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Jordan Times
08-04-2025
- General
- Jordan Times
Southern Levant: Landscape archaeology, social transformations in Early Bronze Age
The Bronze Age site Tell Deir Alla, located in central Jordan (Photo courtesy of ACOR) AMMAN — During the mid-4th to the mid-3rd millennia Cal BC, the southern Levant saw changes in social organisation, settlement character and economy. Settlements became walled, megalithic funerary monuments were built and technological advancement took place. Such changes generally have been explained in the context of the emergence within the region of a number of regional city-states, each centred upon a walled 'town', said British scholar Graham Phillips. 'Although the present discussion is focused upon the internal dynamics of the southern Levant, it is probably no coincidence that these developments were broadly synchronous with major changes in west Asia generally,' said Philip. 'To the North, there was increasing south Mesopotamian contact with North Syria and Anatolia, a process in which the Levant was, at least peripherally, involved,' added Philip from the University of Durham. To the south, the emergence of a state-level polity in Egypt appears to have coincided with increasing Egyptian interest in south-western Palestine, he said. It is hard to imagine that the kinds of changes detailed above could have taken place without corresponding modification in both the physical and conceptual landscapes inhabited by the local population, the scholar continued. The fact that the construction of fortified settlements and major funerary monuments was coincident with a period that witnessed the substantial restructuring of agricultural practices and social organisation suggests that it should be possible to delineate the articulations between the various strands of change through a consideration of the way in which the landscape might have been implicated in these developments, the professor explained. 'The present account represents an attempt to use an approach rooted in 'landscape archaeology' to examine the inter-connected nature of the various developments, and thus to elucidate their combined impact without recourse to the traditional explanatory mechanism of the appearance of state organisations,' Philip elaborated. He noted that the key notion is that landscapes are seen to be composed not simply of physical space but of culturally meaningful 'places.' 'As Knapp and Ashmore point out, 'landscape is an entity that exists by virtue of its being perceived, experienced and contextualised by people', and so is neither a passive backdrop to nor a determinant of culture. As people's senses of place arise from their own particular engagement with the world, notions of place are highly dependent upon individual social, cultural and historical situations,' Philip elaborated. A community's particular sense of place and time will play a key role in structuring the way in which they make use of the available material resources, and thus occupy and manage their environment. In this way landscapes can be seen to constitute social and ideological symbols which shape people's comprehension and experience of the world, Philip explained. The scholar added that humans do not inhabit a neutral geometric space but rather 'experiential landscapes', shaped by beliefs and values and perceived as they move, in the pursuance of their daily activities, through a network of places connected by pathways and routes. 'This is what Barrett has termed people's 'routine occupancy' of the landscape,' he added. 'From this standpoint, it is clear that constructional activity, and other physical modifications to the landscape, such as those consequent upon changing agricultural practices, will create new places, even new kinds of places, and modify existing ones. As a result, the network of routes and patterns of movement will change,' Philip underscored. In this way, human activity transforms not just the physical landscape, but also the way in which it is experienced, both through modified places and changing patterns of movement. As people transform physical spaces into meaningful places through their daily engagement with the material world, the major changes in the nature and organisation of economic activity during the EBA, much of which required direct manipulation of the physical environment, would surely have had a significant impact upon the manner in which 'places' were created and understood, the professor concluded.
New York Times
27-03-2025
- General
- New York Times
For 3 Years, They Quietly Dug Up One of the Biggest Treasures in England
Tom Moore got the call just before Christmas in 2021. The head of the University of Durham's Archaeology department, Mr. Moore was well-known in history circles in Yorkshire, in northeast England. It was why he had received the urgent message, from a man who claimed to have stumbled on something big. 'I think it's Iron Age,' said the caller, Peter Heads, an amateur metal detectorist. And then, no one said a word. Now, after more than three years of painstaking excavation, conducted in near-total secrecy, Mr. Moore and his colleagues say that it could be one of the most significant archaeological finds in northern England — and could change historians' understanding of the Iron Age, around 2,000 years ago. 'Quite simply, this is one of the most important and exciting Iron Age period discoveries made in the U.K.,' Duncan Wilson, the chief executive of the government agency Historic England, said in a statement this week. 'It sheds new light on Iron Age life in the north and Britain, but it also demonstrates connections with Europe.' Since Mr. Heads's finding in 2021, a team of archaeologists working at the site has collected a total of more than 800 objects, most dating to the Iron Age. Among them are cauldrons, a wine-mixing bowl, coral-coated horse harnesses and ceremonial spears. They also include 28 iron wheels, presumably from a chariot or wagon — the kinds of transportation mechanisms never before believed to have existed in such size and scope among the elite of Britain's Iron Age. Experts said that the collection of artifacts — dubbed the Melsonby hoard, for the North Yorkshire town where it was found — stands as an example of how Britain's complicated treasure laws can work to safeguard potential finds. British law defines anything older than 300 years and consisting of at least 10 percent precious metal as 'treasure,' and thus the property of the British crown. After Mr. Heads stumbled on a few pieces of ancient metal, his decision to immediately notify local historians allowed them to quickly protect the site and begin moving the discovery through the legal process. 'It was all done very quietly,' said Professor Moore, who led the excavation. He said that the secrecy was partly to ensure that other, less conscientious detectorists did not try to access the site, and partly so the area could be preserved until the artifacts could be evaluated by British authorities. They eventually assessed the find to be worth around 254,000 pounds (about $329,000). 'It was a very responsible metal detectorist who alerted the archaeologists when he found some of the objects,' Mr. Wilson said in an interview. 'It was a very good example.' Not everyone shows as much familiarity with the laws as Mr. Heads. Britain's rules governing metal detecting require dutiful adherence to reporting requirements, with potential legal consequences for failing to do so. People can use metal detectors on private land with the landowner's permission, but if they discover something that might be considered treasure, they are required to report it. If the item is determined to be treasure, it becomes the property of the government, which manages its potential acquisition by museums. Proceeds from any sale are split between the detectorists and the landowner. Mr. Heads stumbled on the Melsonby hoard while detecting on the property of a friendly landowner. After digging a few holes and recognizing the potential value of the find, he contacted Mr. Moore, whom he knew from working in the area. 'I said to him, 'Don't dig it out,'' recalled Mr. Moore. ''Stop, and I'll bring a team.'' Officials are working to get the hoard to the Yorkshire Museum, which is running a crowdfunding effort to purchase the collection. 'This is a Yorkshire story. This is a history of the place, of the people who organized North Yorkshire,' said Adam Parker, the museum's curator of archaeology. 'We think it's very important for it to be retained in the north.' For Mr. Parker, Mr. Moore and their colleagues, to finally be able to talk publicly about the Melsonby find is a relief. The discovery was kept quiet for years as the items progressed through the treasures assessment process, keeping them from discussing the matter with other experts. 'We're really excited now,' Mr. Moore said. 'We can kind of start the research process.'
The Guardian
19-03-2025
- Science
- The Guardian
Dark energy: mysterious cosmic force appears to be weakening, say scientists
Dark energy, the mysterious force powering the expansion of the universe, appears to be weakening, according to a survey that could 'overthrow' scientists' current understanding of the fate of the cosmos. If confirmed, the results from the dark energy spectroscopic instrument (Desi) team at the Kitt Peak National Observatory in Arizona would have profound implications for theories about the evolution of the universe, opening up the possibility that its current expansion could eventually go into reverse in a 'big crunch'. A suggestion that dark energy reached a peak billions of years ago would also herald the first substantial change in decades to the widely accepted theoretical model of the universe. Prof Alexie Leauthaud-Harnett, a co-spokesperson for Desi and a cosmologist at the University of California, Santa Cruz, said: 'What we are seeing is deeply intriguing. It is exciting to think that we may be on the cusp of a major discovery about dark energy and the fundamental nature of our universe.' Dark energy was discovered in the late 1990s when astronomers used distant supernova explosions to investigate how the rate of cosmic expansion has changed over time. The expectation was that gravity should counteract the expansion that has been underway since the big bang, but instead, the supernovae indicated that the rate of expansion was accelerating, propelled by some unknown force that scientists called dark energy. Dark energy has been assumed to be a constant, which would imply the universe will meet its end in a desolate scenario called the 'big freeze', when everything is eventually so far apart that even light cannot bridge the gap between galaxies. The latest findings, announced on Thursday at the American Physical Society's Global Physics Summit in Anaheim, California, challenge that prevailing view. Desi uses its 5,000 fibreoptic 'eyes' to map the cosmos with unprecedented precision. Its latest data release captures 15m galaxies, spanning 11bn years of history, which astronomers have used to create the most detailed three-dimensional map of the universe to date. The results suggest that dark energy reached a peak in strength when the universe was about 70% of its current age and it is now about 10% weaker. This would mean the rate of expansion is still accelerating, but that dark energy is gently lifting its foot off the pedal. Prof Carlos Frenk, a cosmologist at the University of Durham and member of the Desi collaboration, said: 'What we're finding is that, yes, there is something pushing galaxies away from each other, but it is not constant. It is declining.' The results do not meet the so-called five-sigma threshold of statistical certainty that is the gold standard in physics for claiming a discovery. But many in the collaboration have shifted in recent months from a position of scepticism to confidently backing the finding. 'I'm not on the fence,' said Frenk. 'I've looked at the data carefully. To me, this is a robust result. We're witnessing the overthrow of the old paradigm and the emergence of a new paradigm.' Prof John Peacock, a cosmologist at the University of Edinburgh and a Desi collaborator who voiced scepticism about evolving dark energy at a Royal Society meeting last year, has been similarly persuaded. 'Extreme claims require extreme evidence,' he said. 'There's almost nothing in science that I would bet my house on. But I would put £1,000 on this result.' Others continue to reserve judgment. Prof George Efstathiou of the University of Cambridge, who was not involved in the findings, said: 'My take-home from this analysis is that the … measurements do not yet provide decisive evidence for evolving dark energy. They may do as Desi accumulates more data.' If dark energy keeps decreasing to the point where it becomes negative, the universe is predicted to end in a reverse big bang scenario known as the big crunch. Scientists do not know why dark energy, which is generally estimated to account for about 70% of the universe – with the rest made up of dark and ordinary matter – might be waning or whether this would indicate the laws of physics are changing or that a crucial component is missing from them. Prof Ofer Lahav, an astronomer at University College London and Desi collaborator, said: 'It's fair to say we have no idea what dark matter or dark energy is. The constant dark energy [theory] is already sufficiently challenging. I feel like: 'As if things were not complicated enough.' 'But you can also look at it more positively. For 20 years we've been stuck with dark energy. Now physicists have new questions.'
New York Times
13-02-2025
- New York Times
Sometimes the Best Gift Is Time Alone
I had been looking forward to this all day. As the masseuse began my head massage, I took a deep breath and chuckled inwardly about the awkward positions I'd gotten myself into earlier during a one-on-one aerial yoga class. That had come after a six-mile walking tour across the city, visiting churches, hidden garden courtyards and paying homage to Pasquino, one of the Eternal City's ancient talking statues where Romans to this day leave notes with comments on societal and political issues. This massage was the last treatment of my four-day spa trip to the Italian capital, and I was rejuvenated to head home and resume the glorious chaos of my London life. It was my 87-year-old mother, on an extended visit, who had observed that I needed to slow down. She watched as I tried to balance the busy social life of my energetic 7-year-old twins, volunteered at their school, accepted various work commissions, prepared edits for a new book I had coming out, and helped run a small but very active grass-roots advocacy organization in my home state of Michigan. She could tell that her divorced daughter was tapped out. So, I decided to give myself the gift of 'me' time. It was an opportunity for a reboot, doing things that I loved — shopping, spa treatments, sightseeing — with no agenda and the freedom to choose whether I wanted to interact with anyone. Turns out, I am not the only one who, like Greta Garbo in 'Grand Hotel,' wanted 'to be alone.' This desire to find solitude, whether by attending an ayurvedic retreat in Bali or going solo to a museum in Brussels, often comes about because we have too many demands of our time, said Thuy-vy Nguyen, an associate professor in psychology at the University of Durham in England who is the principal investigator at the Solitude Lab, which researches the effects of being alone. 'We do need balance and equilibrium,' Dr. Nguyen said. 'When we have too much going on, we usually describe that as stress, feeling overwhelmed. And solitude is usually just a convenient space for that, because that's the time where you don't have social feedback, and some people really need to just get away and be on their own.' Just as Henry David Thoreau found solitude near Walden Pond in the 19th century, my friend Ewa Switek, a mother of two teenagers in Warsaw, has learned the joys of 'me' time. She has traveled across Europe many times by herself and last year, on a solo trip, she discovered that she loves mountain trekking. Her goal now is to climb all 28 peaks of the Crown of Polish Mountains (Korona Gor Polski), mostly on her own. So far, she has conquered 18. 'From time to time, you have had enough of everything,' she said. 'You can spend your time without any plan or strictly with a plan, but it's your plan, not anyone else's.' And there are a lot of options for doing something on your own, whether by traveling across an ocean or going out alone to a film or a local restaurant. It's just about having some time to escape from your madding crowd. If you, like Ewa, find that communing with nature helps, the Gutsy Girls, a British adventure travel company founded by a woman, has four hiking trips at different skill levels scheduled to take place in Norway this summer, with yoga, sauna and outdoor swimming as part of the package (£1,125 or $1,430, which includes accommodation and food). They are group trips, but welcome people who come on their own. Or a trip to the Namib Desert in Namibia might do the trick. While staying at Kulala Desert Lodge (starting at about $348 per night), you could take advantage of the lodge's offerings, by going on a guided hike through the 1,000-foot-high dunes, cycling along the plains on an electric fat-tire bike or taking a balloon trip over the landscape that seems to stretch to eternity, truly getting away from it all. For creative types, there are numerous retreats to get the artistic juices flowing. New this year is a 10-day writing retreat to Mongolia through Himalayan Writing Retreat in June ($4,400; travel not included; participants selected on application). After two days of sightseeing in Ulaanbaatar, wordsmiths head to Kharkhorin, the town that was the Mongol Empire's capital in the 13th century, where the retreat truly begins. 'People want to escape their everyday sameness and seek inspiration and creative stimulation,' Chetan Mahajan, the co-founder of Himalayan Writing Retreat, wrote in an email. 'Most participants come alone. Given the goal of focusing on the important work one is pursuing, and improving the craft, participants usually don't want the distraction of a fellow traveler.' Mr. Mahajan and the writer Erika Krouse will lead the retreat. If self-reflection comes better through a piece of clay, La Meridiana in Tuscany offers classes all year long, including a weeklong hand building course (€1,700 [$1,770] tuition) in March and a course on creating contemporary porcelain jewelry (€1,900 tuition) with Luca Tripaldi, a sculptor, in July. Finding inner peace and meditation in a countryside setting is what the Sharpham Trust, in the English county of Devon, offers throughout the year with its three-day retreats. Through guided meditation, periods of silence and walks through the trust's Capability Brown-designed parkland, the sessions would be an opportunity to start learning how to ground yourself or a chance to brush up your skills (prices start at £395 for single occupancy, which includes room and board). Or if doing diet and detox as part of your yoga experience sounds ideal, the Dharana retreat in India's Maharashtra state offers a five, seven or 14-day Art of Detox program that includes cupping, an infrared detoxifying sauna and a consultation with a nutrition expert, as well as all meals (starting at $850 a night). Of course there also are lots of less expensive options that don't require long-distance travel, such as a massage or a night at the movies, a concert or the theater. Kevin O'Neill of Ann Arbor, Mich., the father of 3-year-old identical triplet girls, recently did that, driving 40 minutes into Detroit for an evening of sushi and a musical. 'It was empowering,' he said. Since his solo night out, he and his husband have talked about trying to carve out more time for each of them, and as a couple. 'It makes you a better parent,' he said, 'it lets me come back to them and be fully charged again.'
The Guardian
31-01-2025
- General
- The Guardian
Ethnicity not key factor in England school exclusions, study finds
Poverty and special educational needs, rather than ethnicity alone, are the key influences on individual children's school exclusions and attainment in England, according to analysis. The findings, by a multi-ethnic team of academics from Durham and Birmingham universities, challenge widely held views that children in some ethnic groups are disproportionately affected by exclusions and suspensions. But campaigners for race and equality argue that the research downplays the complex intersection of ethnicity and class that deprives many children of fair access to educational opportunities, and overlooks other methods of exclusion and measures deployed against disadvantaged groups. The research found that once adjusted by free school meal eligibility or special educational needs status, there were no significant differences between ethnic groups in rates of exclusion or academic attainment at primary or secondary school. Prof Stephen Gorard, the lead author and professor of education and public policy at the University of Durham, said the findings had uncovered a correlation rather than a 'causal model' linking special needs and poverty with exclusions. 'But if you were trying to predict or explain who is going to be excluded at an individual level, then if you include poverty and special needs, knowing the ethnicity of a child doesn't help a prediction. That's equivalent to saying: this is not driving exclusions,' Gorard said. 'You could argue that black children, for example, are more likely to be labelled with special needs because they are more likely to be considered for some other reasons. And that is possible. But assuming we accept that the special needs label has validity, then after taking it into account, ethnicity doesn't matter for patterns of exclusions.' Dr Shabna Begum, the chief executive of the Runnymede Trust, said the educational experiences of minority ethnic groups were the result of 'a tangled matrix of race and class' that was difficult to measure. Begum said: 'This should not lead us to conclude that racism is not a factor in attainment or exclusion experiences but that there is no single, linear relationship. 'For instance, we have to interrogate the reasons for why some minority ethnic pupils are more likely to be in the free school meals (FSM) category, which is used as the imperfect proxy for working-class status. 'By focusing on FSM status as some kind of fixed category, we risk ignoring the structural racism in labour markets and the wider housing system that explain why many black African, black Caribbean and Traveller children are more likely to experience those wider economic conditions in the first place, and how race and racism is constitutive of their class and therefore their poverty experiences – not incidental to it.' Dr Kulvinder Nagre, a research and policy coordinator for Race on the Agenda, said 'informal exclusions' such as off-rolling – where families were persuaded or put under pressure to remove a child from school – were often missing from official data. 'Our research has found that black and global majority children, and especially those from our Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities, are disproportionately subject to informal exclusion, and this practice is not captured in the models used by the authors to draw their conclusions,' Nagre said. Nagre also cautioned policymakers against overlooking ethnicity as a critical factor in a child's potential. 'Research has shown time and time again that cultural awareness is hugely important for educational interventions – that which may improve the attainment of a white, working-class pupil from the rural north-east [of England] is unlikely to be as effective for a working-class child from a first-generation migrant family in Tower Hamlets, and vice versa,' he said. The research, published in the journal Education Sciences, used official records from the Department for Education's national pupil database from 2019, for all pupils at state schools in England. It concluded that 'prior attainment and special needs/disability status are the main drivers of attainment at both [key stage 2 at primary school] and [key stage 4 at secondary school]. Individual pupil ethnicity did not help to explain either attainment or exclusions, over and above these other factors'. But Gorard said the data did reveal that schools with high concentrations of pupils with particular special needs, disadvantage or ethnicity were more likely to exclude pupils – and that the government should change national admissions policies to tackle such segregation. 'There is a lot of evidence that, in heavily disadvantaged settings, children are punished differently from how the same individual and the same offence and characteristics might be treated in a low segregation setting. It's one of the dangers of having highly segregated schools,' Gorard said. Pepe Di'Iasio, the general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said: 'Schools and colleges work incredibly hard to support these young people but we do need to see more government action to offset the risk of exclusions and improve attainment.' Di'Iasio added: 'It is a stark reality that an obdurate attainment gap persists between children from disadvantaged backgrounds and their peers, and that this feeds through into a cycle of generational disadvantage that we must break if we are to create a fairer and more productive society.'
