Recent research suggests that diversity in craniofacial morphology is produced by a complex interaction of environmental variables including 1) muscle function, 2) genetic factors related to skull growth, 3) timing and heritability of suture fusion (cessation of growth of the joints connecting the bones of the skull), 4) growth and morphology of the brain, and 5) other non-genetic factors including hormones of the endocrine system. How these factors interact in cranial growth and development is not well understood. This dissertation investigated the influence of androgenic hormone on suture bone biology. Methodology used including in vitro cellular challenges, protein analyses, and in vivo therapies. The work described here utilized a large sample size to establish the role of testosterone as a modulator of bone morphogenetic protein and subsequent effects on osteoblast differentiation. Testosterone increased the effect of BMP on osteoblasts, increasing differentiation. The increased differentiation effect was successfully blocked using flutamide, an androgen receptor blocker. Bone cells harvested from non suture calvaria in craniosynostotic rabbits were most susceptible to flutamide administration. The presence of androgen receptors in cells harvested from the suture and non suture bone of craniosynostotic or wild type rabbits could not be confirmed due to a lack of an effective antibody. In vivo administration of flutamide to the coronal suture of craniosynostotic rabbits resulted in greater growth across the coronal suture. However, no correction of craniofacial growth was observed. These results suggest 1) an alternative pathway for dihydrotestosterones and testosterones effect on the suture, similar to the adrenal androgens, via the MAP kinase pathway, 2) lack of an effective delivery system of the flutamide treatment, or 3) that an androgen receptor blocker-based therapy is not effective for delaying the eventual fusion of the coronal suture in this model.

This dissertation evaluates the relative importance of craft production and ceremonial activities to the development of village communities and political hierarchy in the highland tropics of Western Panama. Previous researchers had suggested that control over the management or distribution of stone axes crucial for land clearance and woodworking activities had provided an avenue for incipient social elites to influence aspects of the broader subsistence economy. Alternatively, other researchers have stressed the importance of the role that ceremonial activities played in the development and persistence of social inequalities and political hierarchies. To evaluate these possibilities, occupational refuse was sampled from seven previously identified archaeological sites occupying different tiers of the settlement hierarchy. Artifact samples from various sites and the residential sectors within them provided the basis for an examination of approximately one millennium of social change and continuity. This work suggests that a sparsely populated region with small agricultural villages and farmsteads provided the social context in which forms of social rank and political economy initially developed and persisted, but that these differences were expressed in variable ways over time. The sponsorship of feasting activities contributed to the expression of elevated social status and the growth of the regions largest village, while a stronger association between incipient elites and lithic craft production elsewhere in the settlement system may have resulted in distinct organizational differences. Relatively isolated farmsteads, by contrast, exhibited less diversity and intensity in various activities than villages throughout the sequence. Combining perspectives from regional and village scales, this research concludes that the evidence for political hierarchy and occupational differentiation developed gradually over time and these differences remained relatively subtle through the sequence. The emergence and persistence of elevated social rank and regional political organization accompanied increasing specialization in serving activities and stone tool production between different villages, rather than being concentrated in one. The detailed sequence presented in this dissertation provides a comparative perspective to models of sociopolitical change in Southern Central America, and highlights one of the variable pathways by which small complex societies may have developed more broadly.

The development of chiefdoms has received considerable attention from archaeologists, but there remains little consensus with respect to the underlying causal mechanisms. In particular, the importance of an economic foundation to the emergence of chiefdoms has been the focus of some debate. Some scholars have argued that the mobilization of key resources such as land, labor, agricultural surplus or craft production is critical to the development of chiefdom polities as it implies a material foundation for political power. An alternative view places more importance on status competition and the display and exchange of prestige goods among emergent elites. Because it may be used to support either strategy, craft specialization has figured prominently in discussions of these two kinds of chiefly political economy. The focus of this dissertation is the degree to which specialized craft production was a significant factor in the development of chiefdoms at the central place community of He-4 in the Río Parita valley of Central Panama. The results of this dissertation show that craft specialization was relatively unimportant to the emergence of chiefdoms in the Río Parita valley during the Cubitá phase (A.D. 550-700), suggesting a social hierarchy based more on non-economic forms of social power, perhaps including feasting activities, warfare or involvement in local trade. The data from He-4 also show that the social hierarchy seen in the burial record after A.D. 700-900 develops in tandem with differences in household status that are apparent as early as the Cubitá phase (A.D. 550-700). These differences in household status become increasingly well developed over time; however, they are never as dramatic as the differences seen in the mortuary record for Central Panama. There is also no real connection between the emergence of the social hierarchy at He-4 and craft specialization. It is only during the Parita phase (A.D. 1100-1300) that craft specialization involving the final stages of axe manufacture and use of polished stone chisels becomes important activities in high status households at He-4.

This study investigates the evolution of the early polity of Chiapa de Corzo, Chiapas, Mexico, from its inception as a political center during the early Middle Formative Dili phase (100-750 B.C) through its apparent peak in political power during the early Terminal Formative Horcones phase (100 B.C.-100 A.D). I approach the evolution of this polity through an analysis of how eight different strategies were employed by rulers in governing the hinterland over the trajectory of Chiapa de Corzo as a political center. My evaluation of the evolution of these political strategies is based on my full coverage survey of 107 km² of Chiapa de Corzo and a portion of its southern hinterland, as well as the large body of research conducted by the New World Archaeological Foundation at Chiapa de Corzo proper. I focus on changes in the following strategies: projection of power into the hinterland; control over access to agricultural lands; control over access to obsidian; control over networks of communication; the use of warfare and coercion; the formation of elite identity, community identity and the use of feasting; and control over ritual and religion. Changes in how rulers applied different strategies suggest that political power at Chiapa de Corzo did not evolve steadily towards stronger and more integrated authority over the hinterland. In some phases increases in markers of status differentiation between rulers and subjects were accompanied by the development and strengthening of mechanisms to project power into the hinterland. However, in other phases increases in status differentiation at the center appear to have been accompanied by the atrophy of aspects of the projection of power and control over economic activities in the hinterland. While the general trend in the part of the Chiapa de Corzo trajectory covered in this study was towards greater political complexity and integration of the hinterland, a focus on the strategies utilized by rulers reveals that these processes did not proceed uniformly.

For several years the Pambamarca Archaeology Project has been investigating a dynamic frontier in the northern Ecuadorian highlands at the edge of the País Caranqui: a confederation of small-scale, autonomous, inter-warring pre-Inkan polities whose nearly twenty year resistance to Inka conquest resulted in the largest concentration of military fortresses in the Inka Empire. In addition to its violent past, Pambamarca is located within 25km of high quality obsidian sources, making it an important region for understanding obsidian production when it is part of local, non-elite exchange. This study analyzes obsidian, non-obsidian flaked lithics, and ceramics to elucidate patterns of obsidian production and site function at five of the Pambamarca sites ranging chronologically from the Early Integration period to the early Colonial Period. Directions for future research which would better clarify these patterns are also proposed.

It is now well recognized that mobile herding subsistence patterns do not preclude the development of complex social organization, but debate continues over whether the development of such societies depends upon and requires interaction with already existing agricultural state-level societies. This is known as the 'dependency' hypothesis. In the Mongolian case this debate centers on the Iron Age Xiongnu (ca. 209 BCE to 93 CE) and whether this polity of mobile herders resulted from indigenous political processes or from the influence of or interaction with sedentary agricultural neighbors to their south. In order to evaluate this, a number of concrete lines of inquiry are investigated in the present study through regional archaeological survey and small-scale excavations of fourteen Late Bronze Age (mid-second to mid-first millennia BCE) domestic contexts in a remote region far from the direct intersection with centers of power such as China, but where numerous monumental structures suggest complex social organizations, so as to investigate the early development of societal complexity in Mongolia and systematically and empirically evaluate the core variables and problematic aspects related to the development of 'nomadic' polities (i.e. those stated in the dependency hypothesis), namely demography, subsistence, mobility, and political economy in relation to higher degrees of sociopolitical organizations. Results of the present study upend some of the ideas tied to the dependency hypothesis and suggest that while clear social hierarchies have not been identified within domestic contexts there does seem to be some level of social differentiation during the Late Bronze Age. Based on this evidence and the evidence from the impressive ritual and funerary monumental landscape, it is suggested that this period may represent the first stage in the emergence of political organization operating beyond the descent group and that relatively complex forms of sociopolitical organization among mobile pastoralists can and did indeed develop in remote regions far from the direct intersection with powerful sedentary agricultural state-level societies. Accordingly, it is also suggested that some of the foundations of Early Iron Age complex sociopolitical organization in central Mongolia were already being laid locally during the preceding Late Bronze Age.

This Bachelors of Philosophy Thesis builds upon the present body of literature and research concerned with the relationship between craft production and the emergence of complex societies. This is done by examining the evidence for textile production at the Early Bronze Age site Karataş, in the Elmalı plain of SW Turkey. This research uses the tools of textile production to draw conclusions about the settlements complex social organization. Karataş consists of a central mound, approximately 100 m in diameter with a 1.9 ha settlement surrounding it. Excavation at this site began in 1963 and continued to 1975, conducted by Bryn Mawr College under the directorship of Dr. Matcheld Mellink (Warner 1994: Preface, 5). This research demonstrates that Karataş went through varying degrees of economic centralization leading ultimately to the sites abandonment. By conducting a GIS analysis of the distribution of artifacts associated with textile production, this research reveals a concentration of textile production in the fourth period of the sites habitation (EBA II). This concentration is presented as possibly the result of an increase in political authority, emanating from the central mound, which was not previously present within this ancient community. It is followed by a gradual decentralization of textile production in the fifth and sixth periods (EBA II-III) and then abandonment. The final decentralization reflects a loss of political control across the settlement, and may be tied directly to the abandonment.

Women's workforce participation has been rising in advanced capitalist countries over the past decades, leading to a question about whether concepts of gender and work are changing. Answering the question is important, because that rise has been associated with a drop in marriage and birth rates, worrying governments concerned about who will pay into social security, replace retirees, do military service, etc. The theory linking these trends is that "traditional" gender concepts (e.g., women as the primary homemakers) hamper women's ability to succeed at work. To address this question I researched public school teachers in Nagasaki, Japan. Men and women teachers work under equal conditions, including the obligation to accept relocations several times during their careers. Relocations challenge teachers work and family arrangements. Studying how teachers have dealt with them should reveal changes in concepts of work and gender. Through ethnographic fieldwork (2003-2006) in Nagasakis outer islands and archival research, I find that even though men and women teachers have long been asked to perform the same duties in terms of teaching courses, leading homerooms, serving on committees, interacting with parents, and accepting transfers and relocations, they respond to this "on-paper" gender-blind work environment in a way which reflects "traditional" gender concepts. Although both choose to relocate alone rather than disrupt a child's education or a parent's elder care, women feel their absence from the home is a burden on others, so tend to race home often, whereas men feel their presence in the home is disruptive to others, so tend to "tough it out" without returning much. And if the family is threatened by the parents' absence from home due to work, the woman is the one expected to quit. "Gender-blind" policies permit men and women to combine work and family, but men's and women's gender concepts continue to shape how they balance these sometimes competing commitments and goals. These findings show that equalizing workforce participation does not lead to changes in concepts of work and gender, nor to a diminishment of gender's significance, even when work policies are "gender-blind." Culture can persist despite social and legal changes.

Prehispanic chiefdoms of Central Panama provide interesting cases for investigating why societies first began to organize themselves hierarchically and why members began to relate to one-another in ways that emphasized the relative status of each. The particular activities through which a small number of individuals elevated their social status above the majority of a population, gaining influence over them, and the broader social circumstances that permitted this transformation are critical to understanding processes that lead to the emergence of social inequality. This dissertation presents data from archaeological excavations of households at the village of El Hatillo/He-4 the principal political center of a prehispanic chiefdom that existed in the Río Parita Valley of Central Panama between about A.D 700 and A.D. 1522. These data and the patterns they reveal provide a basis for comparison of domestic activities and contexts across time within El Hatillo/He-4. Identifying differences in households (observed synchronically and diachronically), like the organization of space and activities that were undertaken within, is among the best ways to understand why certain groups were socially more important and influential than others. The Río Parita chiefdom, like most, also consisted of multiple villages socially unified under an elite leader, or chief, forming a more-or-less cohesive political unit, or chiefdom. Thus, principles of social organization and bases of authority extended beyond relationships among households at El Hatillo/He-4 to also include larger communities and outlying villages. Since household data do not permit us to understand interactions among groups across the village, let alone other villages in the polity, as clearly, the data presented in this dissertation.

This dissertation examines the notion of risk utilized by youth-oriented non-governmental (NGO) and governmental (GO) organizations in Juiz de Fora, MG - Brazil. I argue that the Child and Adolescent Act of 1990 (ECA), a piece of democratic legislation concerned with the rights of youth, has restructured the activities that organizations provide around socio-educative, rights-based initiatives as well as caused a shift in organizational focus away from the previous category of street youth toward an emphasis on at risk youth. In doing so, however, I argue that ECA has subsequently institutionalized the notion of risk and despite the new democratic approach to child and adolescent advocacy embedded in ECAs interpretation at the local level are lingering views of youth as both the referents of the nation-state and as in danger or dangerous. Based on 12 months of ethnographic research with six organizations in Juiz de Fora, I describe how these entities utilize ECA in their outreach, the kinds of activities they engage in and how these activities are connected to the rights-based approach ECA promotes. I analyze from the perspective of NGO and GO staff and the youth they serve the notion of risk and discuss how this concept is perceived differently by each. I situate the local context of programming in Juiz de Fora within larger debates in Brazil over issues of formal education, citizenry, social exclusion and democracy. I present the perspectives of youth to highlight these debates and give voice to this increasingly frustrated population. Finally, I examine the implications these discussions have for democracy at large in Brazil as well as the notion of cidadania invertida (inverted citizenship) as a means of asserting social inclusion. I examine the need for more family-oriented programs and educational reform in Brazil. I discuss the connection of this work to childhood social theory and point to the importance of engaging youth in ethnographic research. I conclude with a discussion of both the theoretical and policy implications of this work.