Seven Aboriginal marriage systems and their correlates

This paper outlines patterns of kin classi® cation and marriage in seven regions of Australia. It considers the implications of differences in those patterns for such features of economy and society as levels of polygyny, the structure and dynamics of country groups, the form of exchange networks and, very brie ̄ y, cosmologies and the roles of religious leaders. The analysis demonstrates certain associations between modes of kin classi® cation and organisational forms such as moieties. Finally, the paper draws conclusions about the environmental and institutional conditions for differences in `levels’ of polygynous marriage, as well as their political and economic consequences

Indigenous participation in Australian economies

This volume seeks to contribute to the body of anthropological and historical studies of Indigenous participation in the Australian colonial and post colonial economy. It arises out of a panel on this topic at the annual conference of the Australian Anthropological Society, held jointly with the British and New Zealand anthropological associations in Auckland in December 2008. The panel was organised in conjunction with an Australian Research Council (ARC) Linkage Grant project on Indigenous participation in Australian economies involving the National Museum of Australia as the partner organisation and the School of Archaeology and Anthropology at The Australian National University. The chapters of the volume bring new theoretical analyses and empirical data to bear on a continuing discussion about the variety of ways in which Indigenous people in Australia have been engaged in the colonial and post-colonial economy. Contributions cover settler capitalism, concepts of property on the frontier, Torres Strait Islanders in the mainland economy, the pastoral industry in the Kimberley, doggers in the Western Desert, bean and pea picking on the South Coast of New South Wales, attitudes to employment in general in western New South Wales, relations of Aboriginal people to mining in the Pilbara, and relations with the uranium mine and Kakadu National Park in the Top End. The chapters also contribute to discussions about theoretical and analytical frameworks relevant to these kinds of contexts and bring critical perspectives to bear on current issues of development

Language in the constitution of kinship

Kinship has been an “essentially contested concept” in social and cultural anthropology. Nevertheless, linguistic and anthropological linguistic studies of kinship terminologies, grammar, and pragmatics have developed in parallel with anthropological ones. Lacking, however, is a broad overview of the range of linguistic variation across languages that would build a bridge between the linguistics and anthropology of kinship. Toward that end, this article explores the role of language in the constitution of kinship. It asks, on what linguistic resources do people of different cultures and languages draw in order to constitute kinship as an institution

The language of ‘rights’ in the analysis of Aboriginal property relations

The analysis of Aboriginal “property” In an earlier article (Keen 2010) I looked at the ways in which Aboriginal “property” was (mis)understood by English speaking observers from quite early in the colonial period through to the present. A concomitant of the process of the colonisation of Australia and appropriation of Aboriginal land has been the misrepresentation of Aboriginal concepts and processes of relations to country. Observers interpreted property, especially in relation to land and ..

An assessment of computational procedures for eleven-stage compressor response to inlet distortion

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Aeronautics and Astronautics, 2003.Includes bibliographical references (p. 74-76).by Keen Ian Chan.S.M

Large-scale Complex IT Systems

This paper explores the issues around the construction of large-scale complex systems which are built as 'systems of systems' and suggests that there are fundamental reasons, derived from the inherent complexity in these systems, why our current software engineering methods and techniques cannot be scaled up to cope with the engineering challenges of constructing such systems. It then goes on to propose a research and education agenda for software engineering that identifies the major challenges and issues in the development of large-scale complex, software-intensive systems. Central to this is the notion that we cannot separate software from the socio-technical environment in which it is used.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figure

The impact of resources on decision making

Decision making is a significant activity within industry and although much attention has been paid to the manner in which goals impact on how decision making is executed, there has been less focus on the impact decision making resources can have. This article describes an experiment that sought to provide greater insight into the impact that resources can have on how decision making is executed. Investigated variables included the experience levels of decision makers and the quality and availability of information resources. The experiment provided insights into the variety of impacts that resources can have upon decision making, manifested through the evolution of the approaches, methods, and processes used within it. The findings illustrated that there could be an impact on the decision-making process but not on the method or approach, the method and process but not the approach, or the approach, method, and process. In addition, resources were observed to have multiple impacts, which can emerge in different timescales. Given these findings, research is suggested into the development of resource-impact models that would describe the relationships existing between the decision-making activity and resources, together with the development of techniques for reasoning using these models. This would enhance the development of systems that could offer improved levels of decision support through managing the impact of resources on decision making

The gains from preferential tax regimes reconsidered

The EU policy against harmful tax competition aims at eliminating tax policies targeted at attracting the internationally mobile tax base. We construct an imperfectly competitive model of costly trade between two countries. In setting their corporate taxes, governments non-cooperatively decide whether to discriminate between internationally mobile and immobile firms. We find the Nash equilibrium tax regimes. When trade costs are high countries impose a uniform tax on all firms while nations will discriminate between mobile and immobile firms when costs are low. At some trade costs, fiscal competition results in tax discrimination despite uniform taxation being socially preferable

Middle and Late Pleistocene environmental history of the Marsworth area, south-central England

To elucidate the Middle and Late Pleistocene environmental history of south-central England, we report the stratigraphy, sedimentology, palaeoecology and geochronology of some deposits near the foot of the Chiltern Hills scarp at Marsworth, Buckinghamshire. The Marsworth site is important because its sedimentary sequences contain a rich record of warm stages and cold stages, and it lies close to the Anglian glacial limit. Critical to its history are the origin and age of a brown pebbly silty clay (diamicton) previously interpreted as weathered till. The deposits described infill a river channel incised into chalk bedrock. They comprise clayey, silty and gravelly sediments, many containing locally derived chalk and some with molluscan, ostracod and vertebrate remains. Most of the deposits are readily attributed to periglacial and fluvial processes, and some are dated by optically stimulated luminescence to Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 6. Although our sedimentological data do not discriminate between a glacial or periglacial interpretation of the diamicton, amino-acid dating of three molluscan taxa from beneath it indicates that it is younger than MIS 9 and older than MIS 5e. This makes a glacial interpretation unlikely, and we interpret the diamicton as a periglacial slope deposit. The Pleistocene history reconstructed for Marsworth identifies four key elements: (1) Anglian glaciation during MIS 12 closely approached Marsworth, introducing far-travelled pebbles such as Rhaxella chert and possibly some fine sand minerals into the area. (2) Interglacial environments inferred from fluvial sediments during MIS 7 varied from fully interglacial conditions during sub-stages 7e and 7c, cool temperate conditions during sub-stage 7b or 7a, temperate conditions similar to those today in central England towards the end of the interglacial, and cool temperate conditions during sub-stage 7a. (3) Periglacial activity during MIS 6 involved thermal contraction cracking, permafrost development, fracturing of chalk bedrock, fluvial activity, slopewash, mass movement and deposition of loess and coversand. (4) Fully interglacial conditions during sub-stage 5e led to renewed fluvial activity, soil formation and acidic weathering

Pulmonary hypERtension and measurement of exerciSe caPacIty REmotely: evaluation of the 1-minute sit to stand test (PERSPIRE): a cohort study

Background: Multi-parameter risk assessment is recommended to aid treatment decisions in patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension. The 1-minute sit-to-stand test has been validated for use in other respiratory illnesses. The aim of this study was to evaluate its safety in the hospital setting and potential utility in remote assessment in patients with pulmonary hypertension. Methods: In a prospective cohort study design patients performed the 1-minute sit-to-stand and Incremental Shuttle Walk tests on the same day. The primary aim of the study was to assess safety signals and correlations with other metrics used in risk assessment. Results: Sixty patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension and 15 with chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension were enrolled. No adverse events were recorded. Post-test change in physiological parameters was lower for the 1-minute sit-to-stand than for the Incremental Shuttle Walk test in heart rate (+9.4(8.0)bpm versus +38.3(25.9)bpm (p<0.001)), oxygen saturation (−3.8(4.0)% versus −8.9(7.3)%, (p<0.01)) and systolic blood pressure (+10.1(10.5)mmHg versus +17.7(19)mmHg, p<0.001). There were significant correlations between the 1-minute-sit-to-stand and Incremental Shuttle Walking test (r= 0.702, p< 0.01), WHO FC (−0.449, p<0.01), emPHAsis-10 (−0.436, p<0.001) and NT-proBNP (−0.270, p=0.022). Ninety-seven percent of patients were willing to perform the test at home. Conclusion: This study has demonstrated the safety, sub-maximal characteristics of the 1-minute sit-to-stand test in pulmonary arterial hypertension chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension in the hospital setting, its positive correlation with the Incremental Shuttle Walk test and potential role in remote risk assessment. Further evaluation of this exercise test is now warranted