Il y a plus d’un siècle que des recherches préhistoriques sont menées sur une vaste zone de l’Asie du Sud-ouest qui s’étend du Levant au Zagros et au Caucase. Le Paléolithique supérieur y est bien représenté dans des sites en grotte mais également de plein air. Les industries lithiques découvertes dans ces gisements ont permis des études typo-technologiques qui n’ont malheureusement pas toujours été accompagnées de datations absolues et de cadre stratigraphique. Dans l’état actuel de nos connaissances, l’Aurignacien semble être la culture du Paléolithique supérieur la mieux représentée dans les chrono-séquences des gisements choisis pour étude. La plupart des recherches paléolithiques en Iran se sont focalisées sur la région du Zagros, c’est pourquoi, afin de combler un no man’s land archéologique, nous avons choisi de travailler sur l’Alborz. Nous nous sommes donc appuyés sur deux sites découverts récemment : Garm Roud (Āmol, Māzandarān), unique site du Paléolithique supérieur en contexte stratigraphique connu dans cette vaste région de l’Iran et daté de 33.878±3300 CalBP et Délazien (Semnān), site de surface qui se situe au Sud de la chaîne de l'Alborz dans le désert central.L'étude typo-technologique de ces deux assemblages nous a permis de pointer des similitudes reconnaissables au niveau des stratégies et des modalités de débitage orientées préférentiellement vers une production lamellaire. Nous avons, a contrario, relevé un certain nombre de dissemblances matérialisées par la présence-absence de certains outils appartenant au fond commun aurignacien. Ces observations confirment ainsi l’attribution de ces ensembles lithiques, notamment celui de Délazian, au Paléolithique supérieur.Enfin, pour terminer notre étude, nous avons comparé les résultats des analyses typo-technologiques des sites iraniens avec celles émanant de sites hors Abortz comme ceux du Levant ou encore, ceux plus éloignés de l’Asie du Sud-ouest. Le constat qui se dégage de notre approche est une évidente hétérogénéité des traditions lithiques à l’Aurignacien qu’il convient d’interpréter en fonction de la nature des sites, des environnements naturels divers et certainement, des gestions différentielles des territoires. / More than a century ago, prehistoric research was carried out over a vast area of south-west Asia extending from the Levant to Zagros and the Caucasus. The Upper Paleolithic is well represented in cave sites but also in the open air. The lithic industries discovered in these deposits have allowed typo-technological studies which unfortunately have not always been accompanied by absolute dates and stratigraphic framework. In the current state of our knowledge, the Aurignacian seems to be the culture of the Upper Paleolithic best represented in the chrono-sequences of the deposits chosen for study.Most Paleolithic research in Iran has focused on the Zagros region, so in order to fill an archaeological no man's land we have chosen to work on the Alborz. We therefore relied on two recently discovered sites: Garm Roud (Āmol, Māzandarān), the only site of the Upper Paleolithic in stratigraphic context known in this vast region of Iran and dated 33.878 ± 3300 CalBP and Délazien (Semnān), site south of the Alborz range in the central desert.The typo-technological study of these two assemblages enabled us to point out recognizable similarities in terms of strategies and debitage modalities oriented preferentially towards lamellar production. On the other hand, we have noted a certain number of dissimilarities materialized by the presence-absence of certain tools belonging to the Aurignacian common fund. These observations thus confirm the attribution of these lithic assemblages, notably that of Delazian, in the Upper Paleolithic.Finally, to conclude our study, we compared the results of typo-technological analyzes of Iranian sites with those from sites outside Alborz such as those of the Levant or those further away from South-West Asia. The conclusion that emerges from our approach is an obvious heterogeneity of the Aurignacian lithic traditions which should be interpreted according to the nature of the sites, the various natural environments and certainly, the differential management of the territories.

Variabilidades de longo período têm sido detectadas no padrão de ventos em larga escala no hemisfério sul, com base em dados observacionais, reanálises e modelos. Estudos recentes têm sugerido algumas respostas oceânicas a mudanças no padrão atmosférico, desde a migração da Frente Subtropical, ao aumento do Vazamento das Agulhas e à intensificação dos giros subtropicais (GS). Apesar da importância do Atlântico Sul (AS) na distribuição global de calor, ainda não está claro a variabilidade de sua circulação e suas respostas às mudanças no campo do vento em larga escala. O presente estudo tem como objetivo investigar, usando resultados de uma simulação com o modelo numérico HYCOM (Hybrid Coordinate Ocean Model), a variabilidade do transporte de volume da Corrente do Brasil (CB) em sua região central (∼30ºS) frente ao campo de vento da Reanálise I do NCEP/NCAR (National Centers for Environmental Prediction/National Centers for Atmospheric Research). Os produtos do NCEP/NCAR apresentam intensificação e deslocamento em direção ao polo do cinturão de ventos de oeste no hemisfério sul (HS), o que ocasiona alteração do rotacional da tensão de cisalhamento do vento, ao longo de toda a bacia do AS, e a migração para sul das linhas de rotacional nulo e máximo em latitudes subtropicais. Mesmo com a intensificação do rotacional médio sobre o AS, a série computada do fluxo de retorno do transporte integrado de Sverdrup em 30ºS, através dos dados da reanálise, demonstram uma diminuição entre os anos de 1960 e 2010. Este comportamento é coerente com a tendência à redução do rotacional mediado zonalmente ao longo da mesma latitude. O transporte da CB computado com resultados do HYCOM apresenta uma tendência próxima à encontrada para o transporte de Sverdrup integrado, de cerca de 0,1 Sv por década, e estas apresentam correlação máxima de 0,6 com defasagem de 2 anos. Ao longo de 30°S, a leste da CB modelada, é encontrado um fluxo para norte identificado como o retorno de uma célula de recirculação, com transporte médio de 4,25±2,87Sv. Este fluxo também apresenta tendência à redução, a qual poderia estar relacionada com uma migração para sul de toda a estrutura da recirculação, acompanhando o deslocamento da confluência Brasil-Malvinas e da Frente Subtropical. O transporte residual na borda oeste (CB+Recirculação) apresenta uma intensificação do fluxo para sul, a qual poderia indicar um fortalecimento do GS, o que estaria em concordância com a intensificação e maior abrangência da Alta Subtropical observada no campo de Reanálise I. No entanto não foi encontrada correlação significativa entre o campo de vento e a variabilidade do transporte residual ao longo da fronteira oeste. / Long term variability has been detected in the South Hemisphere large-scale wind pattern, using models, reanalysis and observations. Recent studies have suggested an oceanic response to changes in the atmospheric pattern, such as the Subtropical Front migration, increase in the Agulhas leakage and intensification of the subtropical gyre (SG). Despite the importance of the South Atlantic in the global heat distribution, the variability of its circulation and response to changes in the large-scale wind field remains unclear. The current study aims to investigate, from a numerical simulation using HYCOM (Hybrid Coordinate Ocean Model), the variability of the Brazilian Current (BC) volume transport at its central region (∼30ºS) according to the wind field from Reanalysis I - NCEP/NCAR (National Center for Environmental Prediction/National Center for Atmospheric Research). The NCEP/NCAR results show an intensification and a poleward shift of the Southern Hemisphere westerly winds, leading changes in the wind curl along the SA, and a southern migration of the zero and maximum curl lines in subtropical latitudes. Even with the intensification of the mean wind curl over the SA, the time series of integrated Sverdrup return flow transport at 30ºS show a decrease between 1960 and 2010. This pattern is in agreement with the reduction trend in the zonal mean curl along the same latitude. The computed BC transport by HYCOM results present a similar trend to the integrated Sverdup transport (approximately 0.1 Sv per decade), with a 0.6 maximum correlation with a 2 year delay. Along the 30ºS, close to the western boundary, a north flow was identified as the return of a recirculation cell, with a 4,25±2,87 Sv mean transport. This flow also presents a reduction trend, which could be related to southern migration of the entire recirculation structure, following the Brazil-Malvinas confluence and Subtropical Front displacement. The residual transport at the western boundary (BC+Recirculation) shows an increase in the south flow that could indicates an increase of the SG, which is in agreement with the intensification and expansion of the Subtropical Ridge observed in the Reanalysis I. However, no significant correlation between the wind field and residual transport variability along the western boundary was found.

abstract: ABSTRACTO La identidad y el pluralismo se debaten cuando hablamos de dos escritoras chicanas. Ellas reclaman una herencia judía e indígena en sus obras literarias: María Speaks: Journeys into the Mysteries of the Mother in My Life (2004) de Sarah Amira de la Garza y The Desert Remembers My Name:On Family and Writing (2007) de Kathleen Alcalá. En sus obras se examina el proceso de la construcción de identidad dentro de la comunidad cripto-judía en el suroeste de los Estados Unidos. Dicha comunidad ejemplifica y pone en cuestión la construcción de la identidad en el mundo moderno, deconstruyendo la historia tradicional. Se aplican dos conceptos derivados del estructuralismo para analizar el proceso de integrar una identidad más en identidades ya existentes. Bricolaje, concepto teórico de Claude Lévi-Strauss en su obra: El pensamiento salvaje (1962); bricolaje proporciona el modelo a seguir para entender los diferentes patrones culturales que conforman la construcción de una identidad. Jonglerie de Seth Kunin o la manipulación de las identidades, extraído del artículo: “Juggling Identities Among the Crypto-Jews of the American Southwest” (2001). Acudimos al deconstructivismo de Jacques Derrida y al poscolonialismo de Gloria Anzaldúa y Emma Pérez. Este estudio revela que María Speaks deconstruye una educación católica al haber contradicciones eclesiásticas y cotidianas que producen un agudo sufrimiento en el sujeto femenino, ejerciendo como bricoleur, éste acude a la historia chicana de resistencia, a los mitos aztecas y coloniales, y al conocimiento y creencias judías para construir una nueva identidad chicana que incluye la cara sefardita. En The Desert Remembers my Name, el sujeto femenino, partiendo de una conciencia mexicoamericana de los 1950 y los 1960 donde se dan indicios culturales judíos, deconstruye su temprana identidad chicana y, como bricoleur, emprende investigaciones históricas y de familia para recuperar hechos, figuras, prácticas y símbolos para reconstruir una identidad sefardita y opata como parte de una actualizada identidad chicana. El método teórico aplicado, Bricolaje, Jonglerie, deconstructivismo y el poscolonialismo han sido útiles para recuperar la cara sefardita de la identidad chicana heterogénea. Creemos que este estudio representará un punto de partida para futuros estudios de la literatura judea-chicana. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Spanish 2019

Excerpt: African Americans have lived in Southwest Virginia since the early eighteenth century, and their traditions—their verbal folklore, customary folklife, and material culture—have long influenced cultural life in Southwest Virginia. African American music has been particularly impactful in the region, yet many people today are unaware of the extent of that influence.

An unsupervised classification was applied to continuous biophysical variables in an attempt to delineate ecoregional boundaries in the desert southwest. Output was then compared with ecoregions delineated by the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the Forest Service at the national level. An attempt was made to use the same biophysical variables for input into the unsupervised classification as was emphasized by the various agencies with their ecoregional classifications at the desert level. Major constraints included data availability at such a large study area, data resolution, and data that were continuous. This eliminated categorical data such as vegetation type, geology type, or soil texture. The aim of the study was to develop a more objective and repeatable approach to identifying self-similar geographic regions.

The control of mesquite is a major range problem in the Southwest. Mesquite is a thorny, woody shrub or tree that has infested 75 million acres of valuable range and pasture land in this region. It competes with grasses and other valuable plants for sunlight, moisture, and plant food. Mesquite also acts as a serious barrier to the handling of cattle on the range.

This study examines and demonstrates the value of a matrix approach in the discipline of conservation and the concerns specific to the conservation of archaeological and ethnographic objects. The chapters identify the relevance of the matrix to current conservation practices through a history of artifact conservation and a discussion of the factors that compromise the conservators' role in the study and preservation of material culture. The discussion evaluates the nature of systematic research collections, the impact of legal issues, and the ethics of including cultural context as important aspects in the development of the matrix approach. The matrix approach provides the conservator with a number of variables or categories of information that may assist in the determination of an appropriate conservation process. In this study, the matrix approach was tested on a number of artifact objects. To provide a common link, all of the objects were characterized by paint on some form of cellulose (wood or a wood-like substrate). The object cases were from both ethnographic and archaeological contexts, and the work involved both laboratory procedures and consideration of non-laboratory (i.e. legal, cultural, ethical) aspects. The specific objects included (1) a probable tiponi of archaeological (Anasazi culture) context, (2) a group of coiled baskets of archaeological (Mogollon culture) context, (3) a kachina doll of ethnographic (Hopi culture) context, (4) a group of prayer sticks of archaeological (Puebloan and Tohono O'Odham) context, and (5) a fiddle of ethnographic (Apache culture) context. By recognizing the unique and diverse aspects of anthropology collections, the conservator who uses a matrix approach is better equipped to work with archaeologists on sites, with curators and exhibit designers in museums, and with claimants (or the descendants of an object's maker) in carrying out the multiple activities frequently involved in the conservation of objects as they exist in an ever broadening and more political context.

Recently documented ice patch sites in the southwest Yukon are ideal for evaluating precontact hunter-gatherer land-use patterns in the western subarctic. Located in the alpine of the mountainous regions of the boreal forest, ice patches are associated with well preserved hunting equipment, caribou (Rangifer tarandus) dung and an abundance of faunal remains dating to over 8000 years ago. However, current models are inadequate for explaining caribou hunting at ice patches as they tend to emphasize large-scale communal hunts associated with latitudinal movements of caribou. Much less is known about the alititudinal movment of caribou and the associated hunting forays to ice patches in the alpine. Based on literature from caribou biology an altitudinal hunting model is proposed. During summer months caribou are predictable in their use of ice patches for relief from insect harassment. Pollen dated from caribou dung frozen in organic layers from the Granger (JdUt-1) and Friday Creek (JcUu-1) ice patches was analysed and compared to pollen assemblages from modern caribou dung to test whether ancient caribou were using these locations during summer months. The multivariate statistical technique, Nonmetric Mutlidimensional Scaling shows that ancient pollen assemblages are unlike any modern dung. Results indicate that pollen derived from dung is complex and various temporal transformations and taphonomic factors such as: (i) the use of modern analogue samples; (ii) changes in phenology; (iii) mode of pollination and; (iv) caribou feeding strategies must be understood before making interpretations on seasonality from dung pollen. I propose that a qualitative model of seasonal pollen signatures also be used to evaluate ancient pollen spectra, especially when there is no modern analogue. Regardless of these factors, the identification of a diversity of forbs and the presence of insect-pollinated taxa such as Polemonium and Epilobium suggest that some of the dung was deposited by caribou in the summer. Ancient hunters, knowing that caribou aggregate in mixed herds on ice patches in summer months, took advantage of this behaviour. Hunting equipment found on ice patches indicates that atlatls (8360± 60 to 1250± 40 yrs BP) and bow and arrows (1300 ± 70 to 90 ± 40 yrs BP) and hunting blinds were part of the ice hunting strategy. Faunal analysis suggests caribou was the primary game animal hunted at ice patches, although sheep (Ovis dalli) may have been important at some locations. Developing an altitudinal migration model provides a fuller picture of caribou hunting at alpine locations in the southwest Yukon and assists in understanding Holocene precontact hunting and land-use patterns in the western subarctic.

This research examined the fire history of ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa Douglas ex P. Lawson & C. Lawson) forests in northwestern New Mexico. The study area included three sites in the Zuni Mountains of Cibola National Forest and one site along the boundary of El Malpais National Monument. I crossdated over 800 fire scars on 75 samples to reconstruct spatial and temporal characteristics of historic wildfire regimes. The Weibull Median Interval, Weibull Modal Interval, and Mean Fire Interval ranged from five to eight years across all sites and percent-scarred classes (all fires, 10% scarred, and 25% scarred) and indicated that low-severity wildfires occurred frequently in the study area during the period 1700 to 1880. Wildfires were historically driven by climatic variability. Superposed Epoch Analyses revealed that wetter conditions typically occurred one to three years prior to a fire event and were followed by drought during the fire year. No relationship was found between the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) and wildfire occurrence. These findings implied that shorter-term fluxes between wet and dry conditions, rather than longer-term climatic variability, were historically most conducive to fire occurrence. Fire frequency decreased suddenly in the late 19th century across the study area, and results indicated that fire has been absent at all sites since the 1920s. Anthropogenic disturbances including livestock grazing, timber harvesting, and fire suppression likely explain observed differences between historic and contemporary wildfire regimes in the Zuni Mountains. This research has important implications for forest management. In ponderosa pine forests of the southwestern United States, land managers often aim to restore historic ecological conditions. The reintroduction of a frequent, low-severity wildfire regime might restore some ecological patterns and processes, but given the strong legacy of human disturbances and the influences of human-induced climate change, a complete return to historic conditions may be neither possible nor desired.

Engaging a determined enemy across a broad range of conditions, the U.S. Army in World War II's Southwest Pacific Area (SWPA) played an important role in the defeat of Japan. How units fought and learned in SWPA and how they adapted to the evolving challenges of their environment is the focus of this dissertation. The subject remains largely unexplored, especially in contrast to the attention the European theater has received. An examination of the 112th's performance not only illuminates an understudied area in the historiography of World War II but also offers relevant lessons for contemporary military organizations. Mining a rich collection of primary sources, this study analyzes the development of the 112th Cavalry Regiment and sheds light on how American units in SWPA prepared for and conducted combat operations. A National Guard unit federalized in 1940 and sent to the Pacific theater in 1942, the 112th performed garrison duties on New Caledonia and Woodlark Island and eventually fought in New Britain, New Guinea, and the Philippines. Before deactivating, the regiment also served in Japan during the first months of the occupation. Concentrating on one unit illustrates the extent to which ground forces in SWPA were driven to learn and adapt. The 112th had mixed success when it came to carrying out its assigned missions effectively. The same was true of its efforts to learn and improve. The unit's gradual introduction to combat worked to its advantage, but learning was not simply a matter of building on experience. It also involved responding to unexpected challenges. Experience tended to help, but the variety of circumstances in which the cavalrymen fought imposed limits on the applicability of that experience. Different situations demanded that learning occur in different ways. Learning also occurred differently across the organization's multiple levels. Moreover, failure to learn in one area did not, as a matter of course, undermine advancement in all. Much depended on the presence of conditions that facilitated or disrupted the learning process, such as the intricacy of the tasks involved, the part higher headquarters played, and the enemy's own responses to the changing environment.