Glimpses of the Third Millennium BC in the Carpathian Basin

The relative and absolute chronology of the cultural groups of the 3rd millennium BC is a particularly exciting field of prehistoric research because this period spans the assumed boundary of two major periods — the final phase of the Copper Age and the initial phase of the Early Bronze Age. The transition from one major archaeological period to the next no doubt involved major structural changes. The transition period roughly spanning the middle third of the 3rd millennium BC, i.e. the period between the close of the Late Copper Age and the Early Bronze Age 2a in Hungary, corresponds to what is known as the Late Eneolithic in Central Europe and is generally divided into three main phases: 1. the late Baden, 2. the post-Baden/Vučedol, and 3. the post-Vučedol period. The transition in the Carpathian Basin had a mosaic patterning: the rhythm of change varied from region to region and the transformation in each major region followed a different cultural trajectory (Fig. 1, Table 1). This period is here examined in the light of two recently discovered finds from Hungary (Fig. 2, Fig. 4). The finds described here offered a glimpse into the transitional period between the Copper Age and the Bronze Age, with a focus on southern Transdanubia. The more or less identical artefacts and decorative styles appearing roughly synchronously in several regions reflect the period’s cultural contacts spanning extensive territories. The mapping of these communications networks and the clarification of the period’s finer chronological details based on the growing corpus of data will no doubt remain one of the priorities of future research. | A Kr. e. 3. évezred relatív és abszolút kronológiai viszonyainak kutatása különösen izgalmas területe az őskor vizsgálatának, hiszen két nagy korszak feltételezett határán, a rézkor kései és a bronzkor kezdeti fázisainak megismerését foglalja magában. A nagy régészeti korszak definíciók azt sejtetik, hogy fontos strukturális változások állnak mögöttük. A Kr. e. 3. évezred középső harmadára tehető átmeneti időszakot, vagyis a magyarországi késő rézkor vége és kora bronzkor 2a közötti korszakot, közép-európai szemszögből tekintve a késő eneolitikum időszakát három főbb szakaszra tagoltan vizsgálhatjuk: 1. késő Baden, 2. post-Baden/ Vučedol korszak, 3. post-Vučedol korszak. A Kárpát-medence térségében egy mozaikos jellegű, fokozatos, területenként változóan eltérő ütemű és tendenciájú átalakulásnak lehetünk tanúi (Fig. 1, Table 1). Ezúttal két magyarországi lelet alapján vizsgáljuk a korszakot (Fig. 2, Fig. 4). A bemutatott leletek segítségével a rézkor és bronzkor átmeneti időszakának néhány kérdését tekintjük át, különösen a Dél-Dunántúl területére fókuszálva. A kor nagy távolságokat átfogó kapcsolatrendszerének maradandó lenyomatát őrzik azok a tárgyak/stíluslemek, melyek több régióban közel egyidőben és hasonló jellegben találhatók meg. Ezek alapján fontos feladat lesz ennek/ezeknek a kommunikációs hálózat(ok)nak a további feltérképezése és a folyamatosan gyarapodó adatok alapján kronológiai összefüggéseik tisztázása

Community structure and ethnic preferences in school friendship networks

Recently developed concepts and techniques of analyzing complex systems provide new insight into the structure of social networks. Uncovering recurrent preferences and organizational principles in such networks is a key issue to characterize them. We investigate school friendship networks from the Add Health database. Applying threshold analysis, we find that the friendship networks do not form a single connected component through mutual strong nominations within a school, while under weaker conditions such interconnectedness is present. We extract the networks of overlapping communities at the schools (c-networks) and find that they are scale free and disassortative in contrast to the direct friendship networks, which have an exponential degree distribution and are assortative. Based on the network analysis we study the ethnic preferences in friendship selection. The clique percolation method we use reveals that when in minority, the students tend to build more densely interconnected groups of friends. We also find an asymmetry in the behavior of black minorities in a white majority as compared to that of white minorities in a black majority.Comment: submitted to Physica

The Sacrifice of Atonement in Roman Catholic Communities in the Székelyföld Region

In the light of the Marian apparitions in the 20th-21st centuries, people today are in a crisis situation characterised by alienation from the church and the faith, selfishness, the proliferation of sin, from which the way out would be atone-ment, accepting a sacrifice of atonement. From the mid-20th century a growing number of private revelations in Hungary and Transylvania face us with the same phenomenon and solution to the problem. The study presents a few atonement practices that have appeared in the last thirty years in Roman Catholic religious practice in the Székelyföld regio

The European struggle to educate and include Roma people: A critique of differences in policy and practice in Western and Eastern EU countries

Multiculturalism is an established feature of the UK and other European States since the establishment of the Treaty of Rome in 1959. Enlargement has brought EU membership from six (1952) to twenty eight members since its foundation, and allowed free migration across its borders. However, many countries, in spite of agreements to adhere to ‘democratic’ practices, deny minority citizens their full rights, particularly in education contexts. Some recent accession EU States have education systems that are less adaptive to expected policy responsibilities. It is a more unstable aspect of Eastern Europe because of the failure of many of these countries to reduce social and educational inequalities and to establish rights for minority groups, particularly the Roma. An educational focus is used as a platform to highlight issues re the segregation, and discrimination against, Roma children in Europe, typically through the use of special education, which is not suitable for them. Europe generally, both East and West has failed to fully integrate the Roma. Often, institutional blame is placed on Roma communities, rather than situate them socially and economically due to ingrained structural inequalities. Stereotyped categories are often used to ‘label’ them. Countries with high Roma populations, four in Western and five in Eastern Europe are evaluated and compared in relation to the education of Roma children

The development path of the Miskolc agglomeration (1970-2015)

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