This book is an authoritative source for anyone interested in the history and heritage of the Yosemite Miwok. It is a classic study of Miwok tribe culture written by two noted anthropologists and covering topics such as shelter, food, art, and industry. The volume includes forty-eight illustrated plates of artifacts, an extensive bibliography, and many informative maps. For students or anyone interested in Yosemite Indian culture, the book is a fascinating read.
Traditionally, research on the history of Asian religions has been marked by a bias for literary evidence, privileging canonical texts penned in ‘classical’ languages. Not only has a focus on literary evidence shaped the dominant narratives about the religious histories of Asia, in both scholarship and popular culture, but it has contributed to the tendency to study different religious traditions in relative isolation from one another. Today, moreover, historical work is often based on modern textual editions and, increasingly, on electronic databases. What may be lost, in the process, is the visceral sense of the text as artifact – as a material object that formed part of a broader material culture, in which the boundaries between religious traditions were sometimes more fluid than canonical literature might suggest. This volume brings together specialists in a variety of Asian cultures to discuss the methodological challenges involved in integrating material evidence for the reconstruction of the religious histories of South, Southeast, Central, and East Asia. By means of specific ‘test cases,’ the volume explores the importance of considering material and literary evidence in concert. What untold stories do these sources help us to recover? How might they push us to reevaluate historical narratives traditionally told from literary sources? By addressing these questions from the perspectives of different subfields and religious traditions, contributors map out the challenges involved in interpreting different types of data, assessing the problems of interpretation distinct to specific types of material evidence (e.g., coins, temple art, manuscripts, donative inscriptions) and considering the issues raised by the different patterns in the preservation of such evidence in different locales. Special attention is paid to newly-discovered and neglected sources; to our evidence for trade, migration, and inter-regional cultural exchange; and to geographical locales that served as "contact zones" connecting cultures. In addition, the chapters in this volume represent the rich range of religious traditions across Asia – including Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Shinto, and Chinese religions, as well as Islam and eastern Christianities.
"As an Indigenous scholar researching the history and archaeology of his own tribe, Tsim D. Schneider provides a unique and timely contribution to the growing field of Indigenous archaeology and offers a new perspective on the primary role and relevance of Indigenous places and homelands in the study of colonial encounters"--
Imagine you live in a self-contained village where your parents and their parents and all your forebears from the beginning of time have lived. Imagine that within a day's walking distance from your village are the villages of other People-to the east and west and north and south. They are PEOPLE because they speak words you mainly understand. There are in these foothills 9000 such PEOPLE. Then imagine that in the space of a few months 90,000 ûyeayû-white men-come uninvited to all the PEOPLE'S villages to tear away the ground under the PEOPLE'S feet looking for rocks. For each one of you there are 10 of them. Imagine!
Fire in California’s Ecosystems describes fire in detail—both as an integral natural process in the California landscape and as a growing threat to urban and suburban developments in the state. Written by many of the foremost authorities on the subject, this comprehensive volume is an ideal authoritative reference tool and the foremost synthesis of knowledge on the science, ecology, and management of fire in California. Part One introduces the basics of fire ecology, including overviews of historical fires, vegetation, climate, weather, fire as a physical and ecological process, and fire regimes, and reviews the interactions between fire and the physical, plant, and animal components of the environment. Part Two explores the history and ecology of fire in each of California's nine bioregions. Part Three examines fire management in California during Native American and post-Euro-American settlement and also current issues related to fire policy such as fuel management, watershed management, air quality, invasive plant species, at-risk species, climate change, social dynamics, and the future of fire management. This edition includes critical scientific and management updates and four new chapters on fire weather, fire regimes, climate change, and social dynamics.
John Muir called it the "Range of Light, the most divinely beautiful of all the mountain chains I’ve ever seen." The Sierra Nevada—a single unbroken mountain range stretching north to south over four hundred miles, best understood as a single ecosystem but embracing a number of environmental communities—has been the site of human activity for millennia. From the efforts of ancient Native Americans to encourage game animals by burning brush to create meadows to the burgeoning resort and residential development of the present, the Sierra has endured, and often suffered from, the efforts of humans to exploit its bountiful resources for their own benefit. Historian David Beesley examines the history of the Sierra Nevada from earliest times, beginning with a comprehensive discussion of the geologic development of the range and its various ecological communities. Using a wide range of sources, including the records of explorers and early settlers, scientific and government documents, and newspaper reports, Beesley offers a lively and informed account of the history, environmental challenges, and political controversies that lie behind the breathtaking scenery of the Sierra. Among the highlights are discussions of the impact of the Gold Rush and later mining efforts, as well as the supporting industries that mining spawned, including logging, grazing, water-resource development, market hunting, urbanization, and transportation; the politics and emotions surrounding the establishment of Yosemite and other state and national parks; the transformation of the Hetch Hetchy into a reservoir and the desertification of the once-lush Owens Valley; the roles of the Forest Service, Park Service, and other regulatory agencies; the consequences of the fateful commitment to wildfire suppression in Sierran forests; and the ever-growing impact of tourism and recreational use. Through Beesley’s wide-ranging discussion, John Muir’s "divinely beautiful" range is revealed in all its natural and economic complexity, a place that at the beginning of the twenty-first century is in grave danger of being loved to death. Available in hardcover and paperback.
Artifacts linked to projectile technologies traditionally have provided the foundations for time-space systematics and cultural-historic frameworks in archaeological research having to do with foragers. With the shift in archae ological research objectives to processual interpretations, projectile technolo gies continue to receive marked attention, but with an emphasis on the implications of variability in such areas as design, function, and material as they relate to the broader questions of human adaptation. The reason that this particular domain of foraging technology persists as an important focus of research, I think, comes in three parts. A projectile technology was a crucial part of most foragers' strategies for survival, it was functionally spe cific, and it generally was fabricated from durable materials likely to be detected archaeologically. Being fundamental to meat acquisition and the principal source of calo ries, projectile technologies were typically afforded greater time-investment, formal modification, and elaboration of attributes than others. Moreover, such technologies tend to display greater standardization because of con straints on size, morphology, and weight that are inherent to the delivery system. The elaboration of attributes and standardization of form gives pro jectile technologies time-and space-sensitivity that is greater than most other foraging technologies. And such sensitivity is immensely valuable in archae ological research.
