Veblen’s Vested Interest and Power

With this inquiry I shall seek to establish that Thorstein Veblen advanced theories which related the vested interests with power. To accomplish this I shall first dissect the meanings behind Veblen’s definitions of the vested interest , intangible assets and free income. I then, using the previous analysis relate the state to vested interests and solidify their collective unity. After this connection I proceed onto analyzing the implications of the vested interest and how it relates to the common man. Power, normally analyzed within the context of political science is rarely spoken of within economics, this analysis strives to bring the idea of power into the realm of economics through Thorstein Veblen’s work, The Vested Interest and the Common Man [1919]

Rangifer and man: An ancient relationship

A long-term relationship between Rangifer and humans is documented in three case studies: the Canadian Barrenlands (8000 years ago to Historic period), Ice-Age France (11 000-19 000 years ago) and Mesolithic Russia (7000¬10 000 years ago). Ancient human and herd migration occurred in all areas, based upon Rangifer remains and seasonal variations in tools along reconstructed migration routes, with few if any hunting camps outside the routes. An April peak of ancient human births is inferred from the historic record where we see births occurring nine months after peak nutritional states in herds and people. The origin of reindeer domestication and breeding in Eurasia is discussed

Nadlok and Its Unusual Antler Dwellings

Nadlok, or "crossing-place-of-deer" in Bathurst Inuit dialect, is an island camp and herd interception site found in 1982 by Douglas Stern 100 km south of Bathurst Inlet, Northwest Territories. In the "Little Ice Age" (1450-1700 A.D.), a few families of coastal Copper Inuit appear to have abandoned a declining seal resource on the coast for predictable and available inland caribou hunting at Nadlok. A simple tent camp, as seen in the architecturally sterile bottom level dating 1400 A.D., evolved into 15 sturdy stone and antler dwellings occupied in winter. ... Scattered between the floors were late prehistoric Copper Inuit tools, art and trade goods. Men's and women's tools include an ornately engraved antler knife handle, ulus, harpoons, arrows, copper fishhooks with bone lures, needle cases, whittling knives, engraved pendants, fire-starting kits and awls. There were some 40 000 bones, mostly the remains of caribou, but also of birds, fish and muskox. ..

Muskox and Man in the Subarctic: An Archaeological View

Archaeologist Bryan C. Gordon, National Museum of Man, Ottawa, comments on the recent paper by Ernest S. Burch, Jr. in Arctic. He puts forward possible reasons for the relative absence of muskox remains. He concludes that, while barrenland archaeologists rightfully regard the caribou as the staff of life to the prehistoric indigenes, they do not disregard the muskox, but merely seek to accord it a correct relative importance

Father Guy Mary-Rousselière (1913-1994)

Father Guy Mary-Rousselière was 81 when he died in a house fire in Pond Inlet in April. Born in Le Mans, France, Father Mary-Rousseliere obtained a philosophy degree at the seminary of St. Sulpice, Paris in 1931, taking his first vows for the priesthood in the same year. He came to Canada a year after his ordination as an Oblate of Mary Immaculate in 1937, beginning his work with the Dene in northern Saskatchewan and Manitoba, and later ministering to the Inuit of Repulse, Pelly and Hudson bays, and Baffin Island. He told me that his 56 years in the North, with 36 years at Pond Inlet, had been rewarding as a priest. Father Mary-Rousselière was foremost a priest, but ever curious about the prehistory of the people he served. He learned much about Chipewyan and Inuit language and culture, later identifying their early tools and describing their past. ... Father Mary-Rousselière gave of himself in many ways. Archaeologists Hans Muller-Beck and Susan Rowley, and archaeology students from other countries visited or worked at Nunguvik or Saatut. He helped me in my Barrenland research by identifying Oblate archives as early sources of birth dates for my seasonality studies. Mary-Rousselière was a member of the Northwest Territories Historic Sites and Monuments Board for many years. His long years of scholarly service in the Arctic were publicly acknowledged when the Honourable Bill McKnight, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, presented him with the Northern Science Award in 1988. ..

Hoarding and the Cult of Money

As a category of psychological diagnosis, Hoarding Disorder has spawned a conception of “the hoarder” marked by social exclusion, a habitual urge to possess objects, and an apparent difficulty in disposing them. Against this limited definition, which stems from a lack of long-term historical and social awareness among scholars of hoarding disorder, my work asks, How is hoarding logical? Can we read hoarding as non-pathological or adaptive? What kind of monuments and record have historical hoarders left behind? Proceeding from the longer etymology of the word, hoard, and coupled with oral history interviews drawn from my own life, this thesis recasts “hoarding” as more complex than the current paradigm implies, pertaining to the rise of capitalism, commodity fetishism, and broader forms of socio-economic reciprocity which preceded and responded to formal and informal empire. Supported by historical documents from major thinkers in political economy, classical Liberalism, Marxism, Social Anthropology, and Neoliberalism, alongside periodical documents from nineteenth and twentieth-century Britain and the United States, I argue that hoarding among the poor and socially vulnerable, such as those affected by post-colonialism, deindustrialization, austerity, statelessness, etc., may be reread as a mode of economic survival and social investment, if the economic idiosyncrasies of an individual hoarder’s subjective lifeworld and context are taken into consideration. In tandem with this line of reasoning, I argue that hoarding is a spectrum of behavior that also includes more ‘normative’ behaviors of the super-wealthy, including cash and land hoarding. This thesis uses oral history, with cultural, anthropological, and literary sources, to shift the language around hoarding and to present it as an underlying logic of capitalism, as a mediator of interpersonal and family relationships, and as a dangerous extension of twentieth-century empire, functioning through hegemonic, legal, but deeply unethical institutions and financial tools such as major accountancy firms, central banks, international tax havens, and international corporations. Using sentimental objects from personal collections, I situate myself as embedded within history, and at the cusp of different economic and cultural worlds, wherein objects are read as unique signifiers of memory and meaning

Bison Antiquus from the Northwest Territories

Reports craniometric data for a well-preserved posterior portion of a mature bison skull incl the horn cores, which was found on the Liard River three mi above the Blackstone River mouth on the opposite shore in Mackenzie District. This is the most northerly recorded occurrence of Bison antiquus