Recognition of this earlier occupational component has significant implications for regional settlement histories and cultural chronology. Subsequent treatments of central coast culture history (Jones and Hylkema 1988; Jones et al. 1989) have relied heavily upon data from this location to define the Middle Period. Recent discussion of early Holocene settlement along the central California coast has been forced, following the original conclusions on the dating of CA-MNT-229, to interpret an apparent absence of early coastal sites in the Monterey Bay area (Breschini and Haversat 1991a: 125 - 132). Breschini and Haversat suggested that this absence may be attributed either to sea-level rise (1991a: 127) or to the ruggedness of the Monterey Bay shoreline relative to more habitable inland terrain (1991a: 131). The early component now recognized at CA-MNT-229 supports recent findings from CA-SON-348/H (Schwaderer et al. 1990; Schwaderer 1992) and other sites, where the antiquity of human presence in the coastal zone of central California has been found to be substantially older than suggested by the corpus of previously available data. Since the original interpretation of the chronology of CA-MNT-229 has been questioned elsewhere (Jones and Hildebrandt 1990:73; Bouey and Basgall 1991:52), this paper is simply intended to set the record straight and present a revised assessment of the dating of this important site. The following discussion emphasizes those aspects of the excavation that bear on the dating of the site—radiocarbon, obsidian hydration, shell and glass beads, and flaked and ground stone artifacts. Descriptions of the rest of the material inventory recovered from this location are included in the original site reports (Dondero 1984; Dietz et al. 1986, 1988).
In “Another view of Trobriand kin categories,” Lounsbury analyzes Trobriand kin terms by providing a core genealogical definition for each term, and then showing how a set of reduction rules make it possible to supply terms for more distant relatives. This article revisits Lounsbury’s analysis in the light of recent advances in linguistics and cognitive science. We show that Trobriand kin terms express a conventionalized tradeoff between expressing relevant information and avoiding marked forms. Formally, we follow Optimality Theory in developing a constraint-based approach, an alternative to Lounsbury’s derivational approach, in which reduction rules are not just stipulated but derived. Kin terms are polysemous, with core and extended senses: a collection of markedness scales and a ranked set of distinctive features (1) marshal core referents of kin terms, and (2) select optimal, best-fit terms for kin types outside the core. Apart from its formal merits, this approach clarifies the connection between the Trobrianders’ Crow-type kin terminology and their matrilineal institutions. It may also have implications for the “the Crow-Omaha problem” – the relationship between skewed and unskewed cross-parallel distinctions. Finally, the organization of kin terms may provide a window onto an evolved domain of conceptual structure: our discussion concludes with some thoughts on the relationship between kinship, genealogy, and biological relatedness.