Publications briefly noted

B. A. HUSSAINMIYA. The Brunei Constitution of 1959: an Inside History. Bandar Seri Begawan: Brunei Press, 2000. xvi, 81 pp. B$8.90, paper.

DAVID E. POLLARD. The Chinese Essay. Hong Kong: Research Centre for Translation, Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1999. US$50.00, hardcover.

EVA HUNG (ed). City Women: contemporary Taiwan Women Writers. Hong Kong: Rendition Paperbacks, 2001. 160 pp. No price given, paper.

P. J. MOORE. A Concise History of Dutch Mauritius, 1598-1710: a Fruitful and Healthy Land. London: Kegan Paul International for the International Institute of Asian Studies, 1998. x, 127 pp. Illustrations. £55.00/US$93.50, hardcover.

HENRY YUHUAI HE. Dictionary of the Political Thought of the People's Republic of China. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2001. 727 pp. US$124.95, hardcover.

WILLIAM DUIKER. Historical Dictionary of Vietnam. Asian/Oceanian Historical Dictionaries No. 27, 2nd edition. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 1998. 512 pp. US$68.00, hardcover.

RIZAL SUKMA. Indonesia and China: the Politics of a Troubled Relationship. London: Routledge, 1999. xiv, 224 pp. £55.00, hardcover.

NICHOLAS TARLING (ed). Indonesia after Soeharto. Auckland: New Zealand Asia Institute, 1999. 168 pp. No price given, paper.

ROY DAVIS LINVILLE JUMPER. Orang Asli Now: the Orang Asli in the Malaysian Political World. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1999. US$48.00, hardcover.

LIANG XIAOSHENG. Panic and Deaf: two Modern Satires. Hanming Chen, trans; James O. Belcher, ed. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2001. 157 pp. US$14.95, paper.

LEO DOUW, CEN HUANG and MICHAEL R. GODLEY (eds). Qiaoxiang Ties: interdisciplinary Approaches to ‘Cultural Capitalism’ in South China. London: Kegan Paul International, 1999. 346 pp. No price given, hardcover.

CYRIL BIRCH. Scenes for Mandarins: the Elite Theatre of the Ming. New York: Columbia University Press, 1999. xiii, 262 pp. US$20.50, paper.

JI GILES UNGPAKORN. Thailand: class Struggle in an Era of Economic Crisis. Hongkong: Asia Resources Monitor Center; Bangkok: Workers' Democracy Book Club, 1999. 118 pp. Thai baht 150.

JI UNGPAKORN. The Struggle for Democracy and Social Justice in Thailand. Bangkok: Arom Pongpangan Foundation, 1997. 130 pp. Thai baht 150.     

Medicaid Expansion and the Political Fate of the Governors Who Support It

We provide evidence regarding potential policy feedback effects of healthcare reform by estimating the effect of Medicaid expansion on public support for the state actor most closely associated with responsibility for the expansion decision—the governor. The discretion granted to state governments concerning Medicaid expansion has created the potential for significant variation in mass feedback effects across the states. We are particularly interested in how these effects are influenced by the emerging racial polarization over healthcare policy, and how this may lead to different types of feedback effects that align with partisan, ideological, and racial cleavages. We estimate the impact of Medicaid expansion on gubernatorial approval, utilizing five waves of the Cooperative Congressional Election Study (2008–16). We find that on average, expansion led to a modest, yet statistically significant increase in gubernatorial approval. However, there is important variation both within and across states in the effect of expansion. Specifically, we find that governors were more likely to be rewarded for expansion by those who supported President Obama, and those who resided in states where the Medicaid recipient population is more likely to be white.     

Domestic Spaces as Public Places: An Ethnoarchaeological Case Study of Houses, Gender, and Politics in the Ecuadorian Amazon

In an ethnoarchaeological case study, we take a gendered perspective on the house as a locus of political life in Conambo, a village of about 200 Achuar- and Quichua-speaking peoples in the Ecuadorian Amazon. In this small-scale society, women and men engage actively in political practice in independent yet complementary ways, and the domestic context is a place where political life is conducted on a daily basis. In this article, the house is examined as a politicized context at three scales of materiality: the organization of settlement in the community, the spatial relationships in the house, and the scale of painted designs on pottery bowls used in the house. At each scale, we identify material correlates of women's and men's participation. Our goal is to bring attention to potential archaeological correlates of women's political involvement in past societies, to question assumptions about women's political lives and domestic spaces, and to expand the ways in which anthropological archaeology may contribute to understanding cross-cultural variation in women's and men's domains of power.     

Exploring place marketing by American microbreweries: neolocal expressions of ethnicity and race

The American craft brewing scene has exhibited continued growth over the past several decades fueled by the desire of many patrons to opt for unique, local brews in the place of homogenous national and international brands. Previous research reports that American microbreweries often express neolocalism in the marketing of their products: using local place names, people, events, landscape features, and icons on their labeling and in their names to establish roots with the local environment and culture. By way of qualitatively surveying 1564 microbrewery websites, this paper looks through a neolocal lens to examine microbrewery usage of ethnicity and race in their marketing efforts. Microbreweries are found to express ethnicity and race in their marketing schemes to a limited extent within which ethnicity, more so than race, is demonstrated. Specific examples include references to ethnic ties to the Scots-Irish in Appalachia, specific Native American tribes throughout the country, and Latino, specifically Mexican/Mexican-American, cultural heritage in the American southwest. In addition, findings reflect the demographics of the industry, which is dominated by whites of European descent.     

Do you never get tired of salmon? Evidence for extreme salmon specialization at Prince Rupert harbour,British Columbia

Faunal evidence from five village sites at Prince Rupert harbour, British Columbia reveals very high levels of dependence on one food resource, salmon, during the period from 500 BC to AD 1000. At some of these sites, it appears that little else in the way of vertebrate fauna was consumed. Comparisons with faunal data from other parts of the Northwest Coast show that the Prince Rupert villagers during this period were extreme salmon specialists, as highly focused on this one resource as any the Northwest Coast culture, and among the most highly resource specialized hunter–gatherer cultures worldwide.     

Proactive Crisis-management Strategies and the Archaeological Heritage

Heritage organisations depend on public support, which presupposes a reputation for responsible custodianship, technical expertise, sound financial management and sensitivity to conflicting public expectations (e.g. conservation and public access). Public support, however, can be fickle; a reputation can be severely damaged in a few days as a result of an unexpected crisis. Heritage managers have traditionally adopted a reactive approach to crisis handling. Such approaches frequently give rise to panic-driven responses, which amplify the scale of the original crisis and lead to a breakdown of trust among stakeholders. Having explored some examples of crises in the management of the archaeological heritage, this paper concludes with a case for managers to develop proactive crisis-management strategies. The proposed framework recognises its symbiotic relationship with the disciplines of strategy and reputation management. It incorporates three key elements: the identification and evaluation of risks; procedural arrangements for operating in a disaster situation; and effective communications to ensure the continuing support of stakeholders.     

Book reviews

CHINA

ZHIYUE BO. Chinese Provincial Leaders: economic Performance and Political Mobility since 1949. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2002. 183 pp. Appendix, bibliography, index. US$74.95, hardcover.

KIRK A. DENTON. The Problematic of Self in Modern Chinese Literature: Hu Feng and Lu Ling. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998. 324 pp. A$90.00, hardcover.

ROSS GARNAUT and LIGANG SONG (eds). China 2002: WTO Entry and World Recession. Canberra: Asia Pacific Press, 2002. x, 192 pp. Bibliography. A$35.00/US$30.00, paper.

NEIL C. HUGHES. China's Economic Challenge: smashing the Iron Rice Bowl. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2002. xv, 235 pp. Photographs, map, index. US$24.95, paper.

P. R. KUMARASWAMY (ed). China and the Middle East: the Quest for Influence. New Delhi: Sage Publications, 1999. 228 pp. Rs425, hardcover.

ROBERT H. SHARF. Coming to Terms with Chinese Buddhism: a Reading of the Treasure Store Treatise. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2002. 414 pp. US$47.00, hardcover.

STEPHEN UHALLEY, JR. and XIAOXIN WU (eds). China and Christianity: burdened Past, Hopeful Future. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2001. 520 pp. Illustration, table, notes, bibliography, glossary, index. $79.95, hardcover.

ANN BARROTT WICKS (ed). Children in Chinese Art. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2002. 216 pp. Illustrations (colour and b/w), glossary of Chinese characters. US$51.00, hardcover.

YONGJIN ZHANG and GREG AUSTIN (eds). Power and Responsibility in Chinese Foreign Policy. Canberra: Asia Pacific Press, 2001. 293 pp. Index. A$36.00/US$32.00, paper.

JAPAN AND KOREA

DAVID BELL. Chushingura and the Floating World: the Representation of Kanadehon Chushingura in Ukiyo‐e Prints. Richmond: Japan Library, 2001. 170 pp. 41 b/w plates, synopsis, list of principal characters and roles, glossary, bibliography, dustjacket. US$48.00, hardcover.

EYAL BEN‐ARI and JOHN CLAMMER (eds). Japan in Singapore: cultural Occurrences and Cultural Flows. Surrey: Curzon Press, 2000. 238 pp. £40.00, hardcover.

MAHITO ISHIMOTO (ed). Remembering Aizu: the Testament of Shiba Gorō. Translated, with Introduction and Notes, by Teruko Craig. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 1999. 158 pp. US$37.00, hardcover; US$19.95, paper.

YASUHIRO NAKASONE. The Making of the New Japan: reclaiming the Political Mainstream (translated and annotated by Lesley Connor). Richmond, Surrey: Curzon Press, 1999. 256 pp. £30.00, hardcover.

HIROSHI SHIMIZU and HITOSHI HIRAKAWA. Japan and Singapore in the World Economy: Japan's Economic Advance into Singapore 1870–1965. London: Routledge, 1999. 268 pp. £60.00, hardcover.

JULIA ADENEY THOMAS. Reconfiguring Modernity: concepts of Nature in Japanese Political Ideology. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001. xv, 239 pp. Index. A$37.50, hardcover.

SOUTH, WEST & CENTRAL ASIA

BAABAR (Bat‐Erdene Batbayar). Twentieth Century Mongolia. Cambridge: White Horse Press, 1999. xiv, 448 pp. £50.00, hardcover.

WENDY DONIGER (ed). Splitting the Difference. Gender and Myth in Ancient Greece and India. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1999. xi, 376 pp. Bibliography, index. £38.50, hardcover; £15.50, paper.

DIANA L. ECK. Dar?an: seeing the Divine Image in India, 3rd edition. New York: Columbia University Press, 1998. v, 115 pp. Appendices, bibliography, glossary. US$16.50, paper.

JEFFREY HOPKINS. Emptiness in the Mind‐Only School of Buddhism: dynamic Responses to Dzong‐ka‐ba The Essence of Eloquence: I. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999. 542 pp. US$45.00, hardcover.

FAREED KAZMI. The Politics of India's Conventional Cinema: imagining a Universe, Subverting a Multiverse. New Delhi: Sage, 1998. 252 pp. Rs 195.

BURTON WATSON, trans. The Essential Lotus: selections from the Lotus Sutra. New York: Columbia University Press, 2002. 195 pp. US$16.95, paper.

SOUTHEAST ASIA

LEONARD BLUSSÉ Bitter Bonds: a Colonial Divorce Drama of the Seventeenth Century. Princeton, NJ: Markus Wiener, 2002. x, 194 pp. US$49.95, hardcover; US$22.95, paper.

ERIK COHEN. The Commercialized Crafts of Thailand: hill Tribes and Lowland Villages. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2000. xiii, 316 pp. Photographs, diagrams, tables, notes, bibliography, index. US$39.00, hardcover; US$19.95, paper.

VIRGINIA MATHESON HOOKER. Writing a New Society: social Change through the Novel in Malay. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2002. xviii, 492 pp. Notes, select bibliography, index. US$39.00, hardcover.

PETER RIDDELL. Islam and the Malay‐Indonesian World: transmission and Responses. London: C. Hurst and Co., 2001. xix, 349 pp. Maps, tables, index, bibliography. £45.00, hardcover.

GENERAL ASIA

RICHARD J. ELLINGS and AARON L. FRIEDBERG (eds). Strategic Asia: power and Purpose 2001–02. Seattle: National Bureau of Asian Research, 2001. 378 pp. US$19.95, paper.

PETER FRANCIS, Jr. Asia's Maritime Bead Trade: 300 B.C. to the Present. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2002. 305 pp. A$52.00, hardcover.

DAVID GOLDSWORTHY (ed). Facing North: a century of Australian Engagement with Asia, Volume 1:1901 to the 1970s. Carlton South: Melbourne University Press, 2001. 523 pp. A$59.95, hardcover; A$39.95, paper.

BRIAN MOERAN (ed). Asian Media Productions. Richmond: Curzon Press, 2001. £45.00, hardcover.     

Mabo,freedom and the politics of difference

This paper attempts to demonstrate the applicability of certain themes from post‐structuralist theory to issues raised by the Mabo judgment and the subsequent debate over native title. It outlines some common features of a post‐structuralist conception of society, commenting particularly on conceptions of freedom and the shared concern with difference. It then shows how questions of difference and identity raised by Mabo may be described in post‐structuralist terms, and contrasts the treatment of difference by Derrida and Deleuze from a political point of view. Finally, the paper suggests ways in which Mabo may be seen as a significant event, and an exercise of freedom, in Deleuzian terms.     

Archaic Period Domesticated Plants in the Mid-Ohio Valley: Archaeobotanical Remains from the County Home Site (33at40), Southeastern Ohio

Late Archaic archaeobotanical remains from the County Home site (33AT40), southeastern Ohio, are described. Measurements of chenopod (Chenopodium berlandieri) seed-coat thicknesses and marshelder (Iva annua) achene and kernel lengths from the site are indicative of domesticated types (ssp. jonesianum and var. macrocarpa, respectively) dating to ca. 3000 B.P. to 3600 B.P. Together, these specimens represent some of the earliest evidence of plant domestication outside the oak-hickory and oak-savannah forests of eastern North America. The recovery of these plants with other cultigens in hearths and earth ovens at the County Home site indicates that the timing for the arrival of the Initial Crop Complex in the Appalachian mixed forest of the middle Ohio Valley occurred earlier than previously documented. The results of this research contribute to the growing database of early plant domestication and a broader understanding of the origins of food production.