Cancer Mythologies: The Problem with Making Things Up is Getting Worse |
|
|| April 29: 2018: UCL News ||ά. Mistaken belief
in mythical causes of cancer is rife, according
to new research from UCL and the University of
Leeds. The findings, published in the European
Journal of Cancer, show that out of 1,330 people
in England more than 40% wrongly thought that
stress, 43% and food additives, 42%, caused
cancer. A third incorrectly believed that
electromagnetic frequencies, 35% and eating GM
food, 34%, were risk factors, while 19% thought
microwave ovens and 15% said drinking from
plastic bottles caused cancer despite a lack of
good scientific evidence.
Among the proven causes of cancer, 88% of people
correctly selected smoking, 80% picked passive
smoking and 60% said sunburn. Belief in mythical
causes of cancer did not mean a person was more
likely to have risky lifestyle habits. But
those, who had better knowledge of proven causes
were more likely not to smoke. Dr Lion Shahab,
UCL Institute of Epidemiology and Health, said,
“People’s beliefs are so important because they
have an impact on the lifestyle choices they
make. Those with better awareness of proven
causes of cancer were more likely not to smoke
and to eat more fruit and vegetables.”
Dr Samuel Smith from the University of Leeds,
said, “It’s worrying to see so many people
endorse risk factors for which there is no
convincing evidence. Compared to past research
it appears the number of people believing in
unproven causes of cancer has increased since
the start of the century, which could be a
result of changes to how we access news and
information through the internet and social
media.
It’s vital to improve public education about the
causes of cancer, if, we want to help people
make informed decisions about their lives and
ensure they aren’t worrying unnecessarily.”
Ms Clare Hyde from Cancer Research UK, said,
“Around four in 10 cancer cases could be
prevented through lifestyle changes so it’s
crucial we have the right information to help us
separate the wheat from the chaff.
Smoking, being overweight and overexposure to UV
radiation from the sun and sunbeds are the
biggest preventable causes of cancer. There is
no guarantee against getting cancer but by
knowing the biggest risk factors we can stack
the odds in our favour to help reduce our
individual risk of the disease, rather than
wasting time worrying about fake news.”
This work was supported by a Cancer Research UK
and Bupa Foundation Innovation Award. ::: ω.
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Narratives are Created: One for the Purpose of Understanding the Meaning of
Human Existence and One for the Purposes of Directing Manipulating and Herding
the Mass: That is Why There is Ethics Involved in It: That is Why Professor
Hanna Meretoja's Book The Ethics of Story Telling is Timely: Her Book is
Discussed at a Symposium at the University of East London Stratford: May 11 |
|| March 26: 2018: University of Turku News: Maria
Vasenkari Writing ||
ά.
Cultural models of sense-making shape our views about
who we are and who we could be, what is possible for us
as individuals and as communities. Professor Hanna
Meretoja’s new book, The Ethics of Storytelling,
provides us with tools for analysing cultural narrative
models and understanding the power of literary
narratives to expand our sense of the possible. The
Ethics of Storytelling was published in the book launch
organised by the Literature Departments of the
University of Turku on March 14.
Professor Meretoja’s book will be discussed at the
Centre for Narrative Research at the University of East
London, University Square, Stratford Campus, London. The
Centre organises a symposium around The Ethics of
Storytelling on May 11.
The event involves a roundtable in which the book is to
be discussed by Professor Matti Hyvärinen, Dr Maarit
Leskelä-Kärki, Professor Jakob Lothe, Professor Ann
Phoenix and Professor Brian Schiff.
The Ethics of Storytelling: Narrative Hermeneutics,
History and the Possible, a new research monograph by
Professor Hanna Meretoja, of Comparative Literature at
the University of Turku, Finland, brings into dialogue
narrative ethics, literary narrative studies, narrative
psychology, narrative philosophy and cultural memory
studies. The book was published by Oxford University
Press. The discussion on the ethical significance of
storytelling has been dominated by polarised views on
the benefits and dangers of narrative.
Against the backdrop of this debate, Professor Meretoja
develops narrative hermeneutics as a nuanced
theoretical-analytical framework for engaging with the
ethical complexity of the roles narratives play in our
lives. ''The ethical potential of literature is
crucially linked to the ways in which literary
narratives open up new possibilities of thought,
experience, action and imagination and cultivate our
awareness of and sensitivity to different
perspectives.'' Professor Meretoja argues.
The key question in the book is how literary and
historical narratives shape our sense of the possible.
''The sense of the possible refers to our sense of what
was or is possible to experience, think, feel and do in
a certain historical and cultural world. Our sense of
the possible, also, concerns our ability to imagine how
things could be otherwise.'' Professor Meretoja
explains. She argues that our sense of the possible is
shaped by the relationship between our narrative
unconscious and narrative imagination.
''Cultural narrative models shape how we perceive, for
example, good life, gender and success and they
condition our actions and attitudes without our
awareness. Literary narratives, that make such narrative
models visible can enrich our narrative imagination and
help us gain critical distance from culturally available
narrative identities.
Professor Meretoja analyses literary and
autobiographical narratives, that deal with 20th century
historical traumas. Most important of these narratives
are Julia Franck’s The Blind Side of the Heart 2007,
Günter Grass’s Peeling the Onion 2006, Jonathan
Littell’s The Kindly Ones 2007 and David Grossman’s To
the End of the Land 2008 and Falling Out of Time 2011.
''In dialogue with these narratives, I address our
implication in violent histories and argue that it is as
dialogic storytellers, fundamentally, vulnerable and
dependent on one another, where we become who we are,
both as individuals and communities.''' Professpr
Meretoja summarises.
The legacy of the Holocaust and the Second World War
shows the dangerous power of storytelling. ''The Nazis
built a mythology, that provided the Germans with a
strong narrative identity as 'Aryans' but, at the same
time, it, drastically, diminished the possibilities of
the Jews and several other minorities to the point of
denying them the right to live. In the book, the
European legacy of fascism is discussed in relation to
more recent political turmoil, such as, the
Israel-Palestine conflict and the rise of right-wing
populist narratives.
''In order to understand the atrocities of the past,
such as, the Holocaust, and contemporary terrorism, we
should, instead of demonising the evil-doers, try to
imagine not only the perspectives and experiential world
of the victims but, also, that of the perpetrators and
various implicated subjects. Only then can we properly
engage with the conditions, that made the atrocities
possible.
The book develops a heuristic model for evaluating the
ethical potential and dangers of different kinds of
narratives. It provides six evaluative continuums on
which narratives can be placed. These continuums explore
whether narratives i: expand or diminish our sense of
the possible; ii: develop or distort our
self-understanding; iii: promote or impair our ability
to understand the experiences of others in their
singularity; iv: participate in building inclusive or
exclusive narrative in-betweens; v: cultivate or impede
our perspective-awareness and vi: function as a form of
ethical inquiry or dogmatism. Instead of binaries, these
are differentiating continuums on which different
narrative practices can be placed. They provide us with
analytic tools to engage with the narrative dimension of
human existence in all its complexity.
On February 06, the Narrative Research Special Interest
Group of the American Educational Research
Association:AERA awarded Professor Hanna Meretoja the
Early Career Award for her 'substantive contributions
and commitment to narrative research' and for 'her work
with a large cohort of graduate students'. The award is
designed to 'recognize a researcher’s outstanding
accomplishment in the area of narrative research'.
Caption: Centre image of Professor Hanna Meretoja by
Maria Vasenkari
Further information on the book
:: The text is Creative Commons licensed and it is free
to use. Please attribute the work to the University of
Turku::
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Trafficking and Migration Continue From St Patrick's Time:
Actually Migration Began When Adam and Eve Were Thrown Out of Eden Onto the
Earth: What was Jesus Christ Himself If Not a Refugee and Most Importantly
Unless Humanity and Compassion Were Shown to Mary and Joseph What Would Have
Happened to Jesus: We Want to Make Things Sound Modern and Post Modern and Ultra
Modern So We Invent Things Such as Migration This and Trafficking That: How Did
Slavery Get Started and Spread Unless It was Originated From Trafficking
|
|| March 16: 2018: University College Cork News ||
ά.
People trafficking, war, famine and displacement of
people are not unique to the 21st century as in the
fifth century, when St Patrick was trafficked to
Ireland, where his life was one of hardship and
migration according to Dr Piaras Mac Éinrí, migration
expert at University College Cork. St Patrick’s life
story is known through his own extraordinary
autobiographical account, The Confessio. ''My name is
Patrick. I am a sinner, a simple country person and the
least of all believers. I am looked down upon by many.
My father was Calpornius. He was a deacon; his father
was Potitus, a priest, who lived at Bannavem Taburniae.
His home was near there and that is where I was taken
prisoner.
I was about sixteen at the time.…I was taken into
captivity in Ireland, along with thousands of others.
…The Lord brought his strong anger upon us and scattered
us among many nations even to the ends of the earth.''
''The 21st century is seeing new waves of people
displaced by war, famine and climate change. “Indeed, it
would be fair to describe migration as one of the
existential challenges of the age.” says Dr Mac Éinrí,
Department of Geography and Institute for Social Science
in the 21st Century at UCC. So far, we are not handling
it with great success in Ireland or the EU Dr Mac Éinrí
rightly points out. “Barriers are going up everywhere
and people are, even, being denied their legal right to
seek refuge.
Racism and xenophobia are stronger now than at any time
since the 1930s.” he says. “The Irish record in the
diaspora is not always the best either. Imagine, if, we
were at the receiving end?” poses Dr Mac Éinrí. “We
were, once, as on June 20, 1631, a pirate raiding party
kidnapped over 100 English and Irish people from the
village of Baltimore in West Cork and took them to a
life of slavery in North Africa. Some spent their days
as galley slaves, others became prisoners of the Sultan.
At most, three of them saw Ireland again.
The Pope’s comments on trafficking in February this year
are worthy of note.” Dr Mac Éinrí says. The Pope told
his weekly general audience, ''Having few possible legal
channels, many migrants decide to risk other avenues,
where often there awaits abuse of every kind,
exploitation and slavery.”
Criminal organisations specialised in trafficking people
take advantage of migratory flows 'to hide their victims
among migrants and refugees' he added. In an appeal, the
Pope invited everyone to 'join forces to prevent
trafficking and guarantee protection and assistance to
victims'. He prayed to give 'those suffering because of
this shameful scourge the hope to regain freedom'.
“These words should resonate in the Irish context.” Dr
Mac Éinrí says. “The more than one million Irish, who
fled famine and disease in the mid-19th century, at
least, had places to go. Even, if, they were sometimes
received grudgingly, calls to ‘build that wall!’, if,
there were any, went unheeded. Their circumstances were
miserable but they were not denounced as murderers,
thieves and rapists by the highest politicians of the
day.'' Dr
Mac Éinrí says.
“Ultimately, they were seen as downtrodden people, who
hauled themselves out of hardship and made something out
of themselves wherever they went, without losing a sense
of their own culture, history and identity. That is
something we can celebrate.” says Dr Mac Éinrí. “But we
should, also, recognise our present-day responsibilities
in a wider world, where we are no longer at the bottom
of the ladder. Even, in Ireland itself, people are still
being trafficked, whether into the sex industry or into
forms of labour undertaken in appalling and oppressive
conditions. In all cases, someone, somewhere knows of
these abuses and does not act.
Perhaps, as well as, stressing the centrality of
migration as a ‘constant feature of the Irish
experience’ we should, also, attend, rather more
seriously, to the ongoing and brutal reality of human
trafficking and forced migration as a constant feature
of human experience. In so doing, we could more fully
embrace Patrick’s legacy and our own place and
responsibilities in today’s world.”
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Earliest Cave Paintings Were Made by Neanderthals: New Reseach |
|| February 26: 2018: University of Southampton News
|| ά. Scientists have found the first major evidence,
that Neanderthals made cave paintings, indicating, they, may,
have had an artistic sense similar to our own. A new study, led
by the University of Southampton and the Max Planck Institute
for Evolutionary Anthropology shows that paintings in three
caves in Spain were created more than 64,000 years ago, 20,000
years before modern humans arrived in Europe. This means that
the Palaeolithic, Ice Age, cave art, including, pictures of
animals, dots and geometric signs, must, have been made by
Neanderthals, a ‘parallel’ species to Homo sapiens and Europe’s
sole human inhabitants at the time.
The research, also, indicates that the Neanderthals, may, have
had a similar artistic sense, in terms of thinking symbolically,
to modern humans. Published in the journal Science, the study
shows how an international team of scientists used an advanced
technique, called, uranium-thorium dating to fix the age of the
paintings as more than 64,000 years. Until now, cave art has
been attributed entirely to modern humans, as claims to a
possible Neanderthal origin have been hampered by imprecise
dating techniques. However, uranium-thorium dating provides much
more reliable results than methods, such as, radiocarbon dating,
which can give false age estimates.
The uranium-thorium method involves dating tiny carbonate
deposits, that have built up on top of the cave paintings. These
contain traces of the radioactive elements uranium and thorium,
which indicate when the deposits formed and, therefore, give a
minimum age for whatever lies beneath.
Joint Lead Author Dr Chris Standish, an Archaeologist at the
University of Southampton, said, “This is an incredibly exciting
discovery, which suggests Neanderthals were much more
sophisticated than is popularly believed. Our results show that
the paintings we dated are, by far, the oldest known cave art in
the world and were created at least 20,000 years before modern
humans arrived in Europe from Africa, therefore, they, must,
have been painted by Neanderthals.”
A team of researchers from the UK, Germany, Spain and France
analysed more than 60 carbonate samples from three cave sites in
Spain, La Pasiega, north-eastern Spain, Maltravieso, western
Spain and Ardales, south-western Spain. All three caves contain
red, ochre or black paintings of groups of animals, dots and
geometric signs, as well as, hand stencils, hand prints and
engravings.
According to the researchers, creating the art, must, have
involved such sophisticated behaviour as the choosing of a
location, planning of light source and mixing of pigments.
Professor Alistair Pike, of Archaeological Sciences at the
University of Southampton and Co-director of the study, said,
“Soon after the discovery of the first of their fossils in the
19th century, Neanderthals were portrayed as brutish and
uncultured, incapable of art and symbolic behaviour and some of
these views persist today.
The issue of just how human-like Neanderthals behaved is a hotly
debated issue. Our findings will make a significant contribution
to that debate.” Joint Lead Author Dirk Hoffmann, of the Max
Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, said that
symbolic material culture, a collection of cultural and
intellectual achievements handed down from generation to
generation, has, until now, only been attributed to our species.
The emergence of symbolic material culture represents a
fundamental threshold in the evolution of humankind. It is one
of the main pillars of what makes us human. Artefacts whose
functional value lies not so much in their practical but rather
in their symbolic use are proxies for fundamental aspects of
human cognition as we know it.”
Early symbolic artefacts, dating back 70,000 years, have been
found in Africa but are associated with modern humans. Other
artefacts, including, cave art, sculpted figures, decorated bone
tools and jewellery have been found in Europe, dating back
40,000 years ago. But researchers have concluded that these
artefacts, must, have been created by modern humans, who were
spreading across Europe after their arrival from Africa.
There is evidence that Neanderthals in Europe used body
ornamentation around 40,000 to 45,000 years ago but many
researchers have suggested this was inspired by modern humans,
who, at the time, had just arrived in Europe.
Study Co-author Mr Paul Pettitt, of Durham University, said,
“Neanderthals created meaningful symbols in meaningful places.
The art is not a one-off accident. We have examples in three
caves 700km apart and evidence that it was a long-lived
tradition. It is quite possible that similar cave art in other
caves in Western Europe is of Neanderthal origin, as well.”
The research was supported by the Natural Environment Research
Council, the National Geographic Society, the Max Planck Society
and a Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award.
Caption: Colour enhanced image of
three Neanderthal hand stencils, centre right, centre top and
top left: Image: H.Collado:
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Witches Witches Bewitching All: Kill 'Em One and Kill 'Em
All: But Why Sir May I Venture to Ask: For They Practise Dark Arts: But Sir Beg
I for You to Show Me What Dark Arts Are: Need I Not Bother for I Say So |
|| November 04: 2017: University of Southampton News
|| ά. The fear of witchcraft was rife in Exeter in the
late 16th and early 17th centuries, according to new research
from the University of Southampton, which has showed the extent
of court cases and executions in the Devon city over a 100-year
period. Historian Professor Mark Stoyle has discovered that
Exeter was not only the last place in England, where people were
hanged for practising ‘dark arts’, but that these were just the
last in a series of executions, which, may have, begun as early
as 1566. In fact, Exeter, may have, been one of the first places
in the kingdom to sentence a witch to death. New evidence shows
that, between the accession of Queen Elizabeth I in 1558 and the
accession of King Charles II in 1660, more than 20 local women
and men were accused of being ‘witches’ or ‘sorcerers’ and
denounced to the local magistrates. Many of these individuals
were believed to possess ‘familiar spirits’: demons in the shape
of small animals, like rats and toads, which unleashed their
evil powers to ‘waste’ both livestock and humans on the witches’
behalf.
“It’s long been known that Exeter witnessed the last English
witch-executions.” says Professor Stoyle. “In 1683, three
elderly women from North Devon, Temperance Lloyd, Susannah
Edwards and Mary Trembles, were hanged at Heavitree Gallows,
while in 1685, another Devon woman, Alice Molland, was sentenced
to death at the Exeter Assizes. What we didn’t realise before
was that further alleged witches were, also, executed in Exeter
over the preceding 100 years.” And here is the most fundamental
point, it is time, that these historical terrible injustices are
acknowledged as such and these very souls, that have been
'murdered' are declared innocent. Why is it necessary, because
as a civic society, it is necessary, not to eradicate the past,
which can not and must not be done, but accept and show that,
even, when current society can not rectify the injustices but it
can acknowledge and declare the innocent slaughtered to be
innocent so that their names exist in posterity as innocent
human beings, who were terribly and utterly violated by a
society, that did the highest harm to them by killing them.
Professor Stoyle said, “The world-famous witch trials at
Salem, in colonial America, have been the subject of many books
and films, as has the mass witch-hunt led by Matthew Hopkins,
the so-called Witch-finder General, in East Anglia in the UK
between 1645 and 1647. Yet, it’s too rarely appreciated that
there were other centres of witch-prosecution in Tudor and
Stuart England as well. In Exeter, there was a long succession
of indictments and prosecutions during the 16th and 17th
centuries, which resulted in many unlucky women and men being
banished, imprisoned or sent to the gallows.''
Witchcraft in Exeter: 1558-1660.
Sourced from centuries-old court records, manuscript chronicles
and registers of births, marriages and deaths, it charts the
progress of each case of alleged ‘witchcraft’ from accusation to
ultimate sentence.
Among the cases highlighted is one, which occurred soon after a
Parliamentary statute of 1563 first decreed that those convicted
of using ‘conjurations, enchantments and witchcrafts’ should
suffer the death penalty. Two local women, Maud Park and Alice
Mead, appeared before the city court in 1566 and were charged
with causing death and physical injury through the exercise of
‘magic art’. Park and Mead were both found guilty, and although,
no record of their execution survives, if they did, indeed, fall
victim to the noose, as seems all too likely, than they were
among the first people in England to be executed for witchcraft
following the passage of the statute.
Further hangings of witches certainly took place in the city
soon after this case. In 1585, for example, an Exeter woman
named, Thomasine Shorte was convicted of killing the entire
family of an unfortunate local weaver through the exercise of
the ‘black arts’ and was executed at the city gallows. Then, in
1609, an Exeter labourer named Richard Wilkyns was, likewise,
hanged, after having been convicted of killing and hurting both
people and livestock through witchcraft.
Other cases discussed in the book include those of Mary Stone,
an Exeter widow, who in 1620 was accused of killing chickens,
infesting a household with lice and killing a man by bewitching
him, causing him to fall from a field stile. She was, also,
alleged to have commanded a familiar, in the shape of a rat, to
spy on a woman and ‘do her harm’. Similarly, accused of
conspiring with familiars was Joan Baker, whom witnesses claimed
kept toads in a pot and who was, even, seen with a toad sitting
in her lap. It’s believed Stone somehow escaped a death sentence
and continued to live among her suspicious neighbours. The fate
of Baker, who appeared in court in 1653, is unknown.
Professor Stoyle’s research provides numerous other individual
stories of black magic, sorcery, curses and alleged murder,
which combine to tell an intriguing tale, shedding powerful new
light on occult belief in Tudor and Stuart Exeter and on the
dark, uneasy world of the urban ‘witch’.
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Researchers Look Into the Meaning of Ancient Geometric Earth-Works in South
Western Amazonia |

Jacó Sá and Seu Chiquinho
sites featuring circular, square and
U-shaped earthworks. Geometric patterns
provided people with qualities, such as,
knowledge and power. Image: Sanna
Saunaluoma |
|
|| August 30:
2017: University of Helsinki News:
Pirjo Kristiina Virtanen Suvi
Uotinen and Karin Hannukainen
Writing || ά. |
|
Researchers examinepre-colonial geometric
earthworks in the south-western Amazonia from the point of
view of indigenous peoples and archaeology. The study shows
that the earthworks were once important ritual communication
spaces. The geometric earthworks, found in this region of
Amazonia have raised the interest within the scientific
community, as well as, the media and the general public and
they have been explored recently by several international
research teams. These unique archaeological sites have been
labelled as, the Geoglyphs of Acre, as most of them are
located in the Brazilian State of Acre.
Nearly 500 sites have already been
registered and have been included on the Brazilian State
Party's Tentative List for inscription on the UNESCO World
Heritage List. The construction period and use, span the
time period of approximately 3000-1000 BP. The earthwork
ditches form geometric patterns, such as, squares, circles,
U-forms, ellipses and octagons. They can be several meters
deep and enclose areas of hundreds of square meters. Dr
Pirjo Kristiina Virtanen, Assistant Professor of Indigenous
Studies at the University of Helsinki, Finland, has
conducted research with indigenous peoples in the study area
for a long time.
Dr Sanna Saunaluoma, Post Doctoral
researcher at the São Paulo University, Brazil, is
specialised in Amazonian archaeology and made her doctoral
dissertation on Acre's earthwork sites. Their article
published in the American Anthropologist, 2017, already in
early view, examines pre-colonial geometric earthworks from
the point of view of indigenous peoples and archaeology.
The study shows that the sites were once important ritual
spaces where, through the geometric designs, certain members
of the community communicated with various beings of the
environment, such as, ancestor spirits, animals and
celestial bodies. Thus, people were constantly reminded that
human life was intertwined with the environment and previous
generations. People did not distinguish themselves from
nature, but non-humans enabled and produced life.
The geometric earthwork sites were, especially, used by the
experts of that era, who specialised in the interaction with
the non-human beings. The sites were important for members
of the community at certain stages of life and the various
geometric patterns acted as 'doors' and 'paths' to gain the
knowledge and strength of the different beings of the
environment. Visualisation and active interactions with
non-human beings were constructive for these communities.
The geometric patterns inspired by characteristics and skin
patterns of animals still materialise the thinking of
indigenous people of Amazonia, and are, also, present in
their modern pottery, fabrics, jewelry and arts. As the
theories of Amerindian visual art, also, show, geometric
patterns can provide people with desired qualities and
abilities, such as, fertility, resistance, knowledge and
power.
Contemporary indigenous peoples of Acre still protect
earthwork sites as sacred places and, unlike other Brazilian
residents in the area, avoid using the sites for mundane
activities, such as, housing or agriculture, and therefore,
protect these peculiar ancient remains in their own way.
Contact: Dr. Pirjo Kristiina Virtanen, Assistant Professor:
Indigenous Studies: University of Helsinki, Finland: Tel.
+358 50 318 2400, pirjo.virtanen at helsinki.fi:
ω.
Whatever Your Field of
Work and Wherever in the World You are, Please, Make a Choice to Do All You Can
to Seek and Demand the End of Death Penalty For It is Your Business What is Done
in Your Name. The Law That Makes Humans Take Part in Taking Human Lives and That
Permits and Kills Human Lives is No Law. It is the Rule of the Jungle Where Law
Does Not Exist.
The Humanion |
|
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Oh How the Same Death Connected Us
Together as Life Except We Do Not Accept the Connection in Life
So That We Fall Victims to Famines: Famine in Ireland and
Finland and the Search for Famine Monuments

The memorial in Iisalmi and Ronan Newby. Kuva: Andrew Newby
|| July 09: 2017: University of Helsinki News:
Pia Purra
Writing
|| ά. Famine killed nearly one-tenth of the Finnish
population 150 years ago. Academy Research Fellow Andrew Newby has toured the
country, mapping monuments erected to memorialise the famine. So far he has
found 78. On the winter solstice in December 2016, the Espoo-dwelling Irish
native Mr Andrew Newby found himself in Sonkajärvi cemetery in Eastern Finland
with a shovel and a flashlight. It was only two thirty in the afternoon, but it
was already pitch black. The historian was digging in the snow to find a
monument for the famine years. He did realise he was quite the sight for any
passers-by.
However, Mr Newby was not indulging in a macabre hobby, but surveying monuments
for his research project 'Famine in Ireland and Finland'. As part of the
project, Newby travels around Finland, looking for monuments of the famine. “I
originally became interested in the monuments because I noticed there were none.
In Ireland there are so many monuments to the Great Famine, that you can’t miss
them. There are, also, monuments to the Great Famine everywhere in the world, as
it is linked closely to Irish emigration.” Mr Andrew Newby explains. The famine
years of the 1860s caused a major population disaster in Finland, just like the
Irish famine did in Ireland. While the Irish famine stemmed from potato blight,
Finland’s was the result of several consecutive years of failed crops. The worst
years were 1867 and 68, i.e, 150 years ago.
“The famine is not a part of Finland’s national narrative in the same way as it
is in Ireland. The anniversary years of the famine are, also, inevitably
overshadowed by bigger events, such as, Finland’s centenary this year. My son’s
trackand-field hobby has required trips to different parts of Finland, to areas
I would probably never have otherwise visited. To pass the time, I went to the
cemeteries of villages in Ostrobothnia and found monuments of the famine there.
I realised that even though they, may be, no national monument, there are many
local ones.” Mr Newby explains.
He began systematically surveying the monuments two years ago. Andrew Newby has
gone through archives, poured over old newspapers and talked to people. He has
found the Suomen muistomerkit book and the archives of the Finnish National
Board of Antiquities, particularly, helpful, as they led him to approximately 30
monuments. Geo-caching has, also, proved to be useful for the researcher, as
caches are often hidden near monuments.
“So far I’ve found 78 monuments to the famine around Finland. I haven’t had the
chance to visit all of them yet, but the plan is to photograph every one.
Sometimes it’s not easy to find the monuments. For example, I was at a cemetery
in Ristiina and I knew there was a monument there, I even had a photo of it. But
during the wintry day I spent looking, I couldn’t find it. I’ll have to go back
to Ristiina.”
The monuments are most common in the areas where mortality was the highest:
Ostrobothnia, Satakunta, Northern Karelia and along the railway connection
between Riihimäki and St Petersburg. The tracks were constructed as a form of
emergency aid. The oldest monuments are in Varkaus and Iisalmi, and the biggest
one is in Lahti. Several monuments were erected in 1967, the centenary of the
famine.
Monument research is not without its dangers. Driving on a
partially frozen road in spring around southern Ostrobothnia or Satakunta, Mr
Newby’s car hit a soft shoulder, flipped and landed in a ditch. A passer by
stopped and alerted a local farmer, who arrived with his tractor to pull the car
back onto the road.
“I tried to tell them that I was from abroad and unused to gravel roads and that
we don’t have ditches like that in Ireland. But the locals didn’t seem to care
that I was Irish, they found it hilarious that a man from Espoo had wound up in
a ditch.”
ω.
Further reading
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So Tell Us About Sami

|| June 25: 2017: University of Helsinki News:
Reetta
Toivanen Writing
|| ά.
International negotiations on human rights gives the Sami people the
opportunity to make their voices heard outside Finland. But how can
international agreements be amended to suit their specific, local situation? The
attempts of Finnish Sami to protect their traditional livelihoods have led to
appeals to the United Nations Human Rights Council. United Nations Special
Rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples Ms Victoria Tauli-Corpuz was
among the representatives expressing their grave concerns on the draft natural
resources management legislation and its negative impact on people with
traditional livelihoods. However, the Finnish Parliament approved the law as
such, with no heed to national or international criticism.
The problem with the International Labour Organisation’s Indigenous and Tribal
Peoples’ Convention and the Nordic Saami Convention, which is currently under
negotiation, lie in the land-use rights of the Finnish government. The
government wants to own the lands in Lapland and exploit its riches.
Consequently, politicians give lip service to the Sami: while they are
encouraged to get involved, they are given no opportunity to make a real
difference in political decision-making. Finland wants to be considered a
forerunner in minority rights. Therefore the Sami have been recognised as an
indigenous people, they have been granted cultural autonomy, and the Parliament
of Finland must hear the Sami. Finland is committed to arranging the Sami issue
according to international human rights norms and to clearing away the factors
that have prevented the ratification of ILO’s Indigenous and Tribal Peoples’
Convention.
For more than 28 years, one Finnish government after another has strived towards
this goal without coming any closer to actually reaching it. International human
rights agreements are drafted and approved far removed from our daily lives.
They are based on the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights from
1948, which is founded on equality and freedom from discrimination. In our
modern world, no place, time or situation exists in isolation. Consequently, the
Sami find themselves amidst a complex web of issues where global markets
intertwine with political discourse. Local interpretations of human rights are
based on personal experiences, local histories and expressions of power between
groups of people.
The interests of the Sami have not been presented on public forums on their own
terms. The political identity of the Sami began to take hold when the Sami began
to work together with the world's other indigenous peoples. This co-operation
emphasised awareness of long-term oppression caused by governmental assimilation
efforts, which sought to absorb the indigenous culture into majority society.
In his 1974 work Power: A Radical View, Steven Lukes describes the strongest
form of power as one that is nearly impossible to identify as such. It’s
important to try to understand the context, in which, the language of
international law is used. That way it becomes possible to recognise the
motivations for singling out individual sections from international agreements
for rhetorical use.
The Finnish Sami have developed their own strategies to function in Finnish
society. The interests of the Sami have not been presented on public forums on
their own terms. For example, Sami fishermen have been all but ignored, as the
dominant stereotype of the Sami involves reindeer husbandry. Forty years ago,
Erik Allardt wrote his observations on the Finnish myth of unity in his book Att
ha, att älska, att vara. Finns cling to this myth as they believe it will help
achieve a conflict-free society.
Thus, it is unsurprising that in an opinion poll from 2007, Finns identified
'equality' as the word, that best describes Finland. The myth of the equal
distribution of power is strong. To protect their livelihood, many people
involved in reindeer husbandry learned to invoke international human rights
clauses. If the Sami were included in this principle of equality, they would
have to be heard in matters where their involvement would erode the myth of
unity.
This could solve the lawless situation of the Sami, who lack
full indigenous status. The Sami Parliament might make their policies more open
to the people most damaged by the government's intense assimilationist policies.
Two parties are typically blamed for the failure of Finland’s Sami politics: the
Sami themselves, who do not promote their own rights with sufficient vigour and
the municipalities in the Sami regions, who refuse to allocate funding to the
Sami. However, the real culprit, the Finnish government, who is officially
responsible for Sami rights, claims to have no say in the matter.
In such a case, the language of international human rights, may, provide crucial
tools to change the situation. This happened in the Nellim forest conflict,
where Metsähallitus was about to destroy an area in northern Lapland, which was
a vitally important winter grazing ground for reindeer, with no respect for
international agreements. To protect their livelihood, the people involved in
reindeer husbandry learned to invoke international human rights clauses. Thanks
to this, the deforestation project was recognised as a human rights problem and,
thus, an issue to be handled by the international community.
Human rights rhetoric has tremendous potential for making voices heard. At the
same time, it carries a significant risk, as legal language carries the
expectations of people as representatives of specific cultures. In these cases,
it is important, which definitions are restrictive and which are liberating.
ω.
:
Reetta Toivanen: Reetta Toivanen, docent, university
lecturer in social and cultural anthropology, University of Helsinki:
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to Seek and Demand the End of Death Penalty For It is Your Business What is Done
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Permits and Kills Human Lives is No Law. It is the Rule of the Jungle Where Law
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Look Not for the Bones: Seek for the DNA: To Know That We
Were There: The Neanderthals

Image: Bournemouth Universtiy
|| April 29: 2017: Bournemouth University News || ά.
DNA from sediment at known archaeological sites has confirmed the
presence of Neanderthal remains, even when no bones are present, for the
first time. Researchers from Bournemouth University were part of a
multinational team, which collected and analysed 85 sedimentary samples from
nine established archaeological sites with known hominin occupation.
The research, led by Viviane Slon, Matthias Meyer and Svante Paabo of the
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, investigated whether
hominin DNA, may, survive in sediments at archaeological sites, known to
have been occupied by ancient hominins. The Bournemouth Associate Professor
John Stewart and PhD student Monika Knul, alongside site Director Dr Rebecca
Miller from the University of Liège, took samples from the Trou Al’Wesse
cave site in Belgium, the only site in the study with no Neanderthal
remains.
DNA recovered from the sediment there now provides direct evidence for the
past occupation of the site by Neanderthals. Dr Stewart said, “This is
exciting because we have actually managed to find evidence of humans without
the actual bones themselves. We have found, what are effectively,
Neanderthal remains, but biochemical rather than physical remains.” “This
highlights the fact that we can still get human genetic information out of
sedimentary evidence, if you don’t have the Neanderthal bones themselves.
“It can, also, help confirm theories around items like the stone tools that
had been found at the site, as there was still some ambiguity around who
lived there.
DNA is often better than bones and findings like this are
important in trying to understand how and when Neanderthals became extinct and
when modern humans arrived.”
The study detected sedimentary Neanderthal remains at three other sites in Spain
and Russia. Skeletal remains of ancient hominins are rare and so evidence of
Neanderthal occupation is often restricted to artefacts and other traces of
human activity, such as bones with cut marks.
The research, published in Science today, demonstrates the feasibility of
extracting DNA from sedimentary samples to confirm the presence of ancient
hominins, even when no bones or other physical remains are found.
“By retrieving hominin DNA from sediments, we can detect the presence of hominin
groups at sites and in areas, where this cannot be achieved with other
methods.”, said Svante Pääbo, Director of the Evolutionary Genetics department
at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology and co-author of the
study.
“This shows that DNA analyses of sediments are a very useful archaeological
procedure, which, may, become routine in the future.”
ω.
Whatever Your Field of
Work and Wherever in the World You are, Please, Make a Choice to Do All You Can
to Seek and Demand the End of Death Penalty For It is Your Business What is Done
in Your Name. The Law That Makes Humans Take Part in Taking Human Lives and That
Permits and Kills Human Lives is No Law. It is the Rule of the Jungle Where Law
Does Not Exist.
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Discover and Decipher: The Lost Writing of the Inkas: What
Did They Write About

Collata coloured khipu cords. Image: University
of St Andrews
|| April 21: 2017: University of St Andrews News || ά.
The lost 'written' language of the Inkas, which used twists of
coloured animal hair rather than ink and paper, has been partially deciphered by
an anthropologist at the University of St Andrews, potentially shedding light on
the mysterious South American civilisation. Dr Sabine Hyland, of the School of
Philosophy, Anthropology and Film Studies at the University, has managed to
translate the meaning of some names recorded on these twisted cords, which are
known as 'khipus'.
This discovery opens up the possibility of deciphering the mysterious Inka
string writing, which would dramatically increase the current understanding of
Inka civilization, the largest indigenous empire of the Americas. It had already
been established that the khipus, which are made using cotton or different
coloured fibre from animals, such as alpacas, llamas and deer, were used by the
Inkas to record numerical accounts but until recently, there was no evidence
that they had been used to record narratives.
However, Dr Hyland has now discovered that the khipus were used in a
logosyllabic system like Classic Mayan, where each logo, in this case a, khipu
pendant cord, represents a phonetic syllable, the first evidence that the Inkas
possessed phonetic writing.
She has managed to phonetically decipher two lineage names on the khipus so far
and is continuing field and archival research to decipher the rest. Dr Hyland
was able to make her discovery after being granted the rare opportunity to
examine two logosyllabic khipus, guarded by residents of the remote village of
San Juan de Collata in the Peruvian Andes, in research funded by the National
Geographic Society.
Village authorities invited Hyland to examine their khipus, which were created
in the 18th century as letters exchanged by local leaders in a revolt against
Spanish authority and are the only Andean phonetic khipus ever identified.
The Collata khipus, as they are known, contrast sharply with the regional
accounting, khipus. They are the first ever reliably identified as narrative
epistles by the descendants of their creators and indicate a widespread, shared
writing system, used in the Huarochiri province in the 18th century.
Analysis of the khipus showed that they contained 95 different symbols, a
quantity within the range of logosyllabic writing systems and notably, more
symbols than in regional accounting khipus. At the end of each khipu, three-cord
sequences of distinct colours, fibres and ply direction appear to represent
lineage, 'ayllu' names.
The Collata khipus express syllables in a profoundly Andean fashion, using
differences among the fibres of various animals, such as vicuña, alpaca and deer
to indicate meaning. The reader must often feel the cords by hand to distinguish
the fibre sources of these three-dimensional texts.
Collata khipus share unique structural features with Inka animal fibre khipus,
underscoring the continuity between Inka woollen khipus and the Collata ones.
The epistolary khipus of Collata indicate that Andean khipus could constitute an
intelligible writing system.
ω.
Whatever Your Field of
Work and Wherever in the World You are, Please, Make a Choice to Do All You Can
to Seek and Demand the End of Death Penalty For It is Your Business What is Done
in Your Name. The Law That Makes Humans Take Part in Taking Human Lives and That
Permits and Kills Human Lives is No Law. It is the Rule of the Jungle Where Law
Does Not Exist.
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And the Bones were Raised and Despite the
Fact That They Turned Earthen They Still Spoke the Truth: That
Education is the Only Enlightenment That Will Light up Human
Souls and Regardless of What Age We Live Without It We Will
Still Seek to Send People to the Stake

Image: University of Southampton
|| April 04: 2017: University of Southampton News || ά.
A new scientific study of medieval human bones, excavated from a
deserted English village, suggests that the corpses they comes from were burnt
and mutilated. Researchers from the University of Southampton and Historic
England believe that this was carried out by villagers, who believed that it
would stop the corpses rising from their graves and menacing the living. The
team found that many of the bones from Wharram Percy in North Yorkshire showed
knife-marks, suggesting the bodies had been decapitated and dismembered.
Additionally, there was evidence of the burning of body parts and deliberate
breaking of some bones after death.
The findings are published in an article in the Journal of Archaeological
Science Reports. The research was led by Simon Mays, Human Skeletal Biologist at
Historic England, working in collaboration with
Professor Alistair Pike, Professor of
Archaeological Sciences at the University of Southampton. In medieval times,
there was a folk-belief that corpses could rise from their graves and roam the
local area, spreading disease and violently assaulting those unlucky enough to
encounter them. Restless corpses were usually thought to be caused by a
lingering malevolent life-force in individuals, who had committed evil deeds or
created animosity when living.
Medieval writers describe a number of ways of dealing with revenants, one of
which was to dig up the offending corpse, decapitate and dismember it and burn
the pieces in a fire. Perhaps the bones from Wharram Percy were parts of bodies,
that were mutilated and burnt because of medieval fears of corpses rising from
their graves. The researchers considered other theories but this explanation
appears to be the most consistent with the alterations observed on the bones.
In some
societies, people may be treated in unusual ways after death because they are
viewed as outsiders. However, analysis of strontium isotopes in the teeth showed
this was not the reason in this case. Professor Alistair Pike, who directed the
isotopic analysis, explains, “Strontium isotopes in teeth reflect the geology on
which an individual was living as their teeth formed in childhood.
A match
between the isotopes in the teeth and the geology around Wharram Percy suggests
they grew up in an area close to where they were buried, possibly in the
village. This was surprising to us, as we first wondered if the unusual
treatment of the bodies might relate to their being from further afield, rather
than local.”
Famines were quite common in medieval times, so another possibility might be
that the remains were of corpses, that had been cannibalised by starving
villagers. However, the evidence did not seem to fit. For example, in
cannibalism, knife marks on bone tend to cluster around major muscle attachments
or large joints but at Wharram Percy the knife marks were not at these locations
but mainly in the head and neck area.
Simon Mays concludes, “The idea that the Wharram Percy bones are the remains of
corpses burnt and dismembered to stop them walking from their graves seems to
fit the evidence best. If we are right, then this is the first good
archaeological evidence we have for this practice. It shows us a dark side of
medieval beliefs and provides a graphic reminder of how different the medieval
view of the world was from our own.”
The bones come from the deserted medieval village of Wharram Percy, North
Yorkshire, a site managed by English Heritage. There was a total of 137 bones
representing the mixed remains of at least ten individuals. They were buried in
a pit in the settlement part of the site. They date from the 11th-14th centuries
AD. ω.
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Work and Wherever in the World You are, Please, Make a Choice to Do All You Can
to Seek and Demand the End of Death Penalty For It is Your Business What is Done
in Your Name. The Law That Makes Humans Take Part in Taking Human Lives and That
Permits and Kills Human Lives is No Law. It is the Rule of the Jungle Where Law
Does Not Exist.
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Digging Into Archaeology Into Palaentology
to Arise at Anthropology to Find It Still is Humanity: New DNA
Research Shows the True Migration Route of Early Farming in
Europe 8,000 Years Ago: That Challenges Previous Theories

|| March 31: 2017: University of Huddersfield News || ά.
University of
Huddersfield researchers confirm that the spread of agriculture
throughout Europe followed migration into the Mediterranean from the Near East,
thousands of years earlier than widely believed. A New article co-authored by
experts at the University of Huddersfield bolsters a theory that the spread of
agriculture throughout Europe followed migration into the Mediterranean from the
Near East more than 13,000 years ago, thousands of years earlier than widely
believed.
This was during the Late Glacial period and initially the migrants were
hunter-gatherers. But they later developed a knowledge of agriculture from
further newly-arrived populations from the Near East, where farming began and
during the Neolithic, approximately 8,000 years ago, they began to colonise
other parts of Europe, taking their farming practices with them. The University
of Huddersfield is home to the Archaeogenetics Research Group, which uses DNA
analysis to solve questions from archaeology, anthropology and history. It is
headed by Professor Martin Richards and the issue of the genetic ancestry
of Europeans has been one of his major research areas for many years.
Now he is a principal contributor to the article that appears in Proceedings of
the Royal Society B. It describes how the researchers used almost 1,500
mitochondrial genome lineages to date the arrival of people in different regions
of Europe. It was found that in central Europe and Iberia, these could mainly be
traced to the Neolithic. However, in the central and eastern Mediterranean, they
predominantly dated to the much earlier Late Glacial period.
The authors write, “This supports a scenario, in which the genetic pool of
Mediterranean Europe was partly a result of Late Glacial expansions from a Near
Eastern refuge and that this formed an important source pool for subsequent
Neolithic expansions into the rest of Europe”.
Professor Richards explained that he and his co-researchers had carried out
their latest investigations using modern DNA samples because in Italy and Greece
there was an acute shortage of pre-Neolithic skeletal remains, from which
ancient samples can be taken. The warmth of the climate has resulted in low
levels of preservation.
“We haven’t been able to fill the gap with ancient DNA, so we
found a way to get round that by looking at modern samples. Instead of dating
the lineages across Europe as a whole, we have dated them firstly in the
Mediterranean area and then we have looked at what happens if you assume that
they have arrived in that area and then moved on.” said Professor Richards.
Now he hopes that new sources of ancient DNA in Italy and Greece will be
discovered, so that his migration scenario can be tested more directly. “In the
past, it’s been difficult to recover DNA from these kinds of environments but
there have been so many technical developments in the recovery of ancient DNA in
the last few years that I think it will happen soon.”
In fact, another team of researchers has already confirmed
one of the paper’s main predictions, by looking at pre-Neolithic DNA from
Sardinia, just one week ago. The research was carried out primarily by Dr Joana
Pereira as part of her PhD project, supervised jointly by Professor Richards and
Dr Luisa Pereira of the Institute of Molecular Pathology and Immunology at the
University of Porto, alongside Dr Pedro Soares of the University of Minho, in
Portugal.
The authors of the new article, titled, 'Reconciling evidence
from ancient and contemporary genomes: a major source for the European Neolithic
within Mediterranean Europe', also, include
Dr Maria Pala, who is Senior Lecturer at the
University of Huddersfield and a key member of the archaeogenetics group.
Professor Martin Richards studied genetics at the
Universities of Sheffield and Manchester, moving to Oxford University and into
archaeogenetic research in 1990. From there, he developed collaborative links
with a small group of like-minded colleagues who spearheaded the use of network
diagrams in the phylogenetic and phylogeographic analysis of human mitochondrial
DNA, mtDNA. This enjoyable collaboration was to yield influential models for the
settlement of both Europe and the Pacific and for prehistoric dispersals in
Africa.
He subsequently moved to UCL, Huddersfield and then Leeds
University, where he taught, amongst other topics, human evolution, molecular
evolution and bioinformatics. He finally moved back to Huddersfield to take up a
Research Chair in January 2012. His research in the last decade has particularly
sought to apply complete mtDNA genome variation to archaeogenetic questions,
such as the route taken by modern humans dispersing out of Africa and the
settlement of Southeast Asia and the Pacific, most recently returning his focus
to the continuing controversy over the settlement of Europe. He co-edited
Mitochondrial DNA and the Evolution of Homo Sapiens, Springer-Verlag, 2006, with
Hans-Jürgen Bandelt and Vincent Macaulay.
The University of Huddersfield: The University of
Huddersfield is an inspiring, innovative provider of higher
education of international renown. It has a national
reputation in enterprise and innovation and has been the
recipient of the Times Higher Education’s University of the
Year Award and Entrepreneurial University of the Year as
well as a Queen’s Awards for Enterprise. In the 2015, the
University was recognised with 5 star status by
international ratings organisation QS Stars for teaching,
internationalisation, employability and for facilities and
access. The University of Huddersfield’s researchers are
dedicated to solving the problems and answering the
questions posed by industry, science and society as a whole.
Our pioneering research is showcased by
internationally-recognised centres of excellence, strategic
industry relationships and a commitment to providing
advanced facilities and equipment. The Chancellor of the
University is His Royal Highness The Duke of York, KG, and
the Vice-Chancellor is Professor Bob Cryan CBE.
ω.
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Work and Wherever in the World You are, Please, Make a Choice to Do All You Can
to Seek and Demand the End of Death Penalty For It is Your Business What is Done
in Your Name. The Law That Makes Humans Take Part in Taking Human Lives and That
Permits and Kills Human Lives is No Law. It is the Rule of the Jungle Where Law
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Approach to Childhood Mental Health Based on Victorian
Values

|| March 23: 2017: University of Portsmouth News || ά.
The approaches to protecting children with mental health issues
are much the same today as in Victorian and Edwardian times, new research shows.
The case files of children from the 1800s reveal that the approach taken by
those responsible for their welfare has changed remarkably little in over 100
years. The research shows that Victorian and Edwardian authorities faced similar
issues to the agencies involved in children’s well-being today and that
different organisations struggled with a joined up approach then, just as they
do now.
Dr Wendy Sims-Schouten, an expert in childhood studies, has been
examining case files from the Children’s Society of children with mental health
issues in the period 1880-1910. The records contain information around the
children’s family background, their health, education and parenting and
highlight the perception of custodians, doctors and professionals who judged
their subjects, and who played an active role in decisions regarding each child.
Dr Sims-Schouten found that some of today’s problems associated with troubled
childhoods were the same as those in the late 1800s, such as family problems,
poverty, deprivation and parental absence or alcoholism.
She says that even the language used by the Victorian and
Edwardian authorities to describe and explain their approach to childhood mental
health is very similar to that used by today’s agencies and reveals a caring
side to the Victorians/Edwardians that she did not anticipate. “The records
demonstrate that the Victorian authorities were very concerned about the
children in their care. They talk about ‘putting the child first’ and ‘examining
what can be done for this child.’ An extract from a children’s case file in 1897
highlights that ‘his mental condition gave rise to great anxiety, whilst a case
file from 1901 shows concern about the child’s home situation: ‘I fear that the
girls home is very undesirable’
“These children were often in homes, and their welfare was the concern of
doctors, schools the church whose case files highlight the perception of these
custodians who judged their subjects and played an active role in what happened
to them. What is also clear is that back then children didn’t have a voice and
this is still the case.”
Dr Sims-Schouten, who specialises in childhood research, says that today’s
approach to children’s mental health is grounded in strategies developed over a
hundred years ago. My initial search of the Children’s Society’s online
catalogue shows 76 results for ‘mental health’ and 46 for ‘mind’. My own
interviews with young care-leavers between 2014-2016 contain extracts such as
‘my mental health is extremely complicated’ and from a careworker: ‘mental
health is tricky, because there are so many different agencies involved.’ These
are issues today that are no different to those faced by the Victorians and
Edwardians.”
Thankfully some of the terminology has changed and today’s records are unlikely
to feature words such as ‘lunatic’ and ‘insane,’ stigmas, which were often used
to describe a child’s sanity and intellect, alongside ‘mental capacity’, ‘mental
deficiency’ and mental derangement.’ However, Dr Sims-Schouten says that despite
some progress, many of the stigmas around mental health still exist today.
“There are still so many unresolved issues and stigma plays a significant role
in successful approaches to the welfare of children with mental health issues.
What does having a mental health issue even mean? Childhood research has been my
focus for many years and mental health is a recurrent theme. Yet there are huge
variations in approaches by different parties involved.
More needs to be done to improve mental health care and reduce
stigma and I hope some of this research can be used to challenge today’s
interpretation and treatment and get the best for our children.” Dr Sims-Schouten’s
research is funded by the Wellcome Trust.
ω.
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Work and Wherever in the World You are, Please, Make a Choice to Do All You Can
to Seek and Demand the End of Death Penalty For It is Your Business What is Done
in Your Name. The Law That Makes Humans Take Part in Taking Human Lives and That
Permits and Kills Human Lives is No Law. It is the Rule of the Jungle Where Law
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Will You Rather Celebrate St Sheelah's Day Today Emerald
Isle

UCC folklorist Shane Lehane observes that antiquarian journals
and newspaper accounts of the 18th and 19th
centuries in Ireland indicate the wide-spread belief that St Patrick had a wife.
Images: University College Cork
|| March 10: 2017: University
College Cork Ireland News || ά. Since he was a man, who became a Saint
and known and celebrated as St Patrick, it is not unreasonable for anyone to
assume that he might as well have been married and had had a wife. And in this
case, there would have been a Mrs Patrick, the other half. Now, as people
celebrate St Patricks Day across Ireland and the World, from the very Emerald
Isle, here is the news, about a Mrs Patrick in the vague and in concrete, a Mrs
Sheelah St Patrick and why not you all make this year a dual celebrations of the
St Patrick-Soul, half and half, making one. St Patrick has long been associated
with snakes and shamrocks but the fact that he had a wife has largely been
confined to the annals of history, according to a folklorist from University
College Cork, Ireland.
In the old Irish calendar the day after St Patrick's Day is Sheelah's Day but
what is less known is that Sheelah was Patrick’s wife. Shane Lehane, Department
of Folklore at University College Cork, says Sheelah was Patrick's 'other half'
and that the March 17th celebrations were extended for an additional 24 hours to
commemorate her life. Lehane observes that antiquarian journals and newspaper
accounts of the 18th and 19th centuries in Ireland indicate the wide-spread
belief that St Patrick had a wife. "Pre Famine, pre 1845, if you go back to the
newspapers in Ireland they talk not just about Patrick's Day but also Sheelah's
Day. So I wondered where this came from? You have Paddy's day on the 17th and it
continues on to Sheelah's day.
I came across numerous references
that Sheelah was thought to be Patrick's wife. She was his other half. The folk
tradition has no problem with such detail. The fact that we have Patrick and
Sheelah together should be no surprise. Because that duality, that union of the
male and female together, is one of the strongest images that we have in our
mythology."
An early reference to the continued celebrations on March 18th, which was St
Sheelah's day, is found in John Carr's 1806 The Stranger in Ireland. Carr said
that on the anniversary of St Patrick, the country people assembled in their
nearest towns and villages and got very tipsy. "From a spirit of gallantry,
these merry devotees continue drunk the greater part of the next day, viz., the
18th of March, all in honour of Sheelagh, St. Patrick’s wife."
Lehane claims the fact that Patrick had a wife is a really fascinating angle
from a feminist point of view. "What I think is very interesting is that people
in Ireland in the past had no problem whatsoever accepting that Patrick had a
wife. The church was very strong and during the period of Lent from Ash
Wednesday right through to Easter Sunday you had major prohibitions.
However, folk tradition was such
that Patrick afforded a special dispensation and Irish people were allowed to
celebrate Patrick's day which always fell in the middle of Lent. It seems to
have been extended to the 18th of March and was a continuation of celebrations.
They continued to drink on Sheelah's day and there is a sense that the women
were more involved in the celebrations on the 18th. So there is a feminist angle
in there."
Lehane has unearthed references to Sheelah's day in the Freeman's Journal of
1785, 1811 and 1841. There are also many accounts in the 19th century Australian
Press evidencing the observance of Sheelah's day, usually in the context of the
consumption of too much alcohol.
He says whilst the feast day is largely forgotten about in Ireland, Sheelah
still has a keen presence in the history of Newfoundland, Canada. "St Sheelah's
Day was news to me. I thought it was amazing, as all memory of her seems to have
died out here. Sheelah and Patrick, at one time, came to represent the
ubiquitous Irish couple. Paddy and Sheelah became a byword for all Irish people.
Sheelah has been forgotten
altogether except in Newfoundland, Canada and in Australia. Irish people headed
over to Newfoundland from the late 1600's. And they brought over with them this
tradition of Sheelah and Sheelah's Day. Tim Pat Coogan once remarked that
Newfoundland is the most Irish place in the world outside of Ireland."
Lehane says that perhaps the most enduring legacy of Sheelah is the so-called 'Sheelah's
Brush' as the name given by Newfoundlanders and Atlantic Canadians to a winter
snowstorm that falls after St Patrick's Day.
Sometimes referred to as 'Sheelah's Broom' or if the snowstorm is mild with only
a bare covering of snow, 'Sheila's Blush', it is still referred to respectfully
by meteorologists and fisherman in that part of the world.
Lehane suggests that perhaps the key to understanding the inherited notion that
St Patrick had a wife, Sheelah, is to explore the hugely interesting
archaeological manifestation that, also, bears her name: the Sheelah-na-Gig.
"Sheela-na-Gig is a basic medieval carving of a woman exposing her genitalia.
These images are often considered to be quite grotesque. They are quite shocking
when you see them first. Now we look at them very much as examples of old women
showing young women how to give birth. They are vernacular folk deities
associated with pregnancy and birth."
Lehane proposes that it is time to revisit and embrace the story of Sheelah.
"Sheelah represented, for women in particular, a go-to person because she
represented the female. The Sheela-na-Gig is a really important part of medieval
folk tradition. She is an important folk deity. The figure of Sheelah was
perhaps much bigger than suggested by the scant mentions we find in the old
newspaper accounts.
She would have been massively
important. She represents a folk personification, allied to, what can be termed,
the female cosmic agency and being such, would have played a major role in
people’s everyday lives. It is a pity that the day has died out. But maybe we
will revive it. I am sure Fáilte Ireland would be delighted with it. I think it
would be a great idea!"
ω.
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We are
the Aboriginal: Read the Hair and Learn the Story of 50,000
Years of Us Being Part of This Land Now Called Australia: We
Have Known It All Along: Now the World Has the Science for It

Image: University of Adelaide
|| March 10: 2017: University of
Adelaide, Australia News || ά.
DNA in hair
samples collected from Aboriginal people across Australia in the early to
mid-1900s has revealed, that populations have been continuously present in the
same regions for up to 50,000 years, soon after the peopling of Australia.
Published in the journal Nature, the findings reinforce Aboriginal communities’
strong connection to the country and represent the first detailed genetic map of
Aboriginal Australia prior to the arrival of Europeans. These are the first
results from the Aboriginal Heritage Project, led by the University of
Adelaide’s Australian Centre for Ancient DNA:ACAD in partnership with the South
Australian Museum.
Researchers analysed mitochondrial DNA from 111 hair samples, that were
collected during a series of remarkable anthropological expeditions across
Australia from 1928 to the 1970s and are part of the South Australian Museum’s
unparalleled collection of hair samples. Mitochondrial DNA allows tracing of
maternal ancestry and the results show that modern Aboriginal Australians are
the descendants of a single founding population, that arrived in Australia
50,000 years ago, while Australia was still connected to New Guinea. Populations
then spread rapidly, within 1500-2000 years, around the east and west coasts of
Australia, meeting somewhere in South Australia.
“Amazingly, it seems that from around this time the basic population patterns
have persisted for the next 50,000 years, showing that communities have remained
in discrete geographical regions.” says project leader Professor Alan Cooper,
Director of ACAD, University of Adelaide. This is unlike people anywhere else in
the world and provides compelling support for the remarkable Aboriginal cultural
connection to country.
We’re hoping this project leads to a
rewriting of Australia’s history texts to include detailed Aboriginal history
and what it means to have been on their land for 50,000 years, that’s around 10
times as long as all of the European history we’re commonly taught.”
A central pillar of the Aboriginal Heritage Project is that Aboriginal families
and communities have been closely involved with the project from its inception
and that analyses are only conducted with their consent. Importantly, results
are first discussed with the families to get Aboriginal perspectives before
scientific publication. The research model was developed under the guidance of
Aboriginal elders, the Genographic Project and professional ethicists.
This is the first phase of a decade-long project, that will allow people with
Aboriginal heritage to trace their regional ancestry and reconstruct family
genealogical history and will also, assist with the repatriation of Aboriginal
artefacts.
“Aboriginal people have always known that we have been on our land since the
start of our time.” says Kaurna Elder Mr Lewis O’Brien, who is one of the
original hair donors and has been on the advisory group for the study. “But it
is important to have science show that to the rest of the world. This is an
exciting project and we hope it will help assist those of our people from the
Stolen Generation and others to reunite with their families.”
“Reconstructing the genetic history of Aboriginal Australia is very complicated
due to past government policies of enforced population relocation and child
removal that have erased much of the physical connection between groups and
geography in Australia today.” says Dr Wolfgang Haak, formerly at ACAD and now
at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Germany.
The South Australian Museum’s collection of hair samples, complete with rich
cultural, linguistic, genealogical and geographical data, comes from the
expeditions run by the Board of Anthropological Research from the University of
Adelaide.
“This Aboriginal Heritage Project is able to exist because of the extensive
records collected by Norman Tindale and Joseph Birdsell and others on those
expeditions, which are held in trust for all at the South Australian Museum.
They include detailed information about the birthplaces, family history and
family trees, film, audio and written records, allowing a wide range of
approaches to be used by this project to reconstruct history.” says Brian Oldman,
Director of the South Australian Museum.
“The South Australian Museum’s Aboriginal Family History Unit has also been
instrumental to the project and has worked closely with the University team to
consult with Aboriginal families and communities to obtain permission for tests
to be performed.” he says.
Professor Cooper says, “We are very grateful for the enthusiasm and overwhelming
support for this project we have received from Aboriginal families, and the
Cherbourg, Koonibba, and Point Pearce communities in particular.”
The research will be extended to investigate paternal lineages and information
from the nuclear genome. Team member Dr Ray Tobler, Postdoctoral Researcher in
ACAD with Aboriginal heritage on his father’s side, has an Australian Research
Council:ARC Indigenous Discovery Fellowship to extend the AHP research, to
examine how the longevity of Aboriginal populations in different habitats across
Australia has shaped the remarkable physical diversity found across modern
Aboriginal Australians.
Other research partners include La Trobe University, Deakin University and the
National Centre for Indigenous Genomics. The project is funded by the ARC
Linkage Projects scheme with financial or additional research support from the
Australian Genome Research Facility, Bioplatforms Australia, the ARC Centre of
Excellence for Mathematical and Statistical Frontiers, and the National
Geographic Society.
ω.
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Working to Protect the Heritage of Humanity: The Past: The
Present: The Future: Of Cultural Heritage

Researchers with the Marzamemi
Maritime Heritage Project study and manage underwater cultural heritage in
Italy, which gives a glimpse into maritime exchange
from the early Roman era through Late Antiquity. Image: Marzamemi Maritime
Heritage Project: University of Pennsylvania
|| February 26: 2017: University of Pennsylvania: USA News: Lauren
Hertzler
Writing
|| ά.
Led by
Anthropology Professor Richard M. Leventhal, the Penn Cultural Heritage Centre
at the Penn Museum is involved with a number of projects to protect and preserve
cultural heritage around the world, including Mexico, Italy, California, Iraq,
and Syria. During the second half of the 19th
century, Tihosuco, a small town in the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico, was at the
centre of the indigenous rebellion called, the Caste War. Overwhelmed by
economic hardships, constant and increasing taxation, repression by Yucatecos,
the local population of European descent, and more, the Maya revolted against
Mexico, hoping to recover their territory and heritage.
The Maya people of Tihosuco still identify closely with the rebellion, which is
reflected in their present-day lives. Penn Anthropology Professor Richard M.
Leventhal says that their connection with their recent history is much stronger
than their often-assumed connection with the ancient Maya. “They just do not
want to be tied to their ancient heritage as many of us have been taught to
think.” he explains. For six years, as part of the Tihosuco Heritage
Preservation and Community Development Project, Leventhal has been working
alongside the community in Tihosuco to identify and preserve some of the
important remaining sites, artefacts and symbols of the Caste War.
The project is a partnership of the Penn Museum’s Penn Cultural Heritage Centre,
which Leventhal founded in 2007 and directs and the Museo de la Guerra de Castas,
the Caste War Museum created in 1993 by the government in Tihosuco. The Ejido de
Tihosuco, a communal land organisation that owns and controls the land around
the community and the Tihosuco Mayor’s Office are also important partners.
''Community is key when doing this type of work.'' Leventhal stresses.
“Community has been and needs to be part of the framing of projects like these.”
he says, while chatting over the phone from Mexico. “Too often, Archaeologists
or other historians come along and believe that they, as professionals and
scholars, know what is heritage and what is important to preserve. But we think
about heritage in a different way when we talk to local communities. Communities
need to take the lead in these partnerships, if they’re going to be successful
and sustainable.”
''A long-term goal for the project, Leventhal says, is to also, identify a
heritage preservation and economic plan for Tihosuco and the region, ultimately
giving a boost to the Maya people, allowing them to control their own heritage
and future.''
The project in Mexico is only one under the Penn Cultural Heritage Centre’s
umbrella. Brian I. Daniels, the Penn Cultural Heritage Centre’s Director of
Research and Programmes and a Lecturer in the Department of Anthropology, has
spent more than a decade working on indigenous communities’ heritage rights,
repatriation and recognition. Specifically, for the Weyka Heritage Project in
California, Daniels’ discussions with Native Americans about their cultural
heritage has evolved into an archaeological project and he is eager to uncover
more knowledge of the community’s past and present. This project is leading the
community toward a greater sense of identity in the present and future.
Daniels also co-directs the Safeguarding the Heritage of Syria and Iraq Project
with Salam Al Kuntar, a Penn Museum postdoctoral fellow and Visiting Assistant
Professor of Anthropology at Penn. Al Kuntar, a Syrian-born Archaeologist, works
with civil activists and community leaders in Syria and Iraq to document and
protect their cultural heritage in the midst of civil war destruction, which is
happening at a tragic and unprecedented rate.
“This heritage can’t just be looked at from a historic view.” she says. “We’re
losing ancient art and archaeological sites, as well as losing the culture and
fabric of a place.” In 2014, the Penn Cultural Heritage Centre and the
Smithsonian Institution began offering assistance for museum curators, heritage
professionals and civilians working to protect cultural heritage in the war-torn
areas.
Most recently, Al Kuntar has been spearheading projects that teach the local
children how to appreciate and protect heritage and see it as a future asset for
their country. She’s also working with women to revive traditional handcrafts in
order to lighten the burden of war. Beginning this April, an exhibition at the
Penn Museum will shed light on Al Kuntar’s work, as well as cultural heritage
preservation work in the Middle East in general.
“For me, this work is more about giving them basically the means to survive.” Al
Kuntar says. “To help them cope with the war atrocities and keep the heritage
alive. To make them not fall into despair and make sure they know people around
the world care about them.”
Another major project within the Penn Cultural Heritage Centre is the Marzamemi
Maritime Heritage Project, which is led by Penn Cultural Heritage Centre
consulting scholars Elizabeth Greene and Justin Leidwanger, Professors at Brock
University and Stanford, respectively.
In Marzamemi, Sicily, the pair are working in a variety of ways with the
community to study and manage underwater cultural heritage, which, due to its
location, gives a glimpse into maritime exchange from the early Roman era
through Late Antiquity. The sea is what drives this small coastal town and
Greene and Leidwanger are working to uphold this base, whether by promoting
underwater heritage dive trails or showcasing excavated materials in a new
Museum of the Sea.
“Similar to all the projects within the Penn Cultural Heritage Centre, it’s not
just one research paper but it’s helping to make Marzamemi a destination for
tourists, as well as offering places for the local children and others to learn
about the town’s heritage.” says Greene.
''Even though the Penn Cultural Heritage Centre projects span different parts of
the world, the heart of each is their bottom-up approach, starting from the
community and working their way up.'' says Peter Gould, a Consulting Scholar of
the Centre. “The heritage that matters is the heritage that matters to the
people it belongs to.” he says.
Now, more than ever, Gould says that it is important to have conversations about
cultural heritage. “We’re living in a time that, in certain respects, is centred
on heritage.” he says. “If you look at the disputes around the world, the
debates are over immigrants, over whether multiculturalism is a good thing. All
have their roots in different perspectives of which heritage is important and
whose should be given priority and who needs to accommodate to that. Having a
vibrant dialogue around the issues is important because the process of how this
sorts itself out is going to be consequential for the entire world.”
ω.
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to Seek and Demand the End of Death Penalty For It is Your Business What is Done
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New Museum Museo Kordilyera Dedicated to the People,
Culture, Heritage and Region of Cordillera

Images: University of the Philippines
Baguio
|| February 23: 2017: University of the
Philippines Baguio
News || ά.
University of the Philippines Baguio formally opened its
three-story ethnographic museum, Museo Kordilyera, on
January 31, seven months after its soft opening in 2016. Its
main areas of focus are the collection, preservation and
exhibition of artefacts and other objects unique to the
Cordillera region, its peoples and its cultures and
traditions.
Conforming to the campus terrain, only the first story of
the museum is at ground level, as with the other campus
buildings, while the second and third levels of the museum
are underground. These lower levels have: spaces for the
Museo Kordilyera’s permanent collection, curatorial space
for ethnographic materials; a temporary exhibition area; a
room for the orientation of visitors; an audio-visual room;
a shop; and a café.
Three inaugural exhibits were mounted as
part of the event: “Batok Tattoos: Body as Archive”, based
on the research of Museo Kordilyera Director Analyn
Salvador-Amores, a Professor at the UPB Department of Social
Anthropology and Psychology; 'Jules de Raedt: Life Works,
Lived Worlds', a retrospective of de Raedt’s work; and, 'The
Indigenous, In Flux: Reconfiguring the Ethnographic
Photograph' by Roland Rabang of the UPB Department of
Language, Literature, and the Arts.
Together with Salvador-Amores, also involved in the
curatorial work for the inaugural exhibits were: Professor
Emeritus Delfin Tolentino, Jr. ot the UPB Department of
Language, Literature, and the Arts; Professor Victoria Diaz
of the UPB Department of Social Anthropology and Psychology
and Cristina Villanueva, a UPB archivist.
Museo Kordilyera is now open to the public.
ω.
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to Seek and Demand the End of Death Penalty For It is Your Business What is Done
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Professor Evelyn Tribble: On the Trail of
Shakespearian Theatrical Cognitive Ecology and Distributive
Processes

The Candle Won't Blow Out
Celebration of William Shakespeare 2016
|| February 20: 2017: Otago University New Zealand News ||
ά. Four
hundred years after the death of William Shakespeare,
Professor Evelyn Tribble is proving that his work still
provides us with new insights into the human condition. In
this case, however, her findings are not based on textual
analysis of the plays as much as the cognitive processes
underlying their performance.
Tribble, Department of English and Linguistics, started out
investigating representations of memory in the great bard’s
plays but it was when she began to explore the mnemonic
demands of the actors performing those plays that she says
her research really found 'traction'.
This work has provided
a rich vein of insights, not just into the 17th century
dramatic process but also human cognitive processes
generally, insights that are relevant to modern day
psychology as well as other disciplines in the Humanities.
Tribble’s forays into the field of distributed cognition
began with her looking at the 16th century playhouse, a
recent innovation at the time, as a workplace, much as we
look at learning processes within a modern organisation.
This included researching the training of actors and the
apprentice system used to develop what were essentially
child actors.
“We know that boys who were apprenticed probably around the
age of 14 went on to play extraordinarily complicated roles
like Lady Macbeth later in their teens. How did they develop
that kind of expertise?” Tribble wondered.
Tribble determined that the non-speaking parts Shakespeare
wrote for boys, such as pages and attendants, acclimatised
them to being on stage. Then, 'bit' parts were written in a
way that enabled older actors to manage the apprentices
onstage through explicit actions or cues.
The work of memorising lines would have been relatively easy
for individuals accustomed to the recitative teaching
methods of Elizabethan-era schools, Tribble believes, but
this doesn’t account for older actors’ ability to memorise
and perform a large number of parts and plays in a
relatively short space of time, as many as 70 different
parts in a three-year period in the case of actor Edward Alleyn.
To explain this skill set, Tribble hypothesises a kind of
'information underloading'. This means that the theatre
environment or 'ecosystem' was configured to support actors’
cognitive requirements, through means such as consistency in
stage design, to the way in which their parts were delivered
to them in playbooks that omitted information unrelated to
their role.
“Such systemic structures facilitated creativity because it
meant actors didn’t need to think about routine aspects of
their work.” says Tribble, “And that allowed creativity to
come forward.”
This sheds light on how Shakespearean actors rehearsed
somewhat differently from the theatrical companies of today
but more importantly, it also suggests an important
relationship between place, body and mnemonic processes,
what Tribble calls the 'cognitive ecology' that influenced
their learning processes.
“Actors in Shakespeare’s time used different materials and
social structures than actors today and therefore, I think
they remembered differently.” says Tribble.
A helpful example to illustrate the cognitive
interrelationship between space, body and mind is the
actors’ mastery of the art of gesture, both to assist recall
and help them hold audience attention, in effect a
developed form of kinesic intelligence.
“It’s been shown that gesture helps speakers manage what
they’re going to say and also helps listeners follow what is
being said.” says Tribble. “In the 17th century we start to
see treatises on the art of gesture and how to train hands
and body in almost the same way an athlete trains their
body. Today, actors still use their body to dispose thoughts
in space, almost making them visible through gesture, as
well as pulling the audience in to them almost in a form of
hypnotism.”
Tribble draws on research in fields such as psychology and
linguistics to explore these and other 'distributed'
cognitive processes in Shakespearean theatre and also
collaborates with colleagues in philosophy, psychology and
cognitive science, both at Otago and further afield.
“The best interdisciplinary work is a dialogue, a two-way
traffic that enables you to understand the other discipline
well enough to see what insights it can provide, but also
what its blind spots might be. There’s a lot to be said for a discipline like English
where you can ask broader questions but you can engage with
material from other disciplines to ask these broader
questions about what it means to be human. That’s what the
humanities do for us.”
Funding for her research comes from
Marsden Fund and
Folger Shakespeare Library Long-Term Fellowship, supported
by the Mellon Fund. ω.
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to Seek and Demand the End of Death Penalty For It is Your Business What is Done
in Your Name. The Law That Makes Humans Take Part in Taking Human Lives and That
Permits and Kills Human Lives is No Law. It is the Rule of the Jungle Where Law
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What is in the UNESCO Australian Memory
of the World Register

Drawing by a child from
Forrest River Mission, 1927-1928 held as part of
anthropologist A P Elkin’s papers. Image: University of
Sydney Australia
|| February 08: 2017: University of Sydney Australia News || ά.
A vital resource of Australian academic work and engagement
with Indigenous people, held by the University of Sydney,
will be inscribed on the UNESCO Australian Memory of the
World Register. Australia’s oldest collection of academic
anthropology records documenting Aboriginal communities in
Australia and Indigenous communities in the South Pacific
region has been recognised by the United Nations
Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation:UNESCO
Australian Memory of the World:AMW Register.
Promoting Australian documentary heritage with influence and
world significance, the register contains noteworthy items
such as the Australian Indigenous Languages Collection, the
Endeavour journal of James Cook, convict records, World War
I diaries and the Pacific and Regional Archive for Digital
Sources in Endangered Cultures:PARADISEC which is partly
housed at the University. On Thursday, February 09, a
collection held by the University Archives and the
University’s Macleay Museum will be inscribed to the
register and celebrated at a ceremony at Canberra Museum and
Gallery, along with other new additions.
Anthropological Field Research and
Teaching Records, University of Sydney, 1926-1956 presents a
unique record of Indigenous life in Australia and the South
Pacific region in the 20th century, Nyree Morrison, Senior
Archivist, said. “The University of Sydney was the first in
Australia to establish a Department of Anthropology.” she
said. “Our early academics lived with Aboriginal and other
Indigenous people in remote areas to record, study and
understand their life and culture. Their personal archives,
along with records of the Department and researchers funded
by the Australian National Research Council:ANRC are
contained in this collection.
“There is a wealth of material: field notes, genealogies,
correspondence, photographs, audio-visual material, reports,
secondary sources as well as significant objects such as
bark paintings and pearl shell ornaments.
“The material reflects the slowly changing, long-held
perceptions Europeans typically had of Aboriginal people and
culture and shows how the work of the Department influenced
government policies and lead the way for the development of
public programmes for Aboriginal communities. David Ellis,
Director of Museums and Cultural Engagement, thanked the
Australian Memory of the World Programme for the inscription
of such historically important materials.
“The collection reveals some of the ways in which
anthropology was communicated and taught at a time when the
University provided training of cadets for Australian
colonial administration in the Department of Home and
Territories.” he said.
”As such, it is a valuable resource for local communities
and historians alike.” The University Archives and the
Macleay Museum are already working with a number of
communities directly, through Land Councils and current
academics in the field in Australia and the Solomon Islands,
to explore the University’s early Department of Anthropology
collections for information on their language, community,
connection to land and family.
Material held by the University Archives may be accessed by
the public by appointment and is publicly searchable via the
Online Archives Search facility.
ω.
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Work and Wherever in the World You are, Please, Make a Choice to Do All You Can
to Seek and Demand the End of Death Penalty For It is Your Business What is Done
in Your Name. The Law That Makes Humans Take Part in Taking Human Lives and That
Permits and Kills Human Lives is No Law. It is the Rule of the Jungle Where Law
Does Not Exist.
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The Roma People: Removal of Segregation and Suspicion
Key to Roma Integration

Image: University of Manchester
|| February 04: 2017: University of Manchester News || ά.
The results of the largest-ever research project into
Europe's Roma minority have been presented at a three-day
conference at Manchester Museum. The MigRom project, a
unique partnership between The University of Manchester,
academic partners across Europe, Manchester City Council,
the European Commission and a Roma organisation at the
Council of Europe, launched in 2013. The project saw
researchers work together in five different countries.
The project investigated the experiences, motivations and
ambitions of Roma migrants from Romania who have recently
moved to Italy, France, Spain, and the UK, and the effect of
migration on their own lives and on the lives of relations
left behind in their home communities. It also examined
popular, media and official reactions to Roma immigration.
Involving assistants from the Roma communities and drawing
on the expertise of an interdisciplinary team of leading
scholars in Romani studies, the project analysed the causes
and effects of Roma migration, examples of good practice of
integration of Roma migrants, capacity building in Roma
migrant communities, policy recommendations and models for
community engagement strategies.
The researchers found that access to housing, removal of
restrictions on employment and access to school places are
the foundations for successful integration. “In the UK, Roma
access the free housing market and have access to services,
while in some of the other research sites, most notably,
France and Italy, they are forced into illegal shantytowns
or camps and subject to repeated evictions.” said Professor
of Linguistics Yaron Matras from The University of
Manchester, who led the research.
The project came about as a result of Manchester City
Council’s Roma Engagement strategy, this was borne out of
the University of Manchester’s Romani Project, which was
launched in 1999 and became a leading international centre
for academic research and public engagement on Roma culture
and identity. For more information,
visit.
ω.
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Work and Wherever in the World You are, Please, Make a Choice to Do All You Can
to Seek and Demand the End of Death Penalty For It is Your Business What is Done
in Your Name. The Law That Makes Humans Take Part in Taking Human Lives and That
Permits and Kills Human Lives is No Law. It is the Rule of the Jungle Where Law
Does Not Exist.
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The Scholar Who Says Humanity is
Repeating Itself Has Not Taken Into Consideration the Fact
That 98.5% of the Human Genome Does Not Even Come to Show
Their Work as Yet: No, Please, Do Not Give the Junk Genome
Hyperbole: Refer Back to This Headline to a Fully Grown up
Humanity in 400 Million Years When 100% of Its Genome Should
Come to Function: Today, Humanity is a Crawling Baby That
Functions with Only 01.5% of Its Genome: Please, Don't Tell
the Taughtologies: Been There, Seen and Done It: Humanity
Has Not Done Very Much as Yet: No Wonder Why Outi Hakola is
Not Enthused

|