Island Biocultural Assemblages — The Case of Kinmen Island

ABSTRACT A growing mass of research contributes to our understanding of how biological and cultural diversity are related in complex and important ways. This paper presents an assembling process of biodiversity and cultural diversity on an island, Kin‐men (Quemoy), based on 1600 years of its environmental history. The study shows that the island's biocultural assemblages are a result both of external relations with the island's surrounding environment and internal relations within the island's changing human ecology. Distant political powers and economic forces are the two major external influences that have affected the flow of natural and cultural elements to and from the island, while ‘screening effects’ and ‘isolation effects’ are two factors that explain internal interactions. The island's biocultural assembling processes reveal that the openness of the island facilitates increase in the diversity of biocultural elements, while its less disturbed isolated condition fosters natural succession and co‐evolution. The study suggests that biocultural assemblages and the associated processes of co‐evolution and nature–society interactions are accomplished through the intermittent opportunities purposively provided by or inadvertently found in the openings and closures of boundaries, setting the scene for both boundary crossings and bounded shelter, by intent or chance.     

Beautiful Geography: The Pictorial Maps of Ruth Taylor White

This paper explores the career of Ruth Taylor White, an American cartographic illustrator who published a significant number of pictorial maps from the 1920s into the 1940s. Taylor White’s ‘cartographs’ (as she called them) were characterized by her signature bobble-headed cartoon characters who romped through colourful, attractive landscapes. These visually rich and highly narrative maps simultaneously strove for accuracy and engaged in profound stereotyping with regard to culture, race, gender and class. They reveal not only the aesthetic and conceptual preferences of their maker but also the cultural biases of their middle-class, white American audience.     

The prehistory of Cyprus: Problems and prospects

The archaeological record of prehistoric Cyprus is rich, diverse, well-published, and frequently enigmatic. Regarded by many as a bridge between western Asia and the Aegean, Cyprus and its past are frequently seen from scholarly perspectives prevalent in one of those two cultural areas. Its material culture, however, differs radically from that of either area. Apart from the early colonization episodes on the island (perhaps three during the pre-Neolithic and Neolithic), evidence of foreign contact remains limited until the Bronze Age (post-2500 B. C.). This study seeks to present the prehistory of Cyprus from an indigenous perspective, and to examine a series of archaeological problems that foreground Cyprus within its eastern Mediterranean context. The study begins with an overview of time, place, and the nature of fieldwork on the island, continues with a presentation and discussion of several significant issues in Cypriot prehistory (e.g., insularity, colonization, subsistence, regionalism, interaction, social complexity, economic diversity), and concludes with a brief discussion of prospects for the archaeology of Cyprus up to and beyond 2000.     

Internal borders and external factors in outermost island regions. The case of the Canary Islands

The defining element of island regions is their isolation, the separation of the islands from the mainland; there is an inherent notion of natural border. This condition has preserved ecosystems and protected against outside threats, stimulating ‘coevolution’ between man and the environment, a fundamental ingredient of sustainability. But insularity also means the evident added costs of access to markets which, together with territorial limits and the scarcity of basic resources, especially on small islands, hinders their socioeconomic development. These costs are even greater in the case of outlying islands, which suffer from a ‘double insularity’ in the form of both external and internal borders. For this reason, it is common for governments to establish various forms of support, from tax exemptions to the creation of permanent aid funds, like those implemented by the European Union for the outermost regions. This article discusses these aspects in the case of the Canary Islands, an example of a European outermost island region. The findings show that the support measures have not always been favourable for all the islands.     

Biometric Differentiation of Wild Philippine Pigs from Introduced Sus scrofa in Modern and Archaeological Assemblages

In many parts of Eurasia, the Middle East and Southeast Asia where native wild suids occur, it is notoriously difficult to differentiate these from introduced domestic pigs in the prehistoric archaeological record. Yet, correct identification of the initial appearance or introduction of domestic pigs (Sus scrofa ) is essential for determining the timing for the transition from purely hunting to the adoption of managed animal populations within different regions across the globe. In a recent review of techniques used by zooarchaeologists to distinguish between domestic and wild pig populations, the analysts concluded that the most reliable method was metrical analyses, when the data produce a clear two‐population pattern, one domestic, the other wild. In this study, we demonstrate how linear metrics are an effective tool, albeit at different levels of confidence, for differentiating the native and endemic species of Philippine pig from S. scrofa , both within modern contemporary assemblages, and the archaeological record. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Farasan Islands,Saudi Arabia: towards a chronology of settlement

An archaeological survey of Saudi Arabia's Farasan Islands in May 2010 recorded a broad range of sites that have not previously been documented. The survey concentrated on Greater Farasan and Segid islands, and comprised a rapid recording of sites shown to the authors by representatives of the Saudi Commission for Tourism and Antiquities. The sites were photographed, their positions logged, sketch drawings made of the principal features and surface pottery drawn and photographed. Detailed drawings were made of a stone anchor and a well with possible Ancient South Arabian carved decoration. The sites visited included settlements, wells, cemeteries and a cave. Several sites included the remains of buildings made of massive ashlar blocks, as well as others of rubble‐stone construction. Datable material at the sites points to several periods of occupation, from the early first millennium BC to early modern times. Some locations were characterised by long periods of settlement. Apart from the findings of this survey, most of the sites remain largely uninvestigated, and suggest significant potential for future research into settlement on the archipelago, as well as into past maritime activity and technology in the southern Red Sea region and beyond.     

Gay and lesbian emotional geographies of clubbing: reflections from Paris and Turin

Urban nighttime entertainment spaces, including bars, pubs, and clubs, are a crucial space for the performance of gendered social relations and the experience of sexual identities. This article investigates the emotional spaces of commercial gay and lesbian recreation in two different settings: lesbian nights in Paris, France, and gay clubs in Turin, Italy. This research was carried out through direct observation and auto-ethnographic fieldwork. Drawing on the literature from emotional geographies, the article proposes an alternative take on the geography of gay and lesbian clubbing by applying the metaphors of the island and the archipelago from cultural geography to the gay and lesbian scene. The island and archipelago are presented as metaphors that imply emotions, performance, materiality, spatiality, strategy, and imagination in the performance of the gay and lesbian playscape. The article argues that the club, intended as a type of gay and lesbian island, does not necessarily imply a condition of insulation. Rather, the island implies both metaphor and materiality, and movement may also be considered an emotional strategy for gays and lesbians in the heteronormative urban space.     

西汉合浦郡之朱卢县考

汉元帝初元三年罢珠崖郡后,海南岛之归属和建置情况如何?学术界对此长期争论不休。明代,海南王佐认为自汉元帝罢珠崖郡后,海南岛成为中原王朝的域外之地,直至南朝梁武帝大同中因海南儋耳归附于洗夫人才内属。唐胄则认为汉元帝罢珠崖郡后,仅八十六年本岛就又内属。当代,谭其骧先生的观点与王佐大致相同。杨武泉先生则认为从西汉晚期至萧齐,大陆王朝一直在岛上设置县级地方政权。本文虽赞同杨先生的观点,但所用资料和研究方法与之不同,而且只探考西汉朱卢县。认为只需要弄清朱卢县的位置,就可以彻底解决这一历史悬案。现依据许多学术界未曾提及的重要古籍资料和西汉"朱廬執刲"银印所蕴涵的重要信息,采用考据学研究方法,从五个方面来进行考察,所得结论是:西汉合浦郡的朱卢县应当在海南岛。     

‘Islands within Islands?’ The Maldivian resort,between segregation and integration

Abstract

The Maldives resort islands are a type of tourist enclave subject to a dual form of borderization. The islands have an external border that coincides with each island’s coastline and with the limits of the private property of the resort; this border regulates the movement of tourists and locals. The islands also have an internal border that separates the outer edge of the island from the inner edge. The outer edge, which is supposed to represent the perfect landscape of the ‘tropical island,’ houses all of the tourist facilities, while the interior contains the structures dedicated to the metabolic activities of the resort. The frontline staff members and the tourists share the ‘dreamscape’ of the outer edge, whereas the maintenance workers live in the secluded space inside the island, where they are typically hidden from the sight of tourists by high walls, and their movement is usually restricted from staff designated areas to their location of work. For maintenance workers, these spaces, necessarily limited due to the small size of the coral islands, risk becoming ‘islands within islands.’ Recently, the Maldivian government has begun to promote projects and initiatives in support of territorial integration between the resorts and communities of neighboring islands. Thus, the outer limits of the resort islands are, today, more porous. Their internal borders, in contrast, remain very difficult to cross.     

Of Navies and Navels: Britain as A Mental Island

In this paper, the conception of .Great Britain. — a wholly unsatisfactory nomenclature — as an island nation is examined. In this case, a relatively small land mass acted as an originary point of departure for outward‐bound Great Power projections across the open spaces of seas. This paper further explores the varied implications for nationalism within Britain of the diverse island ‘roots’ of the British navel and the ‘routes’ of British navalism. Three themes recur in the popular mobilization of British maritime island nationalism: the besieged island, the island as universal exemplar of civilization, and the navy as national protector. Some consideration is given to the significance of island symbols such as Britannia as a marker of the fate of great island nationalism.