Wednesday 31 July 2013

Initiating Silent Running (Again!)


The unprepossessing new location of World Headquarters, complete with shag carpet and harvest gold electric stove. Any guesses as to the decade it was constructed? Hint: no doubt it was originally equipped with ceiling hooks for swag lamps and kitschy macramé plant hangers.
Your subversive archaeologist has been busily looking for work *"Work!"* *faints* these past few days. So, no subverting. Plenty of thinking about subverting, but nothing close to look-at-able. And now, I'm pleased to announce that there's a new physical location for SA World Headquarters (see above). So, it's time to move stuff in. Tomorrow I'll be sweating away, moving my shit from its temporary home in a U-Haul U-Box in Ferndale, WA to the new digs in Birch Bay [I've yet to see a single individual of Betula, but I'm not giving up hope]. However, the back garden presents a pretty little archaeological riddle (see below). One embrownéd circle and another that's rectilinear [érdekes! as an old friend used to say].


Thursday, after three weeks, I move out of this run-down motel in Blaine, WA [breathing the accumulated cigarette smoke of—I'm guessing—10 or more years and a persistent infestation of fruit flies that seem to have no fruit to fly around], home to the icon of international cooperation shown in the photo below.

The Peace Arch straddles the Canada—U.S. border in
north Blaine, WA/south Surrey, BC
O' course, I'll be moving myself into a house full of boxes [foresightedly annotated for easy retrieval of important stuff, such as toilet paper, my trusty all-in-one printer, and my Coleman inflatable bed—luxury!]. Then on Friday I attend a half-day workshop in Bellingham, WA on how to present myself to prospective employers using résumés and cover letters (two things which, among many other life skills I've never truly gotten the hang of—a set of circumstances that perhaps more than anything else explain why I've been successful in only three job searches in my entire life). Then it'll be another few days before I can plug back in to the intertubes. During those few days any and all e-communication will be via my ever-handy, stunningly beautiful, iPhone 5.

Look for me right here upon my return. ;-)








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SA announces new posts on the Subversive Archaeologist's facebook page (mirrored on Rob Gargett's news feed), on Robert H. Gargett's Academia.edu page, Rob Gargett's twitter account, and his Google+ page. A few of you have already signed up to receive email when I post. Others have subscribed to the blog's RSS feeds. You can also become a 'member' of the blog through Google Friend Connect. Thank you for your continued patronage. You're the reason I do this.

Saturday 27 July 2013

Mired In Psycho Linguistics Land. Dediu and Levinson on Language and Culture

I apologize, in advance, for the esoterica about which I am blurting today. Or, is it abstruse? Obtuse? Confused? Oh, hell. Just read.

 The Daily Mail headline reads
Neanderthals talked like us half a million years ago and could even have shaped the language we speak today
This refers to a recently published paper in the psychology journal, Frontiers in Psychology. [Now in its fourth year of publication—no mean feat given that there are about 90 competitors in that one field!]. I'm ashamed to admit that I missed this bit of yarn-spinning when it first came out. [I must have been getting drunk, too drunk, or recovering from being drunk at that time. Otherwise I'd have been right on it!] Had it not been for the Daily Mail and the Subversive Archaeologist's news ticker I would [prolly] never have seen it! Lucky moi!

Dediu, Dan, and Stephen C Levinson
2013 "On the antiquity of language: the reinterpretation of Neandertal linguistic capacities and its consequences." Frontiers in Psychology 4:1-17. DOI=10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00397      

The article is the perfect paradigm of the disaster that can occur when well-meaning social scientists go looking for evidence in another social science the literature of which they glean from papers that were trumpeted in the credulous media, rather like what has happened with theirs. And, if they weren't pointed to their sources by the media, they may well have canvassed their institution's anthropology department or a recent undergraduate textbook. Perhaps I'm being a bit harsh. After all, these authors are doing nothing that avant-garde palaeoanthropologists wouldn't do when they attempt to paint a state-of-the-art synthesis of that eminently cross-disciplinary field.    

And, let's face it, if you have any familiarity with my theoretical leanings you probably could have guessed how I might treat the product of research that provoked the headline above. Moreover, I'm somewhat familiar with the psychology of language and culture, and I've managed to imbibe bits and pieces of the major players in the very important question of when language came about. And, knowing the shape of the field in the present, I might just as well have tried to repress the memory of the headline and left these two frontier-busting psychologists' work to moulder on the dust heap of the psychological literature. However, it's because of my proximity to such debates, and those occurring in archaeology and human palaeontology that I have chosen to push my nose into this paper.

First of all, I went to the list of references, knowing full well what I WASN'T going to see—any citations of the voluminous work of Iain Davidson (archaeologist) and William Noble (psychologist) on the matter of language evolution. Their book, Human Evolution, Language, and Mind, seems to have escaped the notice of every interested party save one—me. In it, you and the authors of today's commentary would be clearly trained up on the many cogent counter-arguments—both archaeological and psychological—to the work of people like Steve Mithen. So, having reassured myself that today's authors were missing the yin of their yang [or vice versa], I went straight to their treatment of the Neanderthal archaeological record to see how one-sided it might be. I wasn't disappointed. Using the standard story of that archaeological record as a springboard, in the section titled "Culture and Language" they pull off a triple rotating, double twisting, jack-knife vault and totally stick the landing. Their feat should not go unheralded. Prepare to be heralded upon ...
Since I knew I'd get bogged down if I tried to paraphrase, or worse, in order to make critical comments, I decided that I'd simply mark up the text to illustrate two interdigitating characteristics of the piece. Generally I have used the strike-through to indicate what I consider to be problematic evidence, and red underline for those places where the authors literally spin said evidence into a barely-in-touch-with-reality narrative/scenario/just-so-story/metapicture. Those portions that I left unmarked are either not worth the effort criticizing or [believe it or don't] stuff that I consider unproblematic. I'll catch up with you down below. [Not a reference to Hell. Although I may well one day end up in Archaeological Hell for my heresies. For the time being, at least, I'm only in Archaeological Purgatory! Or maybe it's Archaeological limbo.]

Off we go!
Re: the preceding. The rumours of the death of the notion of a human revolution at the time of the Middle to Upper Palaeolithic transition have been exaggerated.

Re: the following. Symbolism has little to do with language. These guys should have stayed in bed the day they decided to write that. Worse, still: linguistic symbols work through abstract convention; a painting of a horse works through iconic similarity. At a minimum these guys have shot one another in the foot in the complete self-contradiction of the two phrases, "symbolism has little to do with language" and "...linguistic symbols..."!
Re: the preceding. "Failed to invent" is wrong on so many levels. And "were present but dormant" sounds like they're analogizing language ability to a virus, like herpes, that is never really cured, but rather lies dormant in the nerve cells of the host. Language as virus. Slick!
Re: the following. Neandertals had large group sizes! Shit. No one's ever demonstrated to my satisfaction that they weren't solitary like orangutans!
Re: the preceding. I can't be certain what the authors intended by the phrase "cultural advance." However, I'm gonna guess that it's a euphemism for "progress." As such, this article reveals itself as having no place in polite anthropological circles.
Re: the following. "Cultural elaboration is the result of population pressure?" Gee, Mr. Wizard, what 1950s textbook did they get that out of? 
 Re: the preceding. I'm speechless.
Hmmm. Their conclusion really says it all. Don't it? Perhaps Neanderthals disappeared because of everything that ever happened to them. Gawd. I wish I'd thought of that!

Notice how they reference the hell out of the archaeological stuff, but they're quiet on the source for their psycholinguistic bafflegab? Either this subject is novel in psycholinguistic circles [which I very much doubt], it's so clear and well understood in psycholinguistic circles that all of their statements are akin to saying "the sun will rise today," or they're full of shit. I refuse to get drawn into name-calling. So... I'm outa here! Almost. Dare I say that this paper could be filed under the heading: "Psycho linguistics?"

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SA announces new posts on the Subversive Archaeologist's facebook page (mirrored on Rob Gargett's news feed), on Robert H. Gargett's Academia.edu page, Rob Gargett's twitter account, and his Google+ page. A few of you have already signed up to receive email when I post. Others have subscribed to the blog's RSS feeds. You can also become a 'member' of the blog through Google Friend Connect. Thank you for your continued patronage. You're the reason I do this.

Thursday 25 July 2013

Touchstone Thursday: Watson and Crick's 'Molecular Structure of Nucleic Acids' (1953)

I suppose I could say that this paper needs no introduction. And, yeah, I guess this is a bit of a reach for a Subversive Archaeologist Touchstone Thursday. But, bear with me [I really do ask you to do this often, don't I?]. This article, only very slightly more than one page in Nature, is quite possibly the most important of the twentieth (or any other) century. 
Watson and Crick's 'Molecular Structure of Nucleic Acids.' [Reproduced here courtesy of Nature, who've made it freely available online. Bless their pointy big heads! Click here for your own copy.] 




Click on these images to make them legible

When I first encountered this paper I was wrong-footed, for a couple of reasons. First, it's sooo short! [Size isn't everything, after all!] Occam's rusty old razor really had something going for it. Elegant theories, even in organic chemistry, don't have to be concomitantly complex. The other facet of this article that struck me was the depth and breadth of research that was already in place by the time the authors' brilliant solution was published. Although giants themselves, they were, truly, standing on the shoulders of similarly proportioned human beings, going right back into the nineteenth century, when D.N.A. was first discovered [I love the way that W & C abbreviate the molecule's nomen with periods between the letters--it's so...quaint-seeming today, when 'dee-en-ay' is, to all intents and purposes, a vocabulary word all on its own]. 
     For anyone who's interested [and you all should be], there's an excellent synthesis of the background to Watson and Crick's touchstone: 
Pray, L. (2008) Discovery of DNA structure and function: Watson and Crick. Nature Education 1(1)
Rosalind Franklin
Read it and be amazed. And let's not forget the crucial piece of the puzzle that Rosalind Franklin and Maurice Wilkins contributed. Unbeknownst to Franklin, Wilkins had shown Watson her X-ray crystallograph of the DNA molecule, known as photo 51. It turned out to be the key datum that convinced Watson that a double helix was the long-sought, but elusive, solution to the puzzle. That photo is reproduced below. It appears as if one's looking right down the throat of the molecule! Amazing. 
Rosalind Franklin's B-form of DNA, photo 51 (Credit for photo)
     And after you read Watson and Crick (1953), pause to reflect on the immense impact that Watson and Crick will have, in reality, for ever and ever, for all of us. Sounds a bit like a secular 'Lord's Prayer,' don't it? I'll prolly rot in Hell.

Tuesday 23 July 2013

UNCLE!

Now that I've found a place to live beginning August 1, I can get back to doing what I do best—bringing you the up-to-the-minute scoop on all things archaeological. I have some serious catching up to do!

I'll take the headlines one at a time.

From Fumane Cave, Italy, comes word that a Neanderthal shell ornament has come to light. Here's a closeup photo.
Scale bar = 10000 µm. Reference: Peresani M, Vanhaeren M, Quaggiotto E, Queffelec A, d’Errico F (2013) "An Ochered Fossil Marine Shell From the Mousterian of Fumane Cave, Italy." PLoS ONE 8(7): e68572. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0068572
This elegant trace of the Neanderthal symbolic life was first mined from fossiliferous sediments almost 100,000,000,000 µm from the archaeological deposits in which it was found, deep in Fumane Cave. Then it was evidently truncated. [I can't help but add a personal interpretation to that of the authors. Perhaps the shel was broken apart to represent the binary opposition of 'inside' and 'outside' as a means of resolving the contradiction inherent in the cave:dead animal carcass parts:death inside the cave and the fecund, ever regenerating open-air:live animal:life outside it.] Finally its outer surface was covered in hematitic clay (red ochre) and its inner surface rubbed with an unpigmented silty clay, which left a microscopic patch of minute parallel striations ranging from 1 to 10 µm across.

I'll admit, it's hard to imagine research that could top the Fumane Cave shell ornament. Nevertheless, a group of archaeologists working in southwestern Europe think they've found evidence of Neanderthal housekeeping. Nobody wants a living space cluttered with chunky, smelly remains of large mammals. So, the Gorham's Cave Mousterian inhabitants kept their activity areas and their gendered spaces [me, again, with an idea to enhance the wobbly ladder of inference] free of large leftovers of large animals that had provided sustenance during a cold, hard winter in MIS 4 [or 5—me, again]. Sadly, I've been unable to locate the monograph whence comes these new revelations about Neanderthal's behavioural repertoire. So, I can't show you a figure to give you a graphic that might help you make sense out of such intriguing and provocative findings. Should you have access to the original work, please do flip it on to me and I'll give it its due. However I do have a loverly photo of the cave, which I'll put up down below. The take-home message here is that it's clear from the relative paucity of large mammal remains compared with the remains of smaller animals that the Middle Palaeolithic inhabitants of Gorham's Cave were, as it were, taking out the garbage before bedding down for the night. Reference: Currant AP, Price C, Sutcliffe AJ, Stringer CB (2012) "The large mammal remains from Gorham’s Cave." In Barton RNE, Stringer CB, Finlayson JC, editors. Neanderthals in Context: a report of the 1995–1998 excavations at Gorham’s and Vanguard Caves, Gibraltar. Oxford: Oxford University School of Archaeology. 141–150. 
One of the proponents of the Gorham's Cave Neanderthal ethos, Clive Finlayson, in front of Vanguard Cave. Not quite Gorham's Cave, but it is in the same rock of Gibraltar. Close enough for the girls I go out with! Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/37/Clive_Finlayson_off_Vanguard_Cave.jpg/640px-Clive_Finlayson_off_Vanguard_Cave.jpg
I'll have much more to say in my next installment. Hang in there. More exciting Neanderthal news to come.


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SA announces new posts on the Subversive Archaeologist's facebook page (mirrored on Rob Gargett's news feed), on Robert H. Gargett's Academia.edu page, Rob Gargett's twitter account, and his Google+ page. A few of you have already signed up to receive email when I post. Others have subscribed to the blog's RSS feeds. You can also become a 'member' of the blog through Google Friend Connect. Thank you for your continued patronage. You're the reason I do this.

Monday 22 July 2013

A Shell That Is But A Shell Of Its Former Self

I'm shocked, shocked to find that mythopoeic archaeology is going on in Italy! [Apologies to Captain Renault.]
Location of Fumane Cave and two palaeontological localities mentioned in Peresani et al.
Once again, the credulous, but impartial, referees at PLoS ONE have ensured that no matter how far-fetched the inference, they're dedicated to giving it an outlet. [I'd really like to know their rejection rate. Any ideas? I kinda doubt there is one! But, that's beside the point. Because that would be argumentum ad hominem, and everybody knows that's not a valid argument!] 
Peresani M, Vanhaeren M, Quaggiotto E, Queffelec A, d’Errico F (2013) "An Ochered Fossil Marine Shell From the Mousterian of Fumane Cave, Italy." PLoS ONE 8(7): e68572. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0068572
In this paper the authors analyze the bejeebuz out of a single, fragmentary specimen of Aspa marginata found in a Mousterian stratum. They say that the only possible conclusion is that this relatively tiny fragment of a marine shell was brought to the cave by [style-conscious] Neanderthals, [inexplicably] rubbed to create minute striations on the interior, and then smeared with hematite [to produce a nice, red lump that was somehow then displayed as a fashion statement]. These are the crucial inferences on which they base their claims.
1) The specimen is a fossil of Aspa marginata.
2) The specimen must have originated in fossiliferous rock 100 km away.
3) The specimen was originally 34 mm long and 24 mm wide.
4) The specimen has numerous minute striations on the inner lip.
5) The specimen has some hematite in numerous little surface dents.
Unfortunately for their argument, the authors have violated Rule #1—they haven't considered all of the natural processes that could account for a) the presence of a single small fragment of non-local shell, b) the striations on the lip, and c) the presence of hematite on the shell.

I want to apologize in advance for the length of this blurt, and for the length of time it has taken me to squeeze it out. It takes a long time to argue against the claims made in a paper like this, if only because the claims are based on limited 'evidence' and not much else. I've made an effort to perform the due diligence that the authors should have taken on. If they'd made the same effort as me, they would never have submitted their findings to a reputable refereed journal, much less to PLoS ONE!
[Because this blurt is so long, I'm going to make the better part of it accessible "after the fold," as they say in blogistan. That means, simply, that the article is continued on a secondary web page.]

Let's take the inferences one at a time...

Inference 1: Taxonomic identification

I have no quarrel with their species ascription. After all, I'm not a malacologist, nor an invertebrate palaeontologist. Despite my shortcomings there does seem to be some dispute in the literature as to the correct genus name—both Bufonaria marginata and Aspa marginata are used as is Bursa marginata [although, apparently, Aspa now has the edge over Bufonaria and Bursa].

Inference 2: The shell's provenance [or, to be more correct, provenience]

A. marginata has occupied the seas of Italy's part of the world since at least the Miocene [when, in fact, the Mediterranean was created by the collision of the African and Eurasian tectonic plates]. It's true that A. marginata occurs in fossiliferous sediments within 100 km or so of Fumane Cave, as the authors tell us. They're also careful to point out that in the present day the species doesn't occur the Mediterranean basin. Doesn't it seem a little odd that they've gone to the trouble of researching the present-day geographic distribution of A. marginata when they're dealing with a 47,000 year old discovery? Well, even if it doesn't seem odd to you, it does to me. I suppose it's possible that the authors wanted to rule out any possibility that their specimen was picked up on the Mediterranean littoral 47 ka. But why? For us to accept such a statement we'd have to think that marine conditions and A. marginata's trophic preferences have been static for those 47 ka. So, as my dear, dead Dad used to say: Beats the shit outa me. Furthermore, I'm surprised that they would cite the World Register of Marine Species as the source for their claim, because it seems to contradict their claim. I went to the same source and found two citations that list the Mediterranean as one of the places that this species lurks—here and here. As Frodo would say, I'm confusticated and bebothered.

If you look at Peresani et al.'s figure below, you may notice a very polished sheen on the archaeological specimen's inner surface, which I've circled in red. [Since we're given four views of the Fumane Cave specimen, the arrows are there to help you by pointing out the corresponding anatomical points on the archaeological and the comparative specimens.] I'll defer to the invertebrate palaeontologists in the group if I'm wrong. However, I think the lustre of this specimen's columella means that there has been no or very little mineralization of this specimen. In other words it appears to be an unaltered fossil, to use palaeo-speak. Such 'fossils' are a frequent occurrence in certain lithofacies. I'm also very curious as to how you would tell an 'unaltered' fossil from a contemporary one. *sigh* The lyf so short, the craft so longe to lerne.

a = archaeological specimen; b through d = comparative fossils
Unfortunately, we don't get to see inside the three comparative specimens. So, the sceptical among us are left to depend on the authors' 'authority' in this matter. And you and I know that argument from authority is not a valid form of argument.

In reality it's of little consequence whether or not the Fumane Cave specimen is truly a fossil or was a living organism at the time of the Neanderthals. There are any number of ways that a cm-sized clast of any solid could have arrived in the cave unintentionally, whether or not it was a fossil that had eroded out of bedrock. Any furry or hairy creature can transport small bits in matted hair for great distances. Had one such animal been killed or scavenged by a Neanderthal, a small fragment of shell could easily have come to rest in the cave and be preserved. The same would be true of other predators that transport carcass parts away from a death site, such as wolves and hyaenas. In this case, the authors' claim is just one of a number of possible scenarios. And a not very important one, at that.

Inference 3: Estimating the original size

I honestly don't have a clue why the authors thought it important to estimate the specimen's original size, nor do they offer a reason. Nevertheless, they take great care to justify their estimate of the original dimensions—including publishing a half-page regression curve to illustrate their six data points, seen below, and a column-width table containing the same six measurements. I feel so inadequate that I don't see the point. It's a mystery to me why the referees didn't just tell them to axe this part of their paper. I realize that in this digital age, bits and bytes are cheap, and the page count means little compared with the days of print-only publication. However, it's still true that you and I have precious little time to read unnecessary verbiage. Under the circumstances, absent a compelling explanation, I have to conclude that their treatment of the specimen's original size is a total waste of my time.

A bit of errant pedantry—Height is not spelled Heigth in any dictionary I've poked my head into. I guess proofreading is the first casualty in an electronic journal that promises "fast publication times." 
So, having thus demonstrated that they are the best darned fossil-shell, original-size estimators this side of the Pecos River, the authors get into the real purpose of their paper.

And I'll see you after the fold!

Friday 19 July 2013

No One Could Have Predicted This ...

Jeebuz! I go away for 5 minutes and all Hell breaks loose in the world of Neanderthal myth-making. How else am I supposed to think when, upon my return to the Subversive Archaeologist's saddle I'm confronted with this stuff. 

A house-proud race. Hmmm. Aside from the loosely logical inferences that produced this claim, I think we're in real trouble. I haven't read the article yet. But I have to say that, if the journ-o thinks there's such a thing as a human race, we're doomed.
You must be joking! Glottochronology? Again? 50 years after it was thoroughly debunked? We're in worse shape than I thought we were.
Oh. All right. We can extend the ethnographic analogies beyond the limits of the archaeological record? My least vituperative response is Pshaw!

I think we should consider ourselves privileged in that we have all lived long enough for Ralph Solecki to remember what happened at Shanidar in the 1950s and 60s. I think we can all agree that it would have been better if he had awoken 30 years ago, when a comprehensive report on the excavations would have been of some use. Under the circumstances I have to wonder if there were any records kept of the plunder excavations at Shanidar. There's certainly never been an adequate accounting of the sedimentary context of the various skeletal remains. For such an important site, the published record is unforgivably thin. R. Solecki has had decades to produce something other than a descriptive account.

All I can say for sure is that 'work' like that of Solecki has given credulous palaeolithic archaeologists plenty of reasons to fabricate extrapolations like the one below, which has just come to light. Can you imagine any [ANY] serious archaeologist getting so exercised about a fragment of marine shell such as the one mentioned below? I hope to Jeebuz not.
I'm still working on this latter bit of fluff. Hang in there.

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SA announces new posts on the Subversive Archaeologist's facebook page (mirrored on Rob Gargett's news feed), on Robert H. Gargett's Academia.edu page, Rob Gargett's twitter account, and his Google+ page. A few of you have already signed up to receive email when I post. Others have subscribed to the blog's RSS feeds. You can also become a 'member' of the blog through Google Friend Connect. Thank you for your continued patronage. You're the reason I do this.

Thursday 18 July 2013

Tonight's Cheer—Lake Chelan (WA) Chelan Gold Hard Cider


Where I'm presently staying, in Blaine, Washington, they literally roll up the sidewalks after sundown. So one must rely on one's own devices to keep awake and alive. Especially after spending most of the day trying to craft a sensible, accurate, take-down of yet another dose of archaeological Neanderthal nuttery. And yours truly can only take so much frustration in the process. So, nothing left to do but satisfy the palate, and the self, with something new to numb the senses. Believe me, this stuff is a completely new sensation for this palate.

I must admit that, at first sip I thought I might be drinking perfume [cheap perfume, at that]. And I'm not sure, yet, if I can get over that first sensation. The 2011 Chelan Gold Hard Cider is an impressive package—1 liter of truly gold- coloured and crystal-clear liquid in what looks like a gilt-edged, clamp-topped bottle.

The makers talk about it as one would a fine wine. You know. Wine-wanker-speak. Here's a sample...

"The color is pale straw. The aromas and flavors are what one would expect from cool climate orchard sites. Beautiful apple pie, fresh summer apple, and fermented apple notes form a great presentation."
"This cider matches perfectly with seafood and poultry entrees and would stand up to fruit salads as well. It makes for a great summer beverage as well, as it pairs nicely with cold sandwiches, fresh fruits or slightly warmed with a dash of cinnamon on a cold winter night!"
Cold it isn't tonight—this part of the Northwest Coast is luxuriating in an anomalously long dry spell with plenty of sunshine and temperatures in the 30s [80s, if you're in the U.S.]. So, I won't by trying the cinnamon. And this perfect weather is predicted to last at least another 10 days. More global weirding, I'm afraid. On the other hand, maybe this summer is just balancing the scales for the summer of 1971, when it rained steadily from the 1st to the 21st of July. [I kid you not! Those guys that wrote the Bible obviously knew nothing about temperate rain forests. Forty days and forty nights? Peanuts compared to the rainfall record in Vancouver.]

I wish I could place the flavour that I'm getting along with the "apple pie, fresh summer apple, and fermented apple notes." I suppose it could be oak. Or it could be poison ivy. Whatever it is, it can stand up to a fruit salad! [For what that's worth.] As I'm NOT an oenophile, nor a ciderophile, I'm ill-equipped to judge this brew authoritatively. And at $10 a liter for apple juice, I'm afraid to say I don't like it. I'm used to BC Growers cider, or Angry Orchard, or Strongbow, all of which are on the dry side. This Chelan Gold is d-r-y. There's not an iota of sugar. But then, apple-tree bark is dry, too. But we don't try to drink it. On the up side, unlike the un-wanky ciders, this puppy is 10+% alcohol by volume! Woo hooooooo!

Well. I think I've said enough for tonight.



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SA announces new posts on the Subversive Archaeologist's facebook page (mirrored on Rob Gargett's news feed), on Robert H. Gargett's Academia.edu page, Rob Gargett's twitter account, and his Google+ page. A few of you have already signed up to receive email when I post. Others have subscribed to the blog's RSS feeds. You can also become a 'member' of the blog through Google Friend Connect. Thank you for your continued patronage. You're the reason I do this.

Wednesday 17 July 2013

Working Again! On Peresani et al. More Neanderthal Jewelry. This Time From The Haut Couture Center Of The Universe—Italia

I'm shocked, shocked to find that mythopoeic archaeology is going on in Italy! [Apologies to Captain Renault.] 


Peresani M, Vanhaeren M, Quaggiotto E, Queffelec A, d’Errico F (2013) "An Ochered Fossil Marine Shell From the Mousterian of Fumane Cave, Italy." PLoS ONE 8(7): e68572. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0068572

Coming soon.


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SA announces new posts on the Subversive Archaeologist's facebook page (mirrored on Rob Gargett's news feed), on Robert H. Gargett's Academia.edu page, Rob Gargett's twitter account, and his Google+ page. A few of you have already signed up to receive email when I post. Others have subscribed to the blog's RSS feeds. You can also become a 'member' of the blog through Google Friend Connect. Thank you for your continued patronage. You're the reason I do this.

Tuesday 16 July 2013

The Subversive Archaeologist's World Headquarters Has Relocated 1571.04 Kilometers North Of Its Previous Location!


While it would violate the rules of privacy to give you an address, the following series of images should enable any one of you to find me, from anywhere in the world [thanks to Google Earth!]. All visitors will be welcome after the first of August, upon which date I will be moving in. Happiness, meet Rob.
 
There's a teeny, tiny, yellow push pin near the 49th parallel north—the new location of World Headquarters!
Just the northern bits of North America shown here. Note the lovely, crinkly edges.
The lighter green (low elevation) geological feature is commonly referred to as the Lower Fraser Valley of British Columbia, but as you can plainly see it extends south of the 49th parallel, well into Washington State. We Canadians and Americans living here are therefore more than children of a common mother, we're children of a common geomorphic process! This area has historically been the vegetable basket of Western Canada. The fruit basket is further east in the Okanagan Valley, while the bread basket is the Prairie Provinces. Who knows what those scalawags in Ontario and Québec subsisted on for all these years!
Birch Bay Village. Land of artificial lakes, an executive golf course, tennis courts, a pool, miles of beaches, a marina, and 24/7 security. And all for $795 a month, which is $555 less than it cost for the previous World Headquarters in Santa Cruz, CA.
The new World Headquarters of the Subversive Archaeologist! A detached house in suburbia. I've finally made it to the middle class ... erm ... actually I've made it to single-family dwelling. I can't call myself Middle Class until I own such a place. And we all know when that'll happen. Don't we? When porcines sprout wings!


ANY TIME IS A GOOD TIME TO GET GOOD STUFF AT THE SUBVERSIVE ARCHAEOLOGIST'S OWN, EXCLUSIVE "A DRINK IS LIKE A HUG" ONLINE BOUTIQUE

SA announces new posts on the Subversive Archaeologist's facebook page (mirrored on Rob Gargett's news feed), on Robert H. Gargett's Academia.edu page, Rob Gargett's twitter account, and his Google+ page. A few of you have already signed up to receive email when I post. Others have subscribed to the blog's RSS feeds. You can also become a 'member' of the blog through Google Friend Connect. Thank you for your continued patronage. You're the reason I do this.

Monday 15 July 2013

If You Call Yourself A Social Scientist (Even If You Don't Think Your Work Qualifies As Science) It's About Time You Did More Than Stand Up To Be Counted On Questions Of Social Justice.


I'm going to ask you to forget the Zimmerman verdict for a moment. Forget about global warming. Forget about the wars of aggression in Afganistan and Iraq. Forget about lobbyists. Forget about "special interests." It's time to show our collective humanity and let the Republican Party and all of its enablers, from tea-baggers to Southern Democrats, drown in their own filth.

Last Thursday the majority-Republican United States House of Representatives passed legislation that, for the moment at least, ends the so-called Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) [a program previously known as food stamps in which the destitute poor in this country receive, on average, $134 a month to help them subsist.]. Yup. One organization reports that in April 2013 47,548,694 people were receiving SNAP benefits. Thus, with a snap of their collective finger [middle digit, almost certainly] the champions of the richest kicked nearly 50 million people to the kerb, to better to roam the nation's sidewalks begging for alms.

My vocation is making archaeological knowledge. Any North American archaeologist will tell you that what I do is anthropology. I have paid dearly to be so called, and I can say with pride that I study humanity from almost every possible angle, including what happened in the recent and distant past.

But, in light of the U.S. Congress's latest stick in the eye of the poor in this country, I must admit that my musings, even the ones considered worthy of publication, "don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world." And, just like Rick Blaine in Casablanca "I'm no good at being noble." A better way to put it might be "I don't have much success at the Hero thing." And what can I do now that food stamps have been axed from the only legislative vehicle that has provided for them since the 1970s? I greet this news with dismay, of course, but also with despair that my person, through my vocation, has no hope of effecting change than might release those 50 million from the pillory that is poverty. As for any hope of addressing global poverty, I can only throw up my hands and say that I'm just one person, and one person never changed anything.

Part of me hopes that I'm wrong in thinking that. Individuals have always been able to root out injustice and replace it with hope, most notably Gandhi, Mother Theresa, Schindler. However, the list is incredibly short. How can I be expected to join that club? In truth, I can't. But that doesn't mean I'll keep mum when I'm faced with a singular act that is as venal, as heinous, as despicable as that which the Republican Congress just evinced. So, I'm bending your ear, and hoping that something might come of it.

There are more than 11,000 members of the American Anthropological Association (AAA). I have to think that a significant number, perhaps the majority of the Society for American Archaeology's 7,000 or so members, choose not to belong to the AAA because for the past forty or so years they perceive a profound disconnect between anthropological theory and that which underpins Americanist archaeology. Sad, but true. The American Psychological Association boasts of 137,000 members. The American Sociological Association: 14,000+. About 18,000 economists comprise the American Economic Association. So, the optimistic number of people whose job descriptions includes improving the human condition through research? 187,000. Even if you include their like-minded relatives and acquaintances, those students whose minds they've molded, the number is frustratingly small.

Unfortunately in a country of around 300 million people, never mind the 187,000 beings who think they have the answers. Let's face it, if the musings of enearly 50 million people living on the edge of starvation don't amount to a hill of beans, what hope is there?

What can possibly explain why a majority of Americans parrot the Republican party line—that poor people are there because they deserve it, and for that reason the rest of us shouldn't be asked to pool our resources to help them out? Contra John Donne, it appears that there are more 'islands' among the people of this country than he could have imagined from his place in 17th century England's society. Nevertheless, in Donne's writings we can see that even in a time and place where many more people professed to be Christians than perhaps at any time in history, there was still a concern as to the level of charity that could be expected of individuals. Donne writes
No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were: any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
There would have been no reason to utter these words had Donne not perceived a worrisome failure on the part of his compatriots to look to the well-being of their neighbours.

And so I leave as I entered. My 'bleeding' heart is broken, again. As is my spirit. Please, somebody 'splain to me what, as an anthropologist, I have done or can do in aid of the less fortunate, especially those less fortunate who're less fortunate than most less fortunate people, like me and you. What to do?

I'm old enough to remember protest songs and be ins and teach ins and an anti-war and later an anti-nuclear movement that I [perhaps naively] believe did make a difference. Just a lot of like-minded people doing more than just standing up to be counted, like so many members of scholarly associations.  Where is our Dylan now? Our Joan Baez? Cesar Chavez? Woody Guthrie? Where is everybody? Nose down, working hard, hoping to dodge the unemployment axe, uncomfortable and disquieted but nevertheless silent. Out of fear? What, then? Or am I just 'projecting,' as the psychologists say, and I'm actually the only one who hasn't figured out a way to make social change happen? The politicians have the so-called bully pulpit, they have the ears of FOX, CNN, MSNBC and so on and so on.

We could issue a statement! Buy space in the New York Times for a darned good argument against what the Republicans are doing!! Maybe a Superbowl commercial next year? How about a Public Service Announcement on network TV? All such suggestions get us nowhere. Who'd read the statement? Who gets the New York Times AND reads full-page arguments? No one would hear the PSA 'cause it'd be aired in the middle of the night. I doubt the Superbowl producers would allow an overtly political message—they've done it before. Well? We could all hold hands and sing "Kumbaya," the way the right in this country expects us to do! Or, perhaps, like the character of Jesus in Jesus Christ Superstar when beset by the poor and leprotic crowd, we could profess an insufficiency of spirit and hope that it wasn't viewed as an insufficiency of concern.

Feel free to jump in any time. For my part, I'm adding about another 375 ml of wine to my daily chardonnay intake just to dull the 50 million new pains that I feel every time I take a breath in this world of so much hate.

ANY TIME IS A GOOD TIME TO GET GOOD STUFF AT THE SUBVERSIVE ARCHAEOLOGIST'S OWN, EXCLUSIVE "A DRINK IS LIKE A HUG" ONLINE BOUTIQUE

SA announces new posts on the Subversive Archaeologist's facebook page (mirrored on Rob Gargett's news feed), on Robert H. Gargett's Academia.edu page, Rob Gargett's twitter account, and his Google+ page. A few of you have already signed up to receive email when I post. Others have subscribed to the blog's RSS feeds. You can also become a 'member' of the blog through Google Friend Connect. Thank you for your continued patronage. You're the reason I do this.

Hold Elsevier's Metaphorical Feet To The Fire!!!

Before I get started, if you are a non-native speaker of English who publishes in English-language journals I want you to know that you are not the object of my criticism, although you are most certainly the catalyst. In fact, you are clearly as much the victim in the process that I am decrying as are the subscribers and the earnest unpaid colleagues that make up editorial boards. Elsevier makes all of us 'look bad' and it's time we did something about it.  

An open letter to the following members of the scientific community regarding the poor standards of Elsevier, publishers of, among others, Quaternary International and the Journal of Archaeological Science.

To the INQUA Executive Committee 2011-2015:
President Dr Margaret Avery (South Africa)
Secretary General Dr Julius Lejju (Uganda)
Treasurer Dr Marie-France Loutre (Belgium)
Vice President Dr Frank Audemard (Venezuela)
Vice President Dr Fabrizio Antonioli (Italy)
Vice President Professor John Lowe (United Kingdom)
Vice President Professor Koji Okumura (Japan)
Past President Professor Allan Chivas (Australia)

the editors and editorial board of
and the editors and editorial board of the Journal of Archaeological Science
Editors
C.O. Hunt, R.G. Klein, Th. Rehren, and R. Torrence
Associate Editors
E. Asouti, K. Brown, M. Canti, J. Fassbinder, H. Huisman, S. J. Lycett, M. Martinón-Torres, D.R. Piperno, J. Sealy, and I. Whitbread
Editorial Board
R. Coard, P. Degryse, K. Edwards, R.P. Evershed, I. Freestone, Y. Goren, D.K. Grayson, E.M. Hedges,  C. Heron, A. Howard, G. Jones, D. Killick, H. Lechtman, J. Mei, J. O'Connell, D. Pearsall, M. Pollard, B. Pyatt, M. Regert, C. Roberts, P. Schwarcz, and B. Turner
Esteemed Colleagues:

I write to bring your attention to a disconcerting lack of editorial oversight on the part of Elsevier, the publisher of INQUA's flagship journal, Quaternary International and Journal of Archaeological Science. Both journals are of interest to palaeoanthropologists and archaeologists, as well as to other members of the physical sciences community.

In brief, Elsevier is happy to publish papers that do not meet the minimum requirements of English grammar and expression that befit the vanguard journals of our several disciplines. I have previously pointed up this shortcoming of Elsevier's oversight in a piece published on the Subversive Archaeologist: "What, Exactly, Do The Elsevier Editors Do? Judging From Lahaye et al. (JAS 40:2840--2847, 2013) They Do Boom All!"

Here is the message that I sent to the four editors of JAS regarding Lahaye et al.

Dear Editors: 
I write to express my profound disappointment in the quality of diction and scientific presentation in the recently published article by Lahaye, et al., "Human occupation in South America by 20,000 BC: the Toca da Tira Peia site, Piauí, Brazil."
You may or may not already have seen my public statement on the matter, the substance of which appears below.
What follows is not intended to embarrass the authors or the journal. However, I think you'll see that the issues I've raised in just the first few sentences of that paper are myriad and ultimately embarrassing to the Editors of Journal of Archaeological Science, and to the unsuspecting team who wrote the piece. [In the interest of disclosure and transparency in this age of digital 'publishing,' I must say that I've redacted the next few lines because, in my zealousness, I went over the line of collegial civility in favour of diction exemplifying my frustration with the circumstances. I later apologized to the editors, who graciously accepted.]
With all due respect,
Rob Gargett 
ABSTRACT, line 1.
"Numerous data, from archaeological researches"
That's simply incorrect grammar. "Researches" is the third-person present form of the verb "to research." The plural of research is "research."
ABSTRACT, line 6.
"all our observations ... tend to prove the good integrity of the site and the anthropological nature of the artifacts."
I'm gonna guess that, by "good integrity" the authors mean stratigraphic integrity, and that the artifacts with an "anthropological" nature are those attributed to human behaviour and not geofacts [as stone that has been fractured in such a way that it is difficult to rule out either nature or human agency.
ABSTRACT, line 8.
"The results bring new pieces of evidence of a human presence"
I've heard of "pieces" of a puzzle and"pieces of eight," but I've never encountered "pieces" of evidence. If taken literally, the use of "pieces" in this context would indicate that not much had been recovered---only pieces of what they might have hoped to obtain.
TEXT, line 1.
"Understanding the dynamics, knowing the age and the way the first peopling of America took place is, more than ever, a challenge for research, and is closely linked with societal issues."
Given that "Understanding" is part of what appears to be a compound subject [of one sort or another], one has to assume that the verb in this sentence is "is," which is followed by "a challenge for research ... [that is] ... "closely linked with societal issues." "Understanding" what, exactly. The "dynamics." But, the "dynamics" of what? If one is to make any sense out of this sentence, whatsoever, one must infer that "the age" and "the way" of the peopling of America are the dynamics alluded to in the first part. And, speaking of firsts, this is the first sentence in the article.
TEXT, line 3.
"Different theories have been in contradiction for a long time, and the paradigm of a post-11,500 years BP occupation has remained predominant for a long time."
I can't help from suggesting that the first part, in a very awkward way, is telling us that "contradictory theories" have been around "for a long time." "Years" is simply redundant. A certain "paradigm" has "predominated," we are told,  AGAIN "for a long time." I wouldn't let this sentence stand in an undergraduate essay.
TEXT, line 6.
"Nevertheless numerous new pieces of data question the initial acceptance of a theory of a migration from Siberia to Beringia, and then from the north to the south of the American continent."
Okay. Let's see if we can sort this one out. The subject is "pieces." Those "pieces" question something. That's impossible. A "piece" of something is incapable of "questioning" anything. [I'll ignore the use of the term "migration," which implies that these people knew where they were going.] This "migration" is said to have taken place beginning in Siberia, continuing across Beringia, and from there, "from the north to the south" of a "continent" that doesn't exist on the map. As to the direction taken once on the continent that has no existence, it would have been difficult for the first people to have travelled in a SOUTH TO NORTH direction!
This paper is heading for a failing mark, and we're not out of THE FIRST PARAGRAPH yet!
TEXT, line 9.
"Maybe, most of all, these new data question the values of the terminus post-quem imposed by a chronological limit fixed to the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM)."
In this example I've highlighted the words that are the frame of this sentence. I'll condense it for you. "These data question the values of the LGM." Somehow I don't think that's what the authors wanted to say. Once again, we have an inanimate object---in this case "data"---questioning "values." We won't find out until much later in the paper why the LGM is mentioned in the introductory paragraph.
TEXT, line 11.
"As far as the southern part of the continent is concerned, until recently it was admitted that it had been quickly colonized after the diffusion of the Clovis culture in the north." There's that mythical continent again! In this, the last sentence of the first paragraph, we are told that someone has "admitted" [South America] was colonized after some diffusion in the north. I doubt that anybody "admitted" anything.
Phew! We've now made it through the first paragraph.

The JAS editors responded as expected in a publishing world that places more emphasis on the 'bottom line' than on the quality of written expression. And I cannot fault them for the present circumstances. Here is how they put it
Hi Rob,
Thanks to alerting us to the problems with the manuscript.  We have been struggling with Elsevier over issues regarding English and editing and your comments will provide good ammunition.
Elsevier took the editing of English out of our hands since our work load is so high.  We process in excess of 800 papers per year.
Hopefully this will lead to a good outcome.
Bestest,
Robin

Dr. Robin Torrence
Senior Principal Research Scientist
Anthropology
So, in response to the high work load expected of unpaid scholars, Elsevier took over the task of editing to correct for non-standard English expression submitted by those whose first language is not English. As you can see in the screen capture below, Elsevier already offers pay-as-you-go editorial help to those whose "poor English" might cause "delays and initial rejections."

But, what about those papers whose publication has not been 'delayed' or 'initially rejected?' I'm talking about those papers that have been approved by the editorial boards, but whose English expression is ambiguous or murky. Despite Elsevier's taking over the task of editing for standard English expression, it would appear that they have done nothing beyond taking the task out of the editors' hands. The latest example that I have noted is the paper by Policarp Hortolà and Bienvenido Martínez-Navarro, "The Quaternary megafaunal extinction and the fate of Neanderthals: An integrative working hypothesis." Quaternary International 295:69--72, 2013. I think we can be certain that the two examples I have pointed to are not the first, nor are they the last to make it into print. Both are rife with expressions that leave one scratching one's head, and are often so ambiguous or murky that the authors' intent needs to be interpolated rather than read and understood.

And what does the publisher have to say about this issue. Here is the response

Dear Prof Gargetti [sic],
Thanks for your message regarding the article recently by Lahaye, et al., "Human occupation in South America by 20,000 BC: the Toca da Tira Peia site, Piauí, Brazil" recently published in Journal of Archaeological Science. I am the publisher for the journal so your message was forwarded to me by the editors.

We take on board your comments and we’ll take any appropriate action if needed [emphasis added].

With best wishes,
Ilaria
Dr Ilaria Meliconi
Publisher

This is an amicable enough response. However, I think you'll agree, the words "we'll take any appropriate action if needed" do nothing to engender confidence.

As I said above, this issue is not about gruff, stuffy, old English speakers lording it over non-native speakers and expecting them to 'sound' well to the English-speaking ear. Rather, it's about published research containing non-standard expression that gets in the way of interpretation. Rather like the person in a bar after too many shots, Elsevier is content to publish works whose authors think are perfectly adequate, but who are in effect saying, "Well, you know what I mean. If, that is, you look at my incoherent statement in the light of whatever else I might have said earlier on the matter." Is this what individual and institutional subscribers expect for the pound of their flesh* handed over to Elsevier? I strongly doubt it. 

And so, dear colleagues, isn't it time to stand up to the amiable fraud behind the curtain instead of kowtowing to the Great and Powerful Elsevier? We have been turned into the 'man behind the curtain,' even while the publisher exists only as an apparition of our own making. In this day of digital submission and [mostly] digital publication, we might ask Elsevier, "Just exactly what do you do besides nominating an unpaid gaggle of earnest academics to sift through your submissions for content that is relevant and then pressing the Enter key that sends the bits and bytes to the pdf-maker and on to the subscriber?

I often entreat the readers of the Subversive Archaeologist to comment on what I put up here. This time I'm asking for a different kind of response. Send me links to material published by Elsevier that you think suffers from inadequate editing of non-native English expression.
* In [William Shakespeare's] The Merchant of Venice, Shylock is a Jewish moneylender who lends money to his Christian rival, Antonio, setting the security at a pound of Antonio's flesh. When a bankrupt Antonio defaults on the loan, Shylock demands the pound of flesh, as revenge for Antonio having previously insulted and spat on him. [Colloquial use of the term "a pound of flesh" persists despite the suspicion of antisemitism that hangs over Shakespeare's characterization of Shylock. I use the term here simply as a short-hand way of highlighting the onerous cost of Elsevier's refereed journals.]  

ANY TIME IS A GOOD TIME TO GET GOOD STUFF AT THE SUBVERSIVE ARCHAEOLOGIST'S OWN, EXCLUSIVE "A DRINK IS LIKE A HUG" ONLINE BOUTIQUE

SA announces new posts on the Subversive Archaeologist's facebook page (mirrored on Rob Gargett's news feed), on Robert H. Gargett's Academia.edu page, Rob Gargett's twitter account, and his Google+ page. A few of you have already signed up to receive email when I post. Others have subscribed to the blog's RSS feeds. You can also become a 'member' of the blog through Google Friend Connect. Thank you for your continued patronage. You're the reason I do this.