Households without Houses : Mobility and Moorings on the Eurasian Steppe

The research that provided the basis for this paper was carried out in collaboration with the Institutes of History and Archaeology of the Mongolian Academy of Sciences and would not have been possible without my colleagues Chunag Amartuvshin, William Honeychurch, and D. Molor and the hospitality of the people of Egiin Gol and Baga Gazaryn Chuluu. The work was supported by the Center for the Study of Eurasian Nomads, the Wenner-Gren Foundation, the National Geographic Society, the Institute of Archaeology of the Mongolian Academy of Sciences, the National Science Foundation, Gettysburg College, Yale University, the Smithsonian Museum’s National Museum of Natural History, the Department of Anthropology at Harvard University, the American School for Prehistoric Research, and the Gerda Henkel Stiftung.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

For Colored Girls and Boys Who Have Considered Suicide/ When Prayer and GOOD Music Weren’t Enough

Lauren Chanel Allen, a 22-year-old Christian graduate student at Howard University, struggled with mental illness for years. Like so many blacks, Lauren expected her faith to serve an elixir for her problems, including depression. However, her prayers were not sufficient. When she was unable to find solace in the church, she sought out an alternative source: the music of Kanye West. She shared her story in a 2016 article, “How An Ultralight Beam Helped My Dark Depression,” which she published in Abernathy magazine. Lauren’s story speaks to the disconnect that many millennials have with the church. Nowhere in her article did she use the word – therapy – or mention seeking professional help for her condition. Lauren’s avoidance of medical specialists speaks to broader issues in the African American community related to mental illness. This article addresses the following questions: Why do some blacks place more faith in their churches than professional therapy to address their mental health concerns? How does the church’s inability to properly address mental illness contribute to the fact that some black millennials find more solace in Hip Hop than in the church when they experience suffering? What do black pastors think about millennials turning to Hip Hop and rappers like Kanye West for comfort instead of the church? How much reliance should black millennials who are struggling with their mental health place in their faith in Hip Hop musicians such as Kanye West that uplift their spirits

Landscapes of Inequality? A Critique of Monumental Hierarchy in the Mongolian Bronze Age

Khirigsuurs are stone monuments of variable scale and complexity that dominate the archaeological landscape of the Mongolian Bronze Age. Though there are countless typical-sized monuments, there are a few very large structures suggesting that a chiefly hierarchy directed their construction. Using measurements of size and formal complexity to compare these mega-monuments and khirigsuurs within fully surveyed areas this article argues that these monuments are not primarily tombs built to represent the social hierarchy of early nomadic pastoralists. Instead, they are monumental places created for living communities to communicate their organization and enduring nature to others and themselves. This communication was essential for early pastoralist communities to become established and survive

Is Antitrust Too Complicated for Generalist Judges? The Impact of Economic Complexity and Judicial Training on Appeals

Modern antitrust litigation sometimes involves complex expert economic and econometric analysis. While this boom in the demand for economic analysis and expert testimony has clearly improved the welfare of economists—and schools offering basic economic training to judges—little is known about the empirical effects of economic complexity or judges' economic training on decision-making in antitrust litigation. We use a unique data set on antitrust litigation in district courts during 1996—2006 to examine whether economic complexity impacts decisions in antitrust cases, and thereby provide a novel test of the frequently asserted hypothesis that antitrust analysis has become too complex for generalist judges. We also examine the impact of one institutional response to economic complexity - basic economic training by judges. We find that decisions involving the evaluation of complex economic evidence are significantly more likely to be appealed, and decisions of judges trained in basic economics are significantly less likely to be appealed than are decisions by their untrained counterparts. Our results are robust to a variety of controls, including the type of case, circuit, and the political party of the judge. Our tentative conclusion, based on a revealed preference argument that views a party’s appeal decision as an indication that the district court got the economics wrong, is that there is support for the hypothesis that some antitrust cases are too complicated for generalist judges.antitrust, Daubert, complexity, economic training, expert witness

I Gotta Testify: Kanye West, Hip Hop, and the Church

The goal of this project, “I Gotta Testify: Kanye West, Hip Hop, and the Church,” is to add a new perspective to the scholarly discourse on Hip Hop and Christianity within classrooms, religious institutions, and popular culture by focusing on Kanye. We chose to focus on Kanye because he has been one of Hip Hop’s most influential artists in the past decade. Furthermore, Kanye is one of the most polarizing celebrities in America and across the globe. His music, fashion, political views, and family (which includes the Kardashians) dominate discourse on social media, blogs, television, and other forms of mass media. With the exception of Julius Bailey’s 2014 edited book, The Cultural Impact of Kanye West, there has been little scholarly work published on Kanye. Bailey’s book contained just one essay, written by Monica R. Miller, dedicated to the theme of Kanye and religion. We intended to produce a nontraditional journal issue, partly because Kanye has never adhered to traditional boundaries. We also chose this method because we wanted to provide a document suitable for both academic and popular audiences. Kanye West identifies as a Christian and primarily uses Christian themes in his music, videos, concerts, and messaging. Dr. Joshua K. Wright, Dr. Adria Y. Goldman and Dr. VaNatta S. For

Payment changes and default risk: The impact of refinancing on expected credit losses

This paper analyzes the relationship between changes in borrowers' monthly mortgage payments and future credit performance. This relationship is important for the design of an internal refinance program such as the Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP). We use a competing risk model to estimate the sensitivity of default risk to downward adjustments of borrowers' monthly mortgage payments for a large sample of prime adjustable-rate mortgages. Applying a 26 percent average monthly payment reduction that we estimate would result from refinancing under HARP, we find that the cumulative five-year default rate on prime conforming adjustable-rate mortgages with loan-to-value ratios above 80 percent declines by 3.8 percentage points. If we assume an average loss given default of 35.2 percent, this lower default risk implies reduced credit losses of 134 basis points per dollar of balance for mortgages that refinance under HARP