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This paper has two principal aims: (1) to analyze and measure how the demographic variables-mortality, fertility, and immigration- affect the cost of education; (2) to evaluate what possibilities developing countries, such as those of Latin America, have for a rapid educational improvement. The paper relates demographic and educational variables of three different populations: Sweden, 1840-1965; the United States, 1850-1960; and Latin America, 1930-2000. Three educational variables are also cone sidered: (a) school attendance rates by sex and age; (b) distribution of students of same age by grade; and (c) cost of student by grade. Demographic changes in countries such as Sweden and the United States were favorable for the development of education. For the future, unless an increase of fertility occurs, mortality and fertility changes will not have a significant effect on the cost of education in these countries. In current less developed countries the demographic changes during the past were less favorable to educational development. A future reduction of fertility will significantly help them to achieve a higher educational level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Simbiosis is the property of University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras Campus, Graduate School of Information Sciences & Technology and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Abstract: Ferdinand de Montessus de Ballore was one of the founders of scientific seismology. He was a pioneer in seismology at the same level as Perrey, Mallet, Milne and Omori. He became familiar with earthquakes and volcanoes in Central America (1881–1885). After his experience in El Salvador his interest for understanding earthquakes and volcanoes oriented all of his life. Back in France he worked out a most complete world catalogue of earthquakes with 170.000 events (1885–1907), and completed his career being the head of the Chilean Seismological Service (1907–1923). Many of his ideas were in advance of later discoveries. He was an exceptional writer and published more than 30 books and hundreds of papers. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This article reassesses John Sutter's role in borderlands history as a destabilizing influence in Mexican California and model for filibusters of the 1850s. Nominally a Mexican citizen, his national loyalties were slippery. In effect, Sutter was an independent filibuster before 1846; californios and the Mexican government regarded him as such. After 1848 his contributions to the American settlement and conquest of California (suitably sanitized and mythologized) made him a pioneer hero who had shown filibusters what might be done in Latin America with a small army and a lot of swagger. Sutter approved and supported Central American filibusters in the 1850s; at least one of his sons fought with filibusters. One of the most colorful characters in the history of the American West, Sutter had eccentricities and personal failings that make him easy to parody. This article shows him in a more serious light. His actions in California had lasting importance there and repercussions elsewhere in Latin America. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study presents an historic analysis of the classification process of the Scarabaeoidea (Insecta: Coleoptera). The analysis is divided in three periods including 59 authors, beginning with Linné in 1735, and finishing in 2001 with Pretorius and Scholtz. The first period (1735-1856) was chosen, since it encompasses a time period prior to the publication of Darwin's "The Origin of Species", and is therefore a classification process arguably free of any Darwinian evolutionary influences. There was a very quick development, in a relatively short period of time (1735-1796), in the number and type of characters used for classification purposes. On some occasions, certain authors reverted to the pre-Linnean tradition of using ecological characters. Likewise, the hierarchic structure of classifications developed rapidly into systems that any modern taxonomist can relate to. Authors like Linné, Fabricius and Latreille, who worked for long periods of time developing classificatory systems, always revolutionized systematics in their very first study. Later on, they remained conservative and made improvements only to the details of systematics. By 1856, the classification of the scarab beetles looks very akin to any present-day system. It is obvious that classifications similar to modern ones can be approximated without having to rely on Darwinian evolutionary principles. The second period (1869-1955) includes a comparative synthesis on the classification of the Coleoptera Lamellicornia based on faunistic and taxonomic works dealing with species from Central America, Europe, India and Indochina, as well as classic world wide checklists, that are representatives of the taxonomical criteria of 17 authors; the possible influence of Darwin's theories is discussed for each classification. Apparently, the main structure of the classification of scarab beetles during this time does not show substantial changes in relation with the proposals of Burmeister or Lacordaire. A large number of new morphological characters were added to the traditional ones, but the family level characters and their use were nearly the same as in the middle of the XIX century. Male genital capsules, internal organs and structures of the immature stages were cited for the first time as useful taxonomic characters, but as accesories of the traditional adult characters. Relations between the groups were eventually exposed as dendrogrames by Sharp and Muir (1912), Paulian (1948) and Crowson (1955), but without clear references to evolutionary theories. These classifications were more complex than the preceding ones, because of the addition of nearly 11,000 new species discovered along 80 years of world exploration. The third period (1957-2001) resumes and analyzes the classification proposals undertaken by 28 authors, based on monographs, faunal studies, keys for regional fauna, papers on comparative morphology, and studies specifically devoted to the understanding of phyletic relationships and evolutionary processes in Scarabaeoidea, for the whole group or for suprageneric groupings of this superfamily. One can detect the patent influence of organic evolution theories on these studies, as well as a progressive reflection of relationships in the proposed classifications, mainly through the use of cladistic and pheneticist approaches. Lately, molecular approaches have also been recruited; but even with all this technology, the main problem remains that most studies do not consider all the diversity of the Scarabaeoidea in one single analysis. Mention must be made of Endrödi's study (1966), who is the first to consider the whole group in analytic and comparative style, proposing to subdivide the Lamellicornia into five families: Scarabaeidae, Melolonthidae, Trogidae, Passalidae and Lucanidae.… [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indigenous territorial governments in Nicaragua's North Caribbean Coast Autonomous Region experience ongoing land and resource contests, in many cases building from longstanding disputes or problems, even after titling. I argue that it is naïve to expect that granting titles - a supposed territorial fix - will resolve conflicts created across decades as a result of ineffective policies and economic pressures. As shown with three demarcated Miskitu territories, tenure insecurity arises from challenges with the state, private firms, non-indigenous colonists, and even from the activities of territorial leaders. These cases suggest the need to move beyond perceptions of Miskitu territories as simple bounded remnants of the past and acknowledge they are complex, porous, trans-local, and transgressed by processes such as migration, urbanisation, and neoliberal economic integration. Indeed, new territorial governments are encouraged by foreign donors and state laws to mirror government agencies and prioritise market linkages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Kiva is the property of Taylor & Francis Ltd and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article presents information on the Aztec children, two children with microcephaly who were allegedly kidnapped from a city located in Central America in the 19th century. Topics include elements of racism in science and ethnology in the period, perceptions of dwarfism and human abnormalities, and interest in Mexican civilizations during the 19th century. Other topics include works on Aztec ruins and civilization and antiquarian Adrien de Longpérier's arguments again the Aztec children.

This essay outlines recent archaeological research on post-Columbian (c. A.D. 1500–1925) indigenous sites in Mexico and Central America. Historical archaeology is a growing field in Mesoamerica, and over the last 20 years investigations of native culture change have increased, especially in rural areas. Contemporary research contributes new insights on indigenous responses to Spanish colonization over a long period. This work also is reassessing chronologies and examining the diversity of indigenous behavior from late preconquest to historic times. Indigenous adaptations to culture contact and social change are characterized by three general stages: conquest, colonization, and independence. Although I do draw on other regions, the focus of the article is the Maya area and Central America, where more investigations have taken place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Geographers have led the effort to better understand Prehispanic, intensive wetland agriculture ("raised fields") in Mesoamerica. An overview of that literature provides the database for a subsequent spatial-temporal analysis and a resource for primary research. The analysis employs maps to identify changing relationships among distribution, hectareage, and morphometry in order to address wetland agriculture's role in the emergence of sedentism, urbanism, statism, and corollary environmental change; its interrelationships with other agroecosystems and ecological parameters; and its productivity and sustainability. The result is a modest benchmark in the research process which identifies significant variables, putative patterns, and several testable hypotheses, namely 1) that wherever social processes elicited dense population nucleations and hydrology was appropriate, farmers built wetland fields; 2) that the emergence of intensive wetland agriculture was ecologically interrelated with terracing, canal irrigation, and extensive agroecosystems; 3) that morphometric variation among wetland fields reflected contextual variables of hydrology, population density, taxation, and centralization of decision making; and 4) that intensive wetland agriculture in Mesoamerica was a productive and sustainable agroecosystem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]