bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Financing Higher Education
Authors: Chapman Bruce , Dearden Lorraine
Published: August 2021

The rapid worldwide growth in higher education undergraduate enrollments since around 1990 has meant that governments have had to rethink provision and funding arrangements to help ensure both cost-effective and equitable outcomes. It is important to understand in detail the fundamental financial conceptual building blocks that are necessary for an efficacious and socially just higher education financing system. In response to the critical question of who should pay for higher education and student income support, the case for the sharing of the costs between students, graduates, and taxpayers is overwhelming from the perspectives of both efficiency and equity. Further, there is a consensus that governments should intervene with respect to the underwriting of student loans, but there are very important and quite different implications for borrowers with respect to loan collection arrangements. The most equitable and effective higher education financing instrument involves loans that are repaid only when and if debtors can afford to do so, known as income-contingent loans. The less desirable form of student loans, defined by time-based collection, is internationally still the most common approach, but recent advances in economic theory and econometric methodology provide both conceptual bases and exciting and innovative ways for governments to understand why traditional student loan approaches are inferior to income-contingent collection. When the effects of student loans on access and welfare become more properly understood, the case for targeted assistance for all disadvantaged prospective students for reasons of social justice remains compelling. The importance of the attainment of the right financing system was highlighted by the economic trauma associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, an ordeal that caused many universities to experience an entirely unexpected financial crisis and led millions of students to struggle with unanticipated loan repayment difficulties.
Quantile Regression for Panel Data and Factor Models
Authors: Lamarche Carlos
Published: August 2021

For nearly 25 years, advances in panel data and quantile regression were developed almost completely in parallel, with no intersection until the work by Koenker in the mid-2000s. The early theoretical work in statistics and economics raised more questions than answers, but it encouraged the development of several promising new approaches and research that offered a better understanding of the challenges and possibilities at the intersection of the literatures. Panel data quantile regression allows the estimation of effects that are heterogeneous throughout the conditional distribution of the response variable while controlling for individual and time-specific confounders. This type of heterogeneous effect is not well summarized by the average effect. For instance, the relationship between the number of students in a class and average educational achievement has been extensively investigated, but research also shows that class size affects low-achieving and high-achieving students differently. Advances in panel data include several methods and algorithms that have created opportunities for more informative and robust empirical analysis in models with subject heterogeneity and factor structure.
Financial Economics of United States Slavery
Authors: Narayanan Rajesh P. , Pritchett Jonathan
Published: August 2021

Financial economics reveals that slaves were profitable investments and that the rate of return from owning slaves was at least as high as the return on comparable investments. The profitability of slavery depended on both the productivity and the market valuation of slaves. Owners increased the productivity of slaves by developing better strains of cotton, employing more efficient systems of production (gang labor), and using force and coercion (whippings). Efficient markets facilitated the interregional transfer of labor, and selective sales devastated slave families. Market studies show that slave prices reflected the capitalized value of labor and that they varied based on labor productivity. The profitability of slaves and the availability of efficient markets made slaves attractive investment vehicles for storing wealth. Their attractiveness as investments, however, may have had some other costs. Several studies argue and provide evidence that investment in slaves supplanted investment in other forms of physical and human capital, much to the detriment of southern industrialization and development. Besides serving as investment vehicles, slaves also facilitated financing. A growing body of work provides evidence that slaves were pledged as collateral to obtain credit.
Sexual and Reproductive Health in China
Authors: Zhou Qianling , Jin Chu-Yao , Wang Hai-Jun
Published: August 2021

Databases of PubMed, Scopus, and China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI) were used to search relevant articles on sexual and reproductive health (SRH) in China published from 2005 to the present (2021), based on the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Operational Framework on Sexual Health and Its Linkages to Reproductive Health. The following results were found. (a) SRH education and information among the Chinese were insufficient, in particular regarding contraception, pregnancy, and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). Adolescents, migrants, and the rural population had insufficient knowledge of SRH. (b) Fertility care services were mainly available in large cities, in urban areas, and for married couples. Services targeted for rural-to-urban migrants, rural residents, and the disabled and elderly are needed. (c) A total of 22.4% of youths aged 15–24 had premarital sexual intercourse, and the age of first sexual intercourse was decreasing. Risky sexual behaviors included multiple partners, casual and commercial sex, and having sex after drinking alcohol. (d) The contraceptive practice rate of women aged 15–49 in China was higher than the world’s corresponding figure. However, contraceptive use among young people was low (only 32.3% among unmarried women). (e) Unmarried pregnancy induced by low contraceptive practice is a critical issue in China. (f) Induced abortion was the major consequence of unmarried pregnancy. The rate of induced abortion among the general population in 2016 was 28.13‰, and the rate among unmarried women was increasing annually. (g) There were 958,000 HIV-infected cases in China as of October 2019. Sexual transmission was the major transmission route of HIV-AIDS. More men than women were infected. Men having sex with men comprised the high-risk group of sexual transmission of HIV-AIDS. (h) Gender-based violence including intimate partner violence (IPV), sexual violence, sexual coercion, and child sexual abuse (CSA) might be underreported in China, since many victims were afraid to seek help as well as due to limited services. Legal and regulatory measures should therefore be taken to prevent and reduce gender-based violence. For future perspectives of SRH in China, it is important to pay attention to SRH education and services. An up-to-date national survey on SRH is needed to reflect the current situation and to capture changes over the past decade. Most of the current research has been conducted among adolescents, and more studies are needed among other groups, such as the disabled, the elderly, and homosexual populations.
Collective Health: Theory and Practice. Innovations From Latin America
Authors: Vieira-da-Silva Ligia Maria
Published: August 2021

Throughout history, knowledge and practices on the health of populations have had different names: medical police, public health, social medicine, community health, and preventive medicine. To what extent is the Brazilian collective health, established in the 1970s, identified with and differentiated from these diverse movements that preceded it? The analysis of the socio-genesis of a social field allows us to identify the historical conditions that made possible both theoretical formulations and the achievement of technical and social practices. Collective health, a product of transformations within the medical field, constituted a rupture in relation to preventive medicine and public health and hygiene, being part of a social medicine movement in Latin America that, in turn, had identification with European social medicine in the 19th century. Focused on the development of a social theory of health that would support the process of sanitary reform, collective health has been built as a space involving several fields: scientific, bureaucratic, and political. Thus, it brought together health professionals and social scientists from universities, health care services, and social movements. Its scientific subfield has developed, and the sanitary reform project has had several successes related to the organization of a unified health system, which has ensured universal coverage for the population in Brazil. It has incorporated into and dialogued with several reformist movements in international public health, such as health promotion and the pursuit of health equity. Its small relative autonomy stems from subordination to other dominant fields and its dependence on the state and governments. However, its consolidation corresponded to the strengthening of a pole focused on the collective and universal interest, where health is not understood as a commodity, but as a right of citizenship.
Urban Homelessness Policy in OECD Nations
Authors: Willison Charley E. , Mauri Amanda I.
Published: August 2021

Homelessness is a public health challenge for modern governments. Homelessness emerged as a formal policy problem for rich nations in the mid- to late 20th century as nations developed stable economies and democracies, including housing and job markets, and social welfare mechanisms to protect citizens from disenfranchisement. In early 21st-century Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) nations, homelessness arises most often among at-risk or vulnerable populations, such as historically marginalized groups and/or persons with constrained access to welfare state mechanisms, such as immigrants or refugees. Thus, homelessness in OECD nations is very different from informal housing or mass poverty in poor nations and/or non-democratic regimes.

Homelessness affects individual and population health, requiring complex policy solutions across multiple domains of health, as well as intergovernmental coordination. Policy responses to homelessness vary across OECD nations in their approach and efficacy. There are four key factors influencing how OECD nations respond to homelessness: (a) the strength and inclusivity of the welfare state; (b) degrees of decentralization in homeless policy governance; (c) the strength, capacity, and inclusivity of the health and behavioral healthcare systems; and (d) the role of federated structures in health and welfare state policy. Overall, nations with weaker welfare states and health/behavioral healthcare systems face greater risks of homelessness. The inclusivity of these systems also shapes who may be eligible for protection or experience homelessness. Local governments, especially those in large metropolitan areas, are the frontline providers of homelessness services. Yet local governments are constrained at both ends: Policies designed, delivered, and funded at larger units of government—such as welfare state provisions—influence many of the determinants of homelessness, such as housing, and the resources available to subnational actors to combat homelessness. Local actors are also constrained by the degree of decentralization. Devolution of homelessness policy to smaller units of government or even solely to nongovernmental actors, through federated mechanisms or decentralization, may create barriers to locally tailored solutions by perpetuating disparities across jurisdictions and/or constraining authority and resources necessary to design or deliver homeless policy.
Social and Environmental Determinants of Health Among People With Disabilities
Authors: Emerson Eric
Published: August 2021

There is extensive evidence that people with disabilities experience significantly poorer health than their nondisabled peers. These are, in part, health inequities (differences in health status that are avoidable, unjust, and unfair) resulting from increased rates of exposure of people with disabilities to a range of well-established social (and environmental) determinants of poor health, including poverty, reduced access to effective education, lack of employment or employment under hazardous or precarious conditions, social disconnectedness, violence, discrimination, and poor healthcare. They also include environmental determinants of poor health that are a direct result of human activity (e.g., outdoor air pollution resulting from industrial processes and transportation). In addition, people with disabilities are often less likely than their peers to have access to many of the resources (power, wealth, social support, problem-solving skills) that have been linked to increased resilience in the face of adversity. As such, it would appear reasonable to expect that the health of people with disabilities is as likely, if not more so, to deteriorate, when exposed to social determinants, than the health of their nondisabled peers. Future research needs to focus on two key issues. First, given that most of the current evidence has been generated in high-income countries, it is critical for future research to focus on the situation of people with disabilities living in middle- and low-income countries. Second, more needs to be known about the determinants of the resilience and/or vulnerability of people with disabilities.

Some significant limitations remain in the current evidence base, but it is clear that existing knowledge is sufficient to drive and guide changes in policy and practice that could reduce the health inequities faced by people with disabilities. These include (a) improving the visibility of people with disabilities in local, national, and international health surveillance systems; (b) making “reasonable accommodations” to the operation of healthcare systems to ensure that people with disabilities are not exposed to systemic discrimination in access to and the quality of healthcare; and (c) ensuring that people with disabilities are included in and benefit equally from local and national strategies to reduce population levels of exposure to well-established social determinants of health.
Terrestrial Analogs to Planetary Volcanic Phenomena
Authors: Mouginis-Mark Peter J. , Wilson Lionel
Published: August 2021

More than 50 years of solar system exploration have revealed the great diversity of volcanic landscapes beyond Earth, be they formed by molten rock, liquid water, or other volatile species. Classic examples of giant shield volcanoes, solidified lava flows, extensive ash deposits, and volcanic vents can all be identified, but except for eruptions seen on the Jovian moon Io, no planetary volcanoes have been observed in eruption. Consequently, the details of the processes that created these landscapes must be inferred from the available spacecraft data. Despite the increasing improvement in the spatial, temporal, compositional, and topographic characteristics of the data for planetary volcanoes, details of the way they formed are not clear. However, terrestrial eruptions can provide numerous insights into planetary eruptions, whether they are effusive eruptions resulting in the emplacement of lava flows or explosive eruptions due to either volatiles in the magma or the interaction between hot lava and water or ice. In recent decades, growing attention has been placed on the use of terrestrial analogs to help interpret volcanic landforms and processes on the rocky planets (Mercury, Venus, the Moon, and Mars) and in the outer solar system (the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, and the larger asteroids). In addition, terrestrial analogs not only provide insights into the geologic processes associated with volcanism but also can serve as test sites for the development of instrumentation to be sent to other worlds, as well as provide a training ground for crewed and uncrewed missions seeking to better understand volcanism throughout the solar system.
Twenty-First Century Developments in the Field of Science, Technology, and International Relations
Authors: Fritsch Stefan H.
Published: August 2021

Traditionally, international relations (IR) conceptualized technology primarily as a static, neutral, and passive tool, which emanates from impenetrable black boxes outside the international system. According to this predominant instrumental understanding of technology, IR “added” technology as a residual variable to existing explanatory frameworks. Consequently, qualitative systemic change—as well as continuity—could only be addressed within existing models and their respective core variables. Subsequently, traditional approaches increasingly experienced difficulties to adequately capture and explain empirically observable systemic changes in the form of growing interdependence, globalization, or trans-nationalization, as well as a plethora of technology-induced new policy challenges. Contrary to traditional conceptualizations, a growing number of scholars have instead embarked on a project to open the “black box” by redefining technology as a highly political and integral core component of global affairs that shapes and itself is shaped by global economics, politics, and culture. A rapidly growing body of theoretically diverse interdisciplinary literature systematically incorporates insights from science and technology studies (STS) to provide a more nuanced understanding of how technology, the global system, and its myriad actors mutually constitute and impact one another.
The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and Its Aftermath
Authors: Palma Oscar
Published: August 2021

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia—FARC) was an insurgent group that emerged in the 1960s as a consequence of struggles between the Conservatives and the Liberals, as well as the consolidation of a Communist party that promoted an armed insurrection. A relative absence of state institutions in farther regions, the uneven distribution of land, and an impoverished peasant class were elements fueling rebellious movements. By the 1980s, however, FARC had become something more complex than an insurgent organization. After initially opposing the idea, the group accepted the generation of income through the taxation of activities in the cocaine-illicit economy. An unprecedented process of growth experienced by the insurgency, with this income, allowed a remarkable offensive against the security forces, in specific regions, by the end of the 1990s.

Since then, an explanation of the organization as a “pure” political insurgency would be inaccurate; the motivation and purpose of some fighters within the group was profit. Although an explanation radically separating political and criminal (economic) agendas may be flawed, at least a concept which portrays the organization as something more than just an insurgency seems helpful. The concept of hybrid group, in which armed, political, and criminal dimensions coexist, invites exploring different types of motivations, purposes, and tasks that fighters might have.

The observation of these dimensions also contributes to an understanding of the evolution of FARC after the Havana Agreement. A strong military offensive during the 2000s was one of the factors motivating the group to engage in peace negotiations with the Colombian government. With the Agreement, FARC as an armed insurgency ceased to exist, but the continuation of factors which motivated the existence of a hybrid group have triggered the emergence of a myriad of smaller groups, several of which claim to be the real successors of FARC, mixing in diverse ways the political and criminal agendas.
Agroecology
Authors: Pimbert M.P. , Moeller N.I. , Singh J. , Anderson C.R.
Published: August 2021

Agroecology is an alternative paradigm for agriculture and food systems that is simultaneously: (a) the application of ecological principles to food and farming systems that emerge from specific socioecological and cultural contexts in place-based territories; and (b) a social and political process that centers the knowledge and agency of Indigenous peoples and peasants in determining agri-food system policy and practice.

Historically, agroecology is associated with a multifaceted body of transdisciplinary knowledge. The academic literature emphasizes the role of scientists in developing an interdisciplinary agroecology over the past ninety years. However, the practice of agroecology is much older, with deep roots in many Indigenous and peasant societies of Africa, the Americas, Asia, Australia, Europe, and Polynesia. Although these societies never adopted the term “agroecology,” their time-tested practices in growing food and fiber illustrate many principles of modern agroecology.

The transdisciplinary field of research on agroecology examines how agroecology contributes to equitable and sustainable food and fiber production, processing, distribution, and consumption. Agroecology builds on people’s knowledge, Indigenous management systems, and local institutions through “dialogues of knowledges” with social science, natural science, and the humanities. The study of Indigenous and peasant agri-food systems has thus been pivotal for the development of both agroecology and anthropology.

The agroecological perspective is based on a transformative vision of the relationship between people and nature. Economic anthropology has unearthed a wide diversity of systems of economic exchange that are informing work on agroecology, including the vital importance of Indigenous and peasant economies, gift economies, circular economies, subsistence, and economies of care. These are pushing agroecologists to think outside of the box of dominant commodity capitalism. Agroecology is also based on a radical conceptualization of knowledge systems, whereby work on cognitive justice, epistemic justice, Indigeneity, and decoloniality is upending the dominance of Western, scientific, Eurocentric, and patriarchal worldviews as the basis for the future of food and agriculture. Agroecology is also underpinned by radical notions of democracy and new conceptualizations of popular education, transformations in governance, and empowering forms of participation.

While the transformative agenda offered by agroecology is deeply contested by proponents of industrial and corporate food and agriculture, agroecology is increasingly important in academic and policy debates on sustainable food, farming, and land use. Exploring the relationship between agroecology and anthropology is both fruitful and timely because it can help re-root agroecology—which is increasingly at risk of becoming an abstract and devitalized concept—in the fundamentally localized practices and culture of agri-food systems.
The Archaeology of Igboland, Southeastern Nigeria
Authors: Ngonadi Chioma Vivian
Published: August 2021

The archaeological investigations in Igboland have been divided into two periods: the early and later scholarship period. In the early period of scholarship, archaeological investigation was focused on describing the early cultural history of the Igbo’s of southeastern Nigeria. Being very much influenced by the earlier reports, these investigations focused on the excavations of the earliest known sites in southeastern Nigeria. The main interest during this phase was to show a typological change of archaeological materials through time and to establish its chronology. The later scholarship period brought about systematic surveys and excavations and documented the existence of many sites, especially iron-smelting sites, and domestic/habitation and ancestral sites. Pottery typology, stratigraphy, and chronology were also the focus of the later scholarship phase.

The archaeological investigations in the early and later period have provided tangible data that have helped in the reconstruction of the way of life of the Igbo of southeastern Nigeria from 2500 bp/500 bce–1500 bp/500 ce, a period characterized by hunting/gathering way of life, pottery making, early farming communities, iron smelting and smithing, bronze working, and trade. It is important to note that this article is not a comprehensive overview of the archaeology of Igboland, southeastern Nigeria. Some sites were not included because of insufficient data and the unavailability of published articles. Nevertheless, a concerted drive toward further archaeological research in southeastern Nigeria could provide a significant opportunity to explore a set of broader themes in the archaeology of Igboland, especially with the Middle Stone Age culture where neither research nor sites have been recorded. This is thus the first step in attempting to understand the wider economy of the region, which to date has produced enigmatic and divergent archaeological data.
U.S.–Nigerian Relations
Authors: McNeil Brian
Published: August 2021

The United States and Nigeria have a long history, stretching back to the transatlantic slave trade in the 18th century and continuing today through economic and security partnerships. While the relationship has evolved over time and both countries have helped to shape each other’s histories in important ways, there remains a tension between hope and reality in which both sides struggle to live up to the expectations set for themselves and for each other. The United States looks to Nigeria to be the model of progress and stability in Africa that the West African state wants to become; Nigeria looks to American support for its development and security needs despite the United States continuously coming up short. There have been many strains in the relationship, and the United States and Nigeria have continued to ebb and flow between cooperation and conflict. Whatever friction there might be, the relationship between the United States and Nigeria is important to analyze because it offers a window to understanding trends and broad currents in international history such as decolonization, humanitarianism, energy politics, and terrorism.
Christian Dominionism and Violence
Authors: Aho James
Published: August 2021

There are several forms of Christian Dominionism. However, all of them advocate “taking America back for God,” which is to say, from “non-Christians” (however understood), undocumented aliens, “sexual deviants,” “femi-Nazis,” liberal progressives, and the like. To be sure, most individual Dominionists and most Dominionist congregations are not violent. Nevertheless, some are. This is not because these few are ignorant, isolated, or insane, but rather because they reside in a particular kind of social/cultural milieu, one that normatively encourages them to harm others (in the name of their god) and offers them opportunities to do so, and where they are not subject to external restraints that might otherwise deter them from acting out their supremacist proclivities. One implication of this is that in order to avert Dominionist-motivated violence, policymakers must do more than merely criticize Dominionist theology—as important as this may be. Additionally, they must deal with local normative expectations that embolden potential terrorists and provide them easy access to high-powered weaponry. They must also protect vulnerable, marginalized populations from being targeted and step up law-enforcement vigilance and preparedness.
Health and Health Systems in the United States
Authors: Dossa Parin
Published: August 2021

The long history of Islam in the United States is not well understood. The first Muslims to come to this country were African slaves followed by Muslims from the Ottoman Empire. As time went by, other Muslims from different parts of the world followed suit. Today, Muslims form part of the sociocultural and religious diversity of US society. A unique feature of this community is its diversity, a function of different schools of thought as well as different migration trajectories in terms of ethnicity, gender, age, class, and countries of origin. Its diversity has generated a rich body of knowledge on health care that can enrich the American biomedical model. Yet, this knowledge has been subjugated and remains unrecognized owing to structural exclusion of Muslims exacerbated by 9/11. The aim of this article is to highlight health beliefs and practices of American Muslims with the view to recognizing their contribution to American society, leading to greater acceptance of this community. In sum, beyond addressing systemic exclusion, it is important to recognize that American Muslims have a long history and richness in understanding health in diverse sociocultural milieus in Islam that can and should be recognized in clinical care.
The Passion of Christ in the New World
Authors: Robin Alena
Published: August 2021

The study of Passion imagery in the New World is located at the crossroads of artistic expressions, historical moments, and interests. It must consider issues of iconography, local devotion, agency, identity, and the materiality of artworks, but also connections to belief, piety, and the colonial context. The Passion of Christ encompasses the last moments in the life of Jesus: from his death sentence and the torments he suffered, to his execution through Crucifixion at Mount Golgotha. Although Passion imagery depicts moments narrated in the four canonical Gospels, artists also found inspiration in apocryphal texts, Spanish mystic literature, and European images that traveled in the form of engravings, which were sources abundantly used in Ibero-America. Spanish, Flemish, and Italian sources circulated in America, providing Passion images with particular characteristics. At the same time, local history was incorporated into the representation of these last moments of the life of Jesus, such as in cases of the Christ of Ixmiquilpan in colonial Mexico or the Christ of the Earthquakes, in Cusco, Peru. Generic Passion images became specific cult images due to their miracles, which were particularly important in the Americas as part of the evangelization process and the preservation of the colonial political order. The indigenous populations of America were in many occasions intertwined in these stories around images of Christ. Soon after the conquest, indigenous people also became manufacturers of these images. Passion imagery is found in the form of painting, sculpture, engraving, and architecture, becoming, in certain cases, Gesamtkunstwerk, or total works of art, since buildings and their interiors make use of many art forms under a unifying concept related to the Passion of Christ, such as sanctuaries dedicated to Jesus or architectural renditions of the Way of the Cross.
The Vaccine Revolt of 1904, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Authors: Cukierman Henrique
Published: August 2021

A review of the literature on the Vaccine Revolt shows that it continues to be treated in an overly simplistic manner as a “structure” subjected to some form of regulation, from which its dynamics can be explained and its “root causes” identified. It is possible to forge a new, more cautious historiographical path, seeking to view this “structure” as a rhizome, as a loosely connected ensemble that exists under unstable circumstances whose precarious (dis)order cannot be grasped in its complexity by a reductionist analysis.

Another historiographical approach that can shed new light on the popular revolt of 1904 situates it in the context of its links to the history of the smallpox vaccine and its diffusion. Viewing the episode as equally relevant to the history of science and technology, this article proposes to “vaccinate the Vaccine Revolt”—that is, to reintroduce the smallpox vaccine as a protagonist in the events—highlighting the need to treat the revolt as a chapter of a sociotechnical history; after all, what could be more sociotechnical than a technoscientific artifact that gave its name to a popular revolt? This is a history of scientists convinced of the superiority of their technical knowledge and of their right to exercise their power for the good of the public, who would be obliged to comply; most of all, it is a history without the problematic distinctions between content and context, between rationality and irrationality, between science and society.

It is also a history of the popular mobilization on the streets of downtown Rio de Janeiro, exemplified by the vigorous resistance mounted in the working-class neighborhood of Saúde under the command of the Black man known as Prata Preta, which serves as a counterpoint to top-down historical narratives more concerned with the comings and goings of White political elites and coup-plotting, positivist-inspired generals, marked by the symptomatic exclusion of Black and working-class actors. It also serves to emphasize the symptomatic absence of the voice of Prata Preta, who was imprisoned and summarily banished without any due process. The fact that he was silenced has made it easier to construct allegories about “the people,” portraying them as heroic opponents of elite oppression or the exact opposite: an antiheroic, dangerous, and disposable rabble. Among the entourage of characters who have been silenced, one should also note the absence of women’s voices; although vaccine opponents rallied around the claim that they were defending against the “violation” of women’s bodies, nothing was heard from women’s mouths.

Finally, revisiting the history of the Vaccine Revolt offers another opportunity to unmask the project of an authoritarian political, military, and scientific elite, with a particular focus on Oswaldo Cruz, one of Brazil’s greatest champions of science. In the name of science and public health, that elite envisioned a modern Brazil, while remaining ignorant of the daily nightmare lived by the vast majority of the Black, poor, and marginalized population.
Violence in Postrevolutionary Mexico
Authors: Kloppe-Santamaría Gema
Published: August 2021

Despite the formal end of civil war and armed conflict, Mexico continued to experience significant levels of violence during the 1930s and 1940s. This period has traditionally been associated with the process of pacification, institutionalization, and centralization of power that enabled the consolidation of rule in postrevolutionary Mexico, a process epitomized by the marked national decline in levels of homicide that began during the 1940s and continued during the second half of the 20th century. The dynamics of coercion and resistance that characterized state-society relations at the regional and local levels reveal, however, that violence pervaded all aspects of society and that it was perpetrated by a multiplicity of actors, including vigilantes, pistoleros, private militias, lynch mobs, military, police, and other violent entrepreneurs. Violence was used as both a means to contest the legitimacy of the postrevolutionary state project as well as an instrument of control and coercion on behalf of political elites and local power brokers. Conversely, violence superseded the realm of traditional politics and constituted a central force shaping Mexican society. Violence against women in the public and private spheres, violence driven by economic interests, and citizens’ attempts to control crime and social transgressions reveal that citizens—and not only state actors—contributed to the reproduction of violence. Although violence in postrevolutionary Mexico was neither centralized nor exercised in a top-down manner, impunity and collusion between criminal and political elements were central in the production and perpetuation of violence both within the state and within civil society. When examined in light of these two decades of the postrevolutionary period, the character and levels of violence in contemporary Mexico appear less as an aberration and more as the latest expression of a longer, though uneven and nonlinear, historical trajectory of decentralized, multifaceted, and multi-actor forms of violence.
The Dominicans as Conveyors of Mesoamerican Objects to Italy and Europe
Authors: Domenici Davide
Published: August 2021

It has been customary to trace back to the early shipments sent by the Spanish conquistadors most of the Mesoamerican artefacts held in ancient European collections. Early 21st-century scholarship, however, has demonstrated that Dominican friars such as Domingo de Betanzos (1480–1549) had a key role in bringing indigenous objects from Mexico to Italy during the 16th century. This new understanding allows a rethinking of the ideological motivations that ignited the transatlantic circulation of indigenous artefacts; textual analysis of relevant sources, in fact, reveals that they were observed and understood within a missionary discourse on indigenous ingenuity, rationality, and convertibility.

Once in Italy, the objects entered local art collections in Bologna, Rome, Florence, and other Italian cities, where they aroused an antiquarian approach to their study. The investigation of the collection history of these objects, which in some instances ended up in museums in other European countries, shows that our knowledge of many of the most iconic Mesoamerican artworks known today can be traced back to the actions of the Dominican friars.
Digital Resources: Brazilian Legal History
Authors: Neder Meyer Emilio Peluso , Guiomar da C. Frota Maria
Published: August 2021

Digital resources for Brazilian legal history in the early 21st century cover an essential range of subjects. Official or institutional websites dominate the archives that allow users to research diverse themes, from the administration of the Portuguese colonies to the documents produced by truth commissions. Many of them are open access, fostering the democratization of the archives. To assess the most relevant ones, one must consider funds, collections, documents, and their accessibility and usability, as well as the limits for accessing Brazilian historical legal documents on the internet. Researchers of Brazilian legal history must consider the dominance of official narratives that can neglect the interpretations of other actors such as minorities.

The colonial period is covered by digital resources with archives that were produced in Spain or Portugal but also by the Brazilian National Library and National Archives. The Historical Archives of the House of Deputies presents relevant resources for the period of the Brazilian Empire. The First and Second Republics historical periods count on collections of judicial rulings provided with easy and free access. The period of partial democratization between 1946 and 1964, the Brazilian dictatorship of 1964–1985, and the Third Republic that came after the Brazilian 1988 Constitution are part of a significant number of digital resources also easily accessible.

Presupposing the necessity of effectiveness to the right of access to information, the process of digitalization of legal resources was consolidated and became a general practice. It dominated a wide range of institutional archives. Nonetheless, researchers must be aware of governmental limits, revisionist theories, and insufficient funding for Brazilian legal digital resources.
History of the Spanish Lexicon
Authors: Dworkin Steven N.
Published: August 2021

From an historical perspective, the Spanish lexicon consists of three different categories: (1) its historical core of words inherited from the Latin spoken in the Roman province of Hispania; (2) loanwords that entered Spanish over its long history as a result of contact at the levels of both oral and written discourse with other languages; and (3) words created internally through such mechanisms of derivational morphology as suffixation, prefixation, compounding, back-formations, and so on. Over the last 150 years, specialists in the history of the Spanish language have studied in considerable detail all three sources of lexical material. Although most of the lexical items inherited from spoken Latin have cognates in many (in some cases, all) of the Romance languages, Spanish has preserved some words that live on only in Spanish (and neighboring Portuguese) or only in Spanish, Portuguese, and Romanian, the geographical extremes of the Romance-speaking world, far removed from the centers of linguistic innovation. As a result of language contact, loanwords from the pre-Roman languages of the Iberian Peninsula, Visigothic, Arabic, Gallo-Romance (northern and southern French), Portuguese, Catalan, Italian, classical Latin, native languages of the New World, and English have entered and taken root in the Spanish lexicon. Although such lexical borrowings have often been studied within a cultural framework, recent research has focused on their introduction and incorporation as examples of contact-induced language change at the level of the lexicon. Throughout its history, Spanish has increased the size of its vocabulary through the creation of neologisms through processes of suffixation, prefixation, and composition. The study of such items has traditionally been the focus of specialists in diachronic derivational morphology. This subfield constitutes in many respects an important component of diachronic lexicology. Indeed, etymology and diachronic derivational morphology are two sides of the same coin. Lexical history is not limited to the study of additions to the vocabulary. Over time, many words have fallen into disuse or have become obsolete. Some recent work on the history of the Spanish lexicon has examined the various external and internal/structural causes of lexical loss in the history of the Spanish lexicon.
The Semantics of Chinese Noun Phrases
Authors: Li Xuping
Published: August 2021

Chinese nominal phrases are typologically distinct from their English counterparts in many aspects. Most strikingly, Chinese is featured with a general classifier system, which not only helps to categorize nouns but also has to do with the issue of quantification. Moreover, it has neither noncontroversial plural markers nor (in)definite markers. Its bare nouns are allowed in various argument positions. As a consequence, Chinese is sometimes characterized as a classifier language, as an argumental language, or as an article-less language. One of the questions arising is whether these apparently different but related properties underscore a single issue: that it is the semantics of nouns that is responsible for all these peculiarities of Mandarin nominal phrases. It has been claimed that Chinese nouns are born as kind terms, from which the object-level readings can be derived, being either existential or definite. Nevertheless, the existence of classifiers in Chinese is claimed to be independent of the kind denotation of its bare nouns.

Within the general area of noun semantics, a number of other semantic issues have generated much interest. One is concerned with the availability of the mass/count distinction in Mandarin nominal phrases. Another issue has to do with the semantics of classifiers. Are classifiers required by the noun semantics or the numeral semantics, when occurring in the syntactic context of Numeral/Quantifier-Classifier-Noun? Finally, how is the semantic notion of definiteness understood in article-less languages like Mandarin Chinese? Should its denotation be characterized with uniqueness or familiarity?
Chinese Reflexives
Authors: Wang Yingying , Pan Haihua
Published: August 2021

Among Chinese reflexives, simple reflexive ziji ‘self’ is best known not only for its licensing of long-distance binding that violates Binding Condition A in the canonical Binding Theory, but also for its special properties such as the asymmetry of the blocking effect. Different researchers have made great efforts to explain such phenomena from a syntactic or a semantic-pragmatic perspective, though up to now there is still no consensus on what the mechanism really is. Besides being used as an anaphor, ziji can also be used as a generic pronoun and an intensifier. Moreover, Chinese has other simple reflexives such as zishen ‘self-body’ and benren ‘person proper’, and complex ones like ta-ziji ‘himself’ and ziji-benshen ‘self-self’. These reflexives again indicate the complexity of the anaphoric system of Chinese, which calls for further investigation so that we can have a better understanding of the diversity of the binding patterns in natural languages.
Natural Hazards Governance in Democratic States With Developing Economies
Authors: Pal Indrajit
Published: August 2021

Catastrophic natural disasters have served as reminders of the connection between fragile governments and human losses. Developing economies are impacted most from natural as well as anthropogenic hazards. For example, the Indian Ocean tsunami (2004) claimed 227,898 lives, primarily in three politically fragmented countries with developing economies: Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and India; and the 2010 Haiti earthquake affected more than 3 million people and killed between 46,190 and 316,000. According to EM-DAT, the cumulative number of global disaster deaths over the past 30 years was 1,677,000, with an annual average of 54,082 deaths. According to Swiss reinsurance companies, the average global natural disaster insurance loss for the last 10 years (2009–2018) was $67 billion, and global insurance losses accounted for 0.09% of global GDP on average. Over the past decade, “natural” disasters have caused more than 780,000 fatalities and destroyed physical properties worth a minimum of $960 billion.

The United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR) initiated the international disaster governance agenda for the Hyogo Framework for Action (HFA) global blueprint in 2005 and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (SFDRR) in 2015. Since the HFA, the international disaster risk reduction (DRR) community is increasingly viewing disaster risk management (DRM) as a governance concern.

Governments are not a single structure; they are divided into various functions, hierarchies, policies, and responsibilities in working to create resilient communities at various levels (national and subnational). In countries with developing economies, government agencies have a significant role in DRM, which includes community-based organizations, science and technology research institutes, environmental protection agencies, and finance ministries. The existence of disaster management systems able to integrate vertical and horizontal coordination efforts is a critical weakness. Although there has been significant improvement globally in government capacities as well as institutional frameworks and legislative provisions for DRR in recent years, progress has been uneven. National-level policy

formulation in a top-down model has often not made a significant impact at lower levels of government, where awareness-raising, training, and capacity-building likely would be significantly addressed. An extensive literature review is provided to help understand decentralized governance and its efficacy for local-level risk management of natural hazards for developing economies. Community risk perceptions and ways to respond to disasters vary from location to location; thus, it is important to implement decentralized policies and customize them to local needs and priorities to achieve low-impact sustainable development.