, as yet another form of cultural colonisation, othering, subalternising, and peripheralising working-class Indian surrogate women in the twenty-first century.     

An Applied Method for General Regional Seismic Loss Assessment—With A Case Study in Los Angeles County

We describe the formulation and application of an integrated general regional seismic loss assessment (RSLA) method for buildings in seismic regions. An efficient method for RSLA is valuable for engineers involved in city planning, risk management, and insurance dealings. In contrast to previously reported methods, the framework presented herein is hazard-based and utilizes a regional rapid seismic hazard deaggregation tool that allows regional assessment to be conducted more efficiently. The proposed technique is implemented as an example to assess general regional seismic loss in Los Angeles County for a ground motion hazard with 10% probability of exceedance in 50 years.     

An empirical evaluation of copper procurement and distribution: elemental analysis of Scioto Valley Hopewell copper

In prehistoric North America, artifacts of copper occupy a position of prominence in the Hopewell societies of Ohio’s Scioto Valley. These artifacts also represent the social contacts and long-distance interactions that brought copper to the Scioto Valley. Yet, our understanding of Hopewell copper acquisition, and the movement of copper artifacts within the social networks of the Scioto Valley and beyond, has been limited due to the limited availability of geochemical data concerning provenance and variability. We begin to develop the foundation for understanding these important social issues by analyzing the elemental variability of Hopewell copper through the use of laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. We analyze 24 samples from four known copper source regions and 52 samples from 6 prominent sites in the Scioto Valley. Results suggest that a majority of the artifacts are consistent with sources in the Great Lakes, with a plurality classified as Isle Royale. However, 21% of Scioto Hopewell copper artifacts were most consistent with southern Appalachian sources. High elemental variability argues against simple models of copper acquisition and suggests that different social groups had access to a variety of copper sources through varying social networks. Native copper regardless of source seems to have been channeled along similar social and symbolic pathways. Our results suggest that instead of being derived from the struggle to access a specific source, value is derived from the social relationships represented by the copper and the connotation of exotic connection embodied in both style and material.