Reflections on North American Pacific Coast prehistory

The Pacific Coast of North America was occupied by many distinctive groups of coastal hunter-gatherers at the times of early contacts with Europeans. Despite significant cultural diversity, Pacific Coast peoples shared lifeways oriented toward generally similar marine, nearshore, littoral, and estuarine habitats. In this paper, we examine some major issues that guide much of the archaeology done along the Pacific Coast, then discuss some of the theoretical and methodological problems that limit the efficacy of archaeological reconstructions. Most archaeological research conducted on North America's Pacific Coast has been oriented toward the search for the origins and development of a variety of cultural patterns. A comparative review of California and Northwest Coast sequences provides interesting parallels and discrepancies in the approaches taken in studying some of the major issues in Pacific Coast prehistory.     

The greening of Oscar Wilde: situating Ireland in the Wilde wars

The importance of Ireland to an understanding of Oscar Wilde has been the subject of contentious discussion in recent years. For one group of critics Wilde has been considered “a militant Irish republican”, an Irish “terrorist by another name”, whose literary practices resembled those of “guerrilla warfare”, an ardent Home Ruler and Parnellite, and committed Irish nationalist whose work is suffused with references to Ireland and the Irish Question, very influenced by his Irish background and political views, possibly shaped by a genuine interest in and awareness of Irish folklore and the Irish oral tradition, and deeply engaged with issues of Irish identity and culture. For an opposing set of critics Wilde should at best be considered a “reluctant” Irish patriot, who referenced his Irish “identity” only when it suited him commercially, was more interested in exploiting intellectual fashions and fads than making genuine political points, was a shallow thinker in most areas of life and certainly didn’t use his writing to pursue Irish nationalist issues, was probably more of a British imperialist than an Irish nationalist, knew precious little about Irish folklore or Irish oral traditions, and his works contain few if any references to Irish issues or themes. The differences between these two interpretive communities certainly seem quite large, and these differences have been emphasised in a disputatious manner which has shed more heat than light on the messy matter of Wilde’s national identity. In this article I want to begin to clear up some of the misunderstandings I think have crept into this critical dispute and suggest fruitful ways in which opposing critics can come together in if not harmony then perhaps a less acrimonious, more productive way.     

晚清"古学复兴":中国旧学纳入近代新知体系之尝试

章太炎、刘师培等人在清末“保存国粹”、“复兴古学”的过程中,开始对中国古代学术进行初步整理,肇始了对中国学术遗产进行发掘、梳理、研究和整合之工作。以西方新知、新理、新法整理中国传统旧籍,发明中国旧学之新义,是晚清学术演进之必然趋势。以新知阐释旧学,以中学比附西学,以近代学科体系界定中国旧学,是晚清学者整理中国旧学之基本思路。正是在对中国传统学术不断进行整理和整合的过程中,中国传统学术开始转变其固有形态,逐步融入近代西学新知体系之中。     

INELASTIC SEISMIC RESPONSE ANALYSIS BASED ON ENERGY DENSITY SPECTRA

Energy balance is used to characterise the seismic energy in inelastic structures where energy input to the structure is decomposed into strain energy, kinetic energy, damping energy, and plastic energy. The exact quantification of plastic energy is derived based on force analogy method for moment-resisting frames. A method of generating energy density spectra is then proposed based on yield displacement of a single degree of freedom system. The effects of different structural vibration characteristics are then studied on energy density spectra. These effects include variations of yield displacement level, earth-quake scaling factor, and damping ratio, which proves to be useful in improving the basic understanding of energy characteristics in structural dynamic response. Finally, the use of energy density spectra is demonstrated on a multi-degree of freedom structure to show the practical applications of these spectra.     

Red Tory: How Left and Right Have Broken Britain and How We Can Fix It

Abstract

Responding to my generous critics, I attempt to clarify my view of reason’s responsibility and its limits, and I underline my agreement with Strauss on the insuperability of political thinking and thus the impossibility of any neat separation between theory and practice or of any trans-political doctrine of transcendence. Finally, I resist invitations to overcome tensions between vertical and horizontal transcendence and thus to go beyond responsibility to autonomy.     

The Direct Historical Approach, Analogical Reasoning, and Theory in Americanist Archaeology

Prior to the early 1950s, Americanist archaeologists, given their interest in chronology, routinely searched for direct historical connections between ethnographically documented cultures and archaeological cultures. In those instances where clear evolutionary connections existed between ethnographic and prehistoric cultures, the ethnic affinities of the latter could be assessed, chronologies of prehistoric cultures could be built, and ethnographic descendant cultures could be used as analogs of prehistoric ancestral cultures. The latter became known as specific historical analogy, and it stands in contrast to general comparative analogy, in which no detectable evolutionary connection exists between archaeological subjects and ethnographic sources. The theory underpinning the use of specific historical analogs is Darwinian evolutionism, or descent with modification; thus similarities between ethnographic sources and archaeological subjects are homologous. By midcentury, with the problem of chronology behind them, archaeologists began to address anthropological concerns. Darwinian evolutionism was replaced by the theory of orthogenesis as an explanation of culture change, and concomitantly specific historical analogy was replaced by general comparative analogy, in which similarities between ethnographic sources and archaeological subjects are the result of convergence. For over a century anthropologists and archaeologists have mixed elements of the two theories.     

Radical Political Theology

Abstract

This essay investigates the claim, advanced by a number of contributors to Theology and the Political, that the potential for political transformation requires an analogical ontology. I argue that this is not the case, and that an ontology of immanence, as found primarily in the work of Gilles Deleuze, provides an alternative and superior paradigm for political transformation. This argument is advanced by examining the manner in which immanence enables a novel approach to creation. Such immanent creation is distinct in that it departs from analogy's dependence on the transcendent as well as from capitalism's dependence on communication.     

Transcendence and Apocalyptic: A Reply to Barber

Abstract

This essay takes up Dan Barber's challenge to think Christian theology non-analogically. It does so by re-affirming and re-conceiving transcendence according to a kind of apocalyptic exigence. Apocalyptic transcendence, it is argued, occurs according to a mode of action that is irreducible either to the univocal production of pure immanence, or to the analogical mediation of transcendence within immanence. Rather, apocalyptic transcendence is operative as a mode of action by which immanence is suspended and the territorial conceptions of this-worldly sovereignty are denied. Through engagement with the work of John Howard Yoder, it is argued that apocalyptic thus gives way to doxology as that mode of engaged and embodied action that alone exceeds the presumed need for effective ontological production.     

An Experimental Study of the Anatomical Distribution of Cut Marks Created by Filleting and Disarticulation on Long Bone Ends

Analogical frameworks created through experimentation are a vital part of taphonomic studies for interpreting the archaeological record. Understanding the anatomical location of cut marks is crucial for interpreting the butchery behaviour of humans in the past, as well as for indirectly inferring the subsistence and economic function of archaeological sites. Two experimental/ethnoarchaeological studies have provided taphonomists with analogues to interpret filleting and disarticulation butchery behaviours from archaeofaunal assemblages. However, these analogues were made with limited control and both involved the use of metal knives. The present work provides the first systematic and controlled study of cut mark distribution on long bones made with stone tools, aimed at differentiating cut marks created by filleting or defleshing from those inflicted during disarticulation. It also studies the variability of cut mark distribution according to stone tool type (simple flakes, retouched flakes and handaxes). The results show some differences with previous studies made with metal tools and offer an updated analogue to interpret butchery (filleting, dismembering and skinning) from prehistoric contexts.