This study explores the process of identity creation in the Caribbean archipelagic space by examining the last five centuries of Grenada’s layered history through detailing and analyzing the major... Show moreThis study explores the process of identity creation in the Caribbean archipelagic space by examining the last five centuries of Grenada’s layered history through detailing and analyzing the major human-environment interactions that have transformed its landscape, particularly following the invasion of Europeans since the 17th century and the establishment of plantation agriculture and slavery (utilizing enslaved Africans and their descendants), village settlements and subsistence agriculture, and much later tourism. It will analyze its landscape transformations by examining land use and settlement patterns of its human occupants from the Indigenous Kali’nago to its current inhabitants via the concept of creolization. Centuries of interactions between and among these various groups of people and the Grenadian environment have created a landscape best described as a palimpsest where layer upon layer of interactions intertwine, overwrite and blend with each other through time. Yet leaving glimpses or blurred pictures of impacts in various and discernable ways, thus creating a long-term biography of this islandscape. By examining the Grenadian palimpsest and analyzing the concept of landscape identity through historical representations and memory-traces embedded in the Creole cultural landscape this study explores the relationship between people and the landscape over time. Show less
Curaçao is an autonomous country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands and has just one single tax treaty for the prevention of double taxation, namely with Norway. Curaçao has proven unsuccessful... Show moreCuraçao is an autonomous country within the Kingdom of the Netherlands and has just one single tax treaty for the prevention of double taxation, namely with Norway. Curaçao has proven unsuccessful in the conclusion and ratification of full tax treaties. Until now, little attention has been paid to the underlying reasons why Curaçao has proven unsuccessful in building a tax treaty network. The central research question is: “How should Curaçao design its tax treaty policy in order to build a tax treaty network?” This study does not aim to provide recommendations on the technical aspects of a tax treaty policy or a model convention. Rather, the objective of this study is to identify the conditions for building a tax treaty network.The research identifies the obstacles for Curaçao to conclude (and ratify) tax treaties. Furthermore, the research shows which considerations are relevant for Curaçao to build a tax treaty network. The outcome of this research is an evaluation framework that can act as a guide for Curaçao when designing a tax treaty policy or adjusting a potentially existing (but unpublished) tax treaty policy. Show less
Afscheidscollege van Prof. dr. Gert J. Oostindie Directeur van het Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde (KITLV-KNAW) Hoogleraar Koloniale en Postkoloniale Geschiedenis aan de... Show moreAfscheidscollege van Prof. dr. Gert J. Oostindie Directeur van het Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde (KITLV-KNAW) Hoogleraar Koloniale en Postkoloniale Geschiedenis aan de Universiteit Leiden uitgesproken op vrijdag 17 december 2021 Show less
Studies of clientelism increasingly focus on the brokers, networks and party machines that make clientelism work in mass democracies. This article highlights the different forms clientelistic... Show moreStudies of clientelism increasingly focus on the brokers, networks and party machines that make clientelism work in mass democracies. This article highlights the different forms clientelistic politics can take by looking at small, rather than large, democracies in the Caribbean and the Pacific. Countries in both regions experience considerable clientelistic politics, but without the same dependence on brokers, networks and party machines. Based on extensive fieldwork in 15 different Caribbean and Pacific small states, resulting in over 200 interviews, we uncover how clientelism is practised in these hitherto neglected cases. We find that the size of these states contributes to the emergence of clientelistic relations based on (1) the ‘face-to-face’ connections and overlapping role relations between citizens and politicians, (2) politicians’ electoral dependence on a very small number of votes, and (3) enhanced opportunities for monitoring and controlling clientelistic exchanges. Smallness is furthermore found to limit, albeit not entirely dispense with, the need for brokers, networks and party machines, and to amplify the power of clients vis-à-vis their patrons, altering the nature and dynamics of clientelism in important ways. In a final section we discuss how clientelism contributes to other dominant trends in small state politics: personalism and executive domination. Show less
Reconstructing ties between archaeological contexts may contribute to explain and describe a variety of past social phenomena. Several models have been formulated to infer the structure of such... Show moreReconstructing ties between archaeological contexts may contribute to explain and describe a variety of past social phenomena. Several models have been formulated to infer the structure of such archaeological networks. The applicability of these models in diverse archaeological contexts is limited by the restricted set of assumptions that fully determine the mathematical formulation of the models and are often articulated on a dyadic basis. Here, we present a general framework in which we combine exponential random graph models with archaeological substantiations of mechanisms that may be responsible for network formation. This framework may be applied to infer the structure of ancient networks in a large variety of archaeological settings. We use data collected over a set of sites in the Caribbean during the period AD 100–400 to illustrate the steps to obtain a network reconstruction. Show less
LeFebvre, Michelle J. vi; Giovas, Christina M.; Laffoon, Jason E. 2019
St. Eustatius, a small island in the Lesser Antilles, was one of the busiest ports in the eighteenth-century Atlantic World. Contested between the Dutch, French, and English, the island... Show moreSt. Eustatius, a small island in the Lesser Antilles, was one of the busiest ports in the eighteenth-century Atlantic World. Contested between the Dutch, French, and English, the island attracted thousands of ships a year and became one of the most cosmopolitan places in the New World. Moreover, the island played an important role in the American War of Independence (1775-1783), during which large quantities of arms, ammunition, and gunpowder were shipped to the fledgling United States through St. Eustatius. Relics of this turbulent past are found all over the island and in its surrounding waters. These include warehouses in the historic port district, fortifications all around the island, sugar plantations in the countryside, and a variety of underwater archaeological sites such as shipwrecks, anchorage areas, and docks. Through extensive archaeological and documentary research, this study aims to provide a detailed analysis of the maritime cultural landscape of St. Eustatius over the past four centuries. It focuses on bridging the gap between the marine and terrestrial worlds and demonstrates that in order to truly make sense of the complex interactions, events, and processes that shaped this maritime world, land and sea need to be studied in relation to each other. Show less
A mosaic is the only image which can do justice to museums in the Caribbean. They are as diverse and plentiful as the many communities which form the cores of their organizations and the hearts of... Show moreA mosaic is the only image which can do justice to museums in the Caribbean. They are as diverse and plentiful as the many communities which form the cores of their organizations and the hearts of their missions. These profoundly social museums adopt participatory practices and embark on community engagement processes in order to embed themselves firmly in contemporary Caribbean societies. This dissertation presents 195 Caribbean museums and the results of a unique research project. It begins with a macro view of 195 Caribbean museums and their participatory practices and continues by zooming in to a micro level to explore the dynamics of community engagement processes in two case studies. The Kalinago Barana Autê in Dominica shows the ongoing process of an indigenous grassroots initiative that became a governmentally owned museum. The Bengal to Barbados exhibition in Barbados reveals the complex dynamics of a co-curation project by a heterogeneous migrant community. By giving voice to grassroots museums, this dissertation shifts the museological discussion away from the usual suspects to consider topics such as the ephemeral museum. Recognizing the different forms the museum can take, it becomes apparent that people everywhere in the world need museums, create museums, and visit museums.The 195 museums studied in the course of this dissertation research are accessible through a separate appendix. This appendix can be read as a catalogue of these museums, whereby each museum is recorded individually. The appendix is accessible online through the Leiden University Respository via: https://hdl.handle.net/1887/76575 Show less
Archaeological excavations of an enslaved African domestic area at the Spring Bay Flat plantation on the island of Saba, Dutch Caribbean, uncovered a small concentration of artefacts (shell, metal... Show moreArchaeological excavations of an enslaved African domestic area at the Spring Bay Flat plantation on the island of Saba, Dutch Caribbean, uncovered a small concentration of artefacts (shell, metal nails, animal bones and five human teeth) overlaid with a lock hinge, interpreted as a lockbox and its contents. Dental anthropological and multi‐isotope (strontium, oxygen, carbon and nitrogen) analyses of the teeth revealed that they belonged to a single individual who originated from Africa and survived a period of pronounced nutritional stress as a juvenile. The results provide rare insights into the life history of an individual who probably experienced enslavement, (forced) migration from Africa and adaptation to plantation life in the colonial‐era Caribbean. Show less
During the Holocene colonization of islands in the Pacific and Caribbean by agropastoral and horticulturalist communities, a variety of proxies (material, genetic, zoogeographic etc.) indicate... Show moreDuring the Holocene colonization of islands in the Pacific and Caribbean by agropastoral and horticulturalist communities, a variety of proxies (material, genetic, zoogeographic etc.) indicate substantial inter-island and inter-community contact. It has been suggested that this contact represents an adaptive response to mitigate intrinsic demographic fragility during the initial phases of island colonization, and that this exogamous imperative faded in the aftermath of initial dispersal as overall population density increased. Here, we evaluate this model by synthesizing and comparing increasingly available 87Sr/86Sr data from funerary populations in the Pacific and Caribbean. After performing basic hygienic discrimination, we conclude that the Caribbean data—both from across the region, and on an intra-site/island basis—lend support to this model, with high early in-migration succeeded by comparatively low in-migration in a relationship which, based on chi-square tests, is statistically significant (1, N = 290) = 4.046, p = 0.044). The Pacific situation is more complex, with data from the Bismarck Archipelago and northern Solomon Islands skewing the analysis. However, in considering these data in detail, we demonstrate that there are reasons to suppose that the Pacific data may also tentatively support a model of high rates of in-migration being replaced later in settlement histories by comparatively low rates. We conclude by highlighting future directions for this incipient research program. Show less
The modern-day Caribbean is a stunningly diverse but also intricately interconnected geo-cultural region, resulting partly from the islands__ shared colonial histories and an increasingly... Show moreThe modern-day Caribbean is a stunningly diverse but also intricately interconnected geo-cultural region, resulting partly from the islands__ shared colonial histories and an increasingly globalizing economy. Perhaps more importantly, before the encounter between the New and Old World took place, the indigenous societies and cultures of the pre-colonial Caribbean were already united in diversity. This work seeks to study the patterns of this pre-colonial homogeneity and diversity and uncover some of their underlying processes and dynamics. This approach and theoretical framework is tested in four case studies dealing with lithic distribution networks, site assemblages as ego-networks, indigenous political networks, and the analysis of artefact styles in 2-mode networks. These were selected for their pertinence to key research themes in Caribbean archaeology, in particular the current debates about the nature of ties and interactions between culturally different communities in the region, and the structure and dynamics of pre-colonial socio-political organisation. The outcomes of these case studies show that archaeological network approaches can provide surprising new insights into longstanding questions about the patterns of pre-colonial connectivity in the region Show less
Patterns of paleomobility in the Caribbean were studied through an inter-disciplinary approach using a combination of archaeological, osteological, mortuary, and isotopic data. Samples of human... Show morePatterns of paleomobility in the Caribbean were studied through an inter-disciplinary approach using a combination of archaeological, osteological, mortuary, and isotopic data. Samples of human enamel from 360 individuals from multiple sites spanning a broad range of geographic and temporal contexts were analyzed for strontium isotope composition. These results were interpreted in reference to a database of strontium isotope variation for the Caribbean biosphere created through the analysis of 288 modern and archeological animal and plant samples. These combined strontium isotope datasets contributed to assessments of the spatial patterning of bioavailable strontium isotopes in the region and to estimations of the local range of isotope variation for the different site populations. These ranges were used to determine whether individuals were of local or nonlocal origin and were then analyzed to examine variability in patterns of migration, with a specific focus on testing possible relationships between residential origins and biological sex, age at death, chronology, grave goods, and dietary practices. Carbon and oxygen isotope analyses of dental enamel were also conducted on a subset of 50 individuals to assess their potential for provenance studies in the Caribbean region and for investigating the origins of suspected long-distance migrants. Show less
In this book the concept of mobility is explored for the archaeology of the Amazonian and Caribbean region. As a result of technological and methodological progress in archaeology, mobility has... Show moreIn this book the concept of mobility is explored for the archaeology of the Amazonian and Caribbean region. As a result of technological and methodological progress in archaeology, mobility has become increasingly visible on the level of the individual. However, as a concept it does not seem to fit with current approaches in Amazonian archaeology, which favour a move away from viewing small mobile groups as models for the deeper past. Instead of ignoring such ethnographic tyrannies, in this book they are considered to be essential for arriving at a different past. Viewing archaeological mobility as the sum of movements of both people and objects, the empirical part of Amotopoan Trails focuses on Amotopo, a small contemporary Trio village in the interior of Suriname. The movements of the Amotopoans are tracked and positioned in a century of Trio dynamics, ultimately yielding a recent archaeology of Surinamese-Trio movements for the Sipaliwini River basin (1907-2008). Alongside the construction of this archaeology, novel mobility concepts are introduced. They provide the conceptual footholds which enable the envisioning of mobility at various temporal scales, from a decade up to a century, the sequence of which has remained a blind spot in Caribbean and Amazonian archaeology. Show less
This thesis presents the study of the possibilities of functional analysis on shell implements. Shell tools from the pre-Columbian sites of Anse à la Gourde and Morel, Guadeloupe were studied and... Show moreThis thesis presents the study of the possibilities of functional analysis on shell implements. Shell tools from the pre-Columbian sites of Anse à la Gourde and Morel, Guadeloupe were studied and interpreted based on archaeological, ethnographical, ethnohistorical and experimental data. In addition, flint and stone tools of both sites were analysed. In this thesis functional analysis is approached from an integral point of view in order to be able to reconstruct the past technological system. The results of the functional analysis of all artefact categories are presented as well as a reconstruction of the technological system in the pre-Columbian period. It is demonstrated how this integral approach provides the possibilities to shed light on the choices made in the past on tool use and the utilisation of different raw materials. Show less
The author of this meticulously researched work surveys the possibilities of functional analysis of shell implements. Her study of shell tools, as well as flint and stone tools, from the pre... Show moreThe author of this meticulously researched work surveys the possibilities of functional analysis of shell implements. Her study of shell tools, as well as flint and stone tools, from the pre-Columbian sites of Anse à la Gourde and Morel, Guadeloupe draws on archaeological, ethnographical,ethnohistorical and experimental data.The results of the functional analysis of all artifact categories are presented, as well as a reconstruction of the technological system in the pre-Columbian period. She demonstrates the value of this integral approach in shedding light on the choices made in the past on tool use and the utilisation of different raw materials Show less
This work discusses the exchange of stone materials and artefacts among the northern Lesser Antilles during the Ceramic Age (500 BC - AD 1492). Through the systematic analysis of source materials... Show moreThis work discusses the exchange of stone materials and artefacts among the northern Lesser Antilles during the Ceramic Age (500 BC - AD 1492). Through the systematic analysis of source materials and a comparison of these with lithic artefacts, the provenance of a significant portion of stone material found at a number of prehistoric Amerindian habitation sites located on different islands from Puerto Rico to Martinique was determined. Following this the distribution of three specific materials, including a variety of flint from Long Island, Antigua, a grey-green mudstone and a multi-coloured conglomerate, both form St. Martin, were specified. These distribution patterns along with data on the production of the artefacts were used to determine the mode of exchange that was responsible for their spread. From these data it appeared that inter-island exchange was a recurrent feature among Amerindian society in the Caribbean throughout the entire Ceramic Age. Furthermore the differences in distributions through time could be related to changes in socio-political organisation within the region and supported the notion of increasing competition within society. Show less
