Review: Rachel Harris, Soundscapes of Uyghur Islam

A book review is presented for Rachel Harris, Soundscapes of Uyghur Islam. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2020

The seductions of Europe and the solidarities of Eurasia

Almost 40 years ago, when I was doing fieldwork in Poland, the word Solidarity was on everyone’s lips. One of the popular rallying cries, here and elsewhere in the region, was that of “rejoining Europe”. Similar ebullience was found in many Western countries at the time, justified by the increasingly progressive politics of the European Economic Community (as it was known at the time) and by the intellectual vogue for “civil society” as a key component of the continent’s liberal Enlightenment heritage.Today, in Poland and elsewhere in Europe, scepticism toward the idea of solidarity at the level of the EU runs deep. Populist politicians thrive and liberal civil society struggles. Why is this happening? Where else in the contemporary world can solidary solutions to the problems of the planet be forged? The answer given in this lecture will be radically Eurosceptic. Without denying the remarkable accomplishments of Europe since classical antiquity, it is necessary to place them in wider contexts. The landmass should be conceived as Eurasia, of which Europe is an important macro-region; it is an equivalent of China, not of Asia. The lecture will touch briefly on Axial Age theory, when social solidarities emerged on an unprecedented scale across the landmass, accompanied by ideas of moral universalism. It will also expound Jack Goody’s thesis concerning “alternating leadership” between East and West since the urban revolution of the Bronze Age. If we follow Goody by abandoning the rhetoric of a “European miracle” and look instead to Eurasian commonalities over the last three millennia, we shall be in a better position to create the geopolitical and moral solidarities urgently needed by humanity.Almost 40 years ago, when I was doing fieldwork in Poland, the word Solidarity was on everyone’s lips. One of the popular rallying cries, here and elsewhere in the region, was that of “rejoining Europe”. Similar ebullience was found in many Western countries at the time, justified by the increasingly progressive politics of the European Economic Community (as it was known at the time) and by the intellectual vogue for “civil society” as a key component of the continent’s liberal Enlightenment heritage.Today, in Poland and elsewhere in Europe, scepticism toward the idea of solidarity at the level of the EU runs deep. Populist politicians thrive and liberal civil society struggles. Why is this happening? Where else in the contemporary world can solidary solutions to the problems of the planet be forged? The answer given in this lecture will be radically Eurosceptic. Without denying the remarkable accomplishments of Europe since classical antiquity, it is necessary to place them in wider contexts. The landmass should be conceived as Eurasia, of which Europe is an important macro-region; it is an equivalent of China, not of Asia. The lecture will touch briefly on Axial Age theory, when social solidarities emerged on an unprecedented scale across the landmass, accompanied by ideas of moral universalism. It will also expound Jack Goody’s thesis concerning “alternating leadership” between East and West since the urban revolution of the Bronze Age. If we follow Goody by abandoning the rhetoric of a “European miracle” and look instead to Eurasian commonalities over the last three millennia, we shall be in a better position to create the geopolitical and moral solidarities urgently needed by humanity

Gellner's Structural-Functional-Culturalism

Enlightenment traditions celebrating the individual & knowledge that is universally valid are only one stream in the social philosophy of Ernest Gellner. As a philosopher, he vehemently rejected Wittgensteinian relativism. As a social anthropologist, he prioritized the study of 'structure' & 'function,' rather than cultural 'costume.' Yet his theory of nationalism relies on a concept of culture that I suggest derives ultimately from the Herderian countercurrent to enlightenment universalism. This notion of culture has a surprising affinity with the world view of Clifford Geertz. The paper argues that such holistic notions of 'a culture' are unconvincing anthropologically, increasingly unrealistic sociologically, & antiliberal politically

Recognizing Eurasia

Die Beiträge in diesem Heft werden in einem konzeptionellen Rahmen zusammengeführt, der dem anhaltenden Gewicht des Eurozentrismus entgegenwirkt, indem er auf langfristige Konnektivitäten und Gemeinsamkeiten in Eurasien aufmerksam macht. Dazu werden Ansätze auf Makro- und Mikroebene vorgestellt und maritime wie terrestrische Kommunikationsnetze und verschiedene Formen der politischen Gesellschaft untersucht – von den Agrarimperien der Antike bis zur heutigen Volksrepublik China. Die Autoren, die mehrere Nationalitäten und theoretische Traditionen vertreten, arbeiten in den Bereichen der Sozialanthropologie, der Area Studies, der Geschichtswissenschaft und der (historischen und politischen) Soziologie.Presenting both macro- and micro-level approaches, exploring maritime as well as terrestrial networks of communication, and investigating diverse forms of political society from the agrarian empires of the ancient world to the People’s Republic of China in our era, the essays in this special issue are brought together in a frame that counters the continuing weight of Eurocentrism by drawing attention to long-term connectivities and commonalities across Eurasia. The authors (representing multiple nationalities and theoretical traditions) work in Social Anthropology, Area Studies, History and (Historical and Political) Sociology

The Invention of Another Tradition: Tim Rogan on a Trio of Radical Historians in 20th Century Britain

Tim Rogan: The Moral Economists: R. H. Tawney, Karl Polanyi, E. P. Thompson, and the Critique of Capitalism. Princeton, NJ / Oxford: Princeton University Press 2017. 978-0-691-17300-

Eurasian Dynamics: From Agrarian Axiality to the Connectivities of the Capitalocene

Der einleitende Beitrag umreißt einen Rahmen, der die Dynamik der eurasischen Landmasse (flexibel definiert) in den Mittelpunkt der Weltgeschichte der letzten drei Jahrtausende stellt. Konzepte von Kulturraum, Zivilisation und Weltsystem werden kritisch überprüft. Besonderes Augenmerk gilt den Theorien der Achsenzeit, die sowohl religiöse als auch säkulare Varianten der Transzendenz umfassen, sowie deren Rolle bei der Legitimation politischer Institutionen. Diese Ansätze werden durch den Rückgriff auf den anthropo-archäologischen Materialismus von Jack Goody ergänzt, der die „alternierende Führung“ zwischen Ost und West betont. Der Fokus von Goody auf die wachsende städtische Differenzierung in den agrarischen Reichen der Bronzezeit kann erweitert werden, indem das Spektrum der Zivilisationen über die der intensiven Landwirtschaft hinaus ausgedehnt wird. Dieser Ansatz lässt sich mit theoretischen Erkenntnissen von Karl Polanyi gewinnbringend kombinieren, um eine neue historische ökonomische Anthropologie anzuregen, die es uns ermöglicht, verschiedene Varianten des Sozialismus auf die Formen der sozialen Inklusion und der „imperialen sozialen Verantwortung“ zurückzuführen,die in der Achsenzeit entstanden sind. Der Aufsatz argumentiert weiterhin, dass die eurasischen Zivilisationen, die die „große Dialektik“ zwischen Umverteilung und Marktaustausch hervorgebracht haben, angesichts der Widersprüche der heutigen neoliberalen politischenÖkonomie die beste Hoffnung sind, um die Spannungen des Kapitalozäns (angemessener wäre „Eurasiazän“) aufzulösen.This introductory paper outlines a frame that places the dynamics of the Eurasian landmass (flexibly defined) at the centre of world history in the last three millennia. Concepts of culture area, civilization and world system are critically reviewed. Particular attention is paid to Axial Age theories, including both religious and secular variants of transcendence, and their role inthe legitimation of political institutions. These approaches are supplemented with recourse to the anthropo-archaeological materialism of Jack Goody, who emphasizes “alternating leadership” between East and West. Goody’s focus on increasing urban differentiation in the agrarian empires of the Bronze Age can be expanded by widening the range of civilizations considered beyond those based on intensive agriculture. This approach can be fruitfully combined with theoretical insights of Karl Polanyi to inspire a new historical economic anthropology that allows us to trace multiple varieties of socialism back to the forms of social inclusion and “imperial social responsibility” that emerged in the Axial Age. It is further argued that, in the light of the contradictions of contemporary neoliberal political economy, the Eurasian civilizations that launched the “great dialectic” between redistribution and market exchange are the best hope we have for resolving the tensions of the Capitalocene (which might be more appropriately termed Eurasiacene)

A Bistatic Ground Station for Concurrent Spacecraft Operations

It is common for SmallSat and CubeSat operators to implement telecommunication systems using a half-duplex UHF system to reduce the cost and complexity of spcecraft hardware. This half-duplex configuration requires transmission and reception of the spacecraft signals at the same frequency, with the 402 MHz to 403 MHz band being a popular choice. Due to practical filter limitations, it is impossible to produce an analogue filter for a ground-based receiver which can sufficiently attenuate transmissions from neighboring transmitters also operating in the same 402-403 MHz, band while still retaining a sufficiently low insertion loss to clearly receive tranmissions from a spacecraft. As a result, only one such half-duplex ground station can operate in the 402-403 MHZ frequency band in any local area at any one time. We developed a bi-static station where the transmitting station is some 15 kilometers distant from the receiving station, allowing multiple concurrent spacecraft passes. Such an approach makes supporting UHF missions economic for ground station providers