Sistema Regional de Información
en línea para Revistas Científicas de América Latina,
el Caribe, España y Portugal

The Sierra Nevada of Santa Marta (SNSM) is an area of great socio-cultural and biophysical complexity, which can be seen in its concrete agricultural practices, such as coffee growing.  These are a product of socio-political processes, transnational economies, and technoscientific interventions.  In this article, the sociomaterial relations that are found between different human and non-human actors that participate in the processes of technological transfer for the production of coffee that was made possible by the National Federation of Colombian Coffee Growers and the coffee growers of the SNSM of the Palmor and Rio Piedras areas of Magdalena, Colombia was studied. Connections formed due to cultural, social, agricultural, political technoscientific and economic relationships that constantly reconfigure the production of coffee and the coffee farm were documented. The focus guiding this article is framed in social and cultural studies of science and technology in which the social appropriation of science and technology (SAS&T) can be understood as a process of meeting, dialogue, negotiation and reconfiguration of knowledge and practices of coffee growing in which a heterogenous group of human and non-human actors, as well as sociotechnical processes and devices play important roles.  A methodology including ethnography and document review was used that permitted the exploration of aspects of the history of the conformation of these areas since the 19th century, the production of coffee, and the ways in which coffee growers have negotiated and appropriated knowledge and practices that are important for coffee growing.  As a result, it has become apparent that in the processes of transfer of new technologies, there are many human (coffee growers, extension workers) and non-human actors (seeds, plants, tools, soil analysis) that participate.  This implies that there are diverse negotiation processes that are expressed in the plurality of ways that technology is appropriated on the part of the coffee growers with respect to political (internal conflicts), economic (crisis), and ecological (environmental alteration) aspects.  In conclusion, it is proposed that transfer and appropriation should not be understood in terms of the generation of final products that are adopted by non-experts users, but rather as elements and dialogue spaces for the negotiation of reality in socially and politically heterogenous contexts.  Likewise, SAS&T is not the ultimate goal of scientific development, but rather a strategy that can be used with the different actors to evaluate the implications of assuming techno-scientific knowledge and technologies, as well as to avoid epistemic homogenization by highlighting the diverse conditions and histories that characterize coffee growing and its actors.

The transition from subsistence economy to political economy has been recognized as one of the main transformations leading to the emergence of social complexity. The development of intensive agricultural strategies was critical for surplus accumulation as a first necessary step for the emergence of regional hierarchies. Landscapes are one of the main evidence archaeologists have used to demonstrate the relationship between agriculture and the emergence of social inequality worldwide. The construction of terraces, raised fields, and other kinds of facilities for cultivation, has been related by the archaeologists to the processes of economic intensification and the emergence of centralized political organization. This paper aims to present a discussion of several archaeological models in which the construction of structures for the production of food surpluses was critical for the emergence of social inequality. To achive this goal, a comparative analysis is presented here based on the archaeological record of the complex societies from the Calima region and the Llanos of Casanare (Colombia); the Black Warrior Valley (Mississippi) in the southeast of North America; and from the Llanos of Moxos (Bolivia), the Marajo Island (Brasil), the Yaguachi region (Ecuador) and the Llanos of Barinas (Venezuela). The main argument of this paper is that just as there were many different pathways to social change in the past, there were also different trajectories of agricultural change that could be related to the emergence of inequality and social complexity.   Keywords: Agricultural change, complex societies, landscape archaeology.

The description of strengths and weaknesses in the evolution of territorial ordering norms in Colombia, the critical analysis of the determinants in the formulation and execution experience of the POT (land management plans), and the explanation of which of them should be priority guidelines to guide a new process of formulation of these instruments, reveal that although the management of natural disaster risk is a guideline to guide the process, it survives a legal and institutional imbalance in the correlation that must have with the territorial ordering, resettlement and relocation. From a documentary research based on the qualitative research model and legal dogmatic approach, this paper develops the reasons for regulating the subject in a country overwhelmed by the overproduction of standards, since the absence of legislation maintains a legal vacuum which facilitates threat and violation of human rights. It is because of this that the need to legislate resettlement and relocation processes generated by natural events is based on the commitments acquired by Colombia through the recognition of international instruments,  some jurisprudential precedents that determine the scope of a legislative initiative,  the main national provisions that contribute to the legislative development of the resettlement and relocation processes, and  some shortcomings of recent national policies about climate change and risk management that account for the urgency of legislatively promoting guarantees and procedures that affect their modification.

In this research is proposed a method of study based on the information provided by the historical cartography in the area of the Bay of Cádiz (Spain), which is established on the study of maritime cultures from a holistic approach based on the concept of maritime cultural landscape formulated for the first time by Christer Westerdahl. This method has allowed us to study the evolution of each factor that make up the maritime landscape of the Bay, such as the physical-natural component of the landscape, as well as elements directly linked to the development of human activities in the maritime field, or elements that highlight the characteristic idiosyncrasy of a coastal community. The cartography, progressively, has been established as one of the sources of documentation of great importance for studies of such characteristics, while these conditioned, with an interdisciplinary and integrating perspective with the objective of knowing in all the points of view of the relation between man and  sea.

The article studies the coffee economy of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta and Serrania de Perijá, as well as the business activities that emerged around this activity, from the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 21st century. The study shows the origins of coffee growing in the Colombian Caribbean, highlighting three haciendas and several pioneers of regional coffee. A considerable part of that colonization started in the late nineteenth century in the Sierra Nevada and Serrania de Perijá, was advanced by foreign businessmen and families, located mostly on the northern slope of the Sierra Nevada. Plantations such as Jirocasaca, La Victoria and Cincinnati are studied in this article with some depth, as well as some pioneers of cultivation such as Pedro Cothinet, Joaquín de Mier, Francois Dangond, Orlando Flye and the Opdenbosch and Weber families. The cases studied in this article are framed within the theoretical postulates of business history and entrepreneurial history, which have their origin in the 1920s in the universities of the United States.   Keywords: Coffee, Coffee Businessmen, Coffee plantations, Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Serrania de Perijá

The ABCA1 gene plays an important role in the extraction of intracellular cholesterol for the formation of the HDL cholesterol. The ABCA1*230Cys allele variant of this gene (polymorphism rs9282541) has been consistently associated with alterations in blood lipid levels. This variant has been observed in maximum frequencies of 33% only in Native Americans and mestizo populations descended from these. This is the reason why it is considered a genetic marker of Amerindian origin. It has not been identified in populations studied in Europe, Asia or Africa. The highest frequencies are shown in Central America, with a decrease toward the extreme north and south of the continent. There are no studies of the rs9282541 polymorphism in Venezuela, therefore it has not been possible to make comparisons with groups from the rest of the continent. With this interest, the objective of this research was to identify the frequency of ABCA1*230Cys in the warao of the Orinoco delta (Delta Amacuro state, Venezuela, N=115), and compare through genetic distances with reports from other American groups. This information is useful to the discussion about its genetic origin. The allele frequency was 13.05%, intermediate value in relation to that reported for other indigenous groups. The genetic distance between warao and the rest of the Amerindian populations establishing similarities with populations of proto-chibchan origin and other hunter-gatherers from the northern Amazon of different linguistic origin. The presence of this Amerindian variant originated in Central America establishes a remote connection with native groups from that region. These results show the importance of such studies integrating genetic and historical data to improve the level of discussion about the origin of Native American populations, also they give value to the usefulness of ABCA1*230Cys variant in other to establish genetic links between populations of interest. This is the first report of the rs9282541 polymorphism of the ABCA1 gene for Venezuelan indigenous populations.

The aim of the present work is to deepen the study of the mortuary practices in the south coast of the mar chiquita lagoon and adjacent plains from the exhaustive analysis of the local bioarchaeological record of the last 4000 years which counts with absolute chronological and cultural information useful to contextualize the findings. It is interesting to highlight changes and continuities, taking into account the modalities of burials, the disposition of the bodies and their distribution across the landscape, considering the chronology of the samples, the biological composition of the sample, the age and sex. Prevalences were calculated for different variables that allow describing the mortuary practices, and the chi-square test was applied to evaluate the statistical significance of the differences observed. While there are continuities that may reflect the survival of certain practices, some subtleties regarding the orientation of the bodies or the position of the lower or upper limbs could indicate some changes regarding the social organization of these groups, with short term rituals which did not require relocation of the dead.

The general objective of this article is to identify and reflet on the type of leadership exercised by five university rectors women in Mexico, through the analysis of journalistic discourse, based on the paradigm of transformational / transactional leadership, the typology with a gender perspective approach proposed by Burín (traditional, transactional and innovative), part of the analysis model of journalistic discourse proposed by Gutiérrez-Vidrio and three categories of stylistic analysis proposed by Prieto-Castillo. Among the results, the categories of coincidences and specificities were highlighted. The speech of three rectors is highlighted since it is inscribed in the transformational and / or innovative model, signified by the breakdown of traditional schemes and a strong presence of three variables: inspirational, ethical and vision of the future. On the other hand, the speech of two rectors can be framed in a leadership called "transition" from the known and accepted to the current. To exercise the position of rector means, for them, a continuum of the role assigned to women from long ago: to be at the service of others. The academic environment would be the terrain where "family culture" is incorporated. However, this singularity makes it clear that none of the five, specifically the last two rectors mentioned, follow the traditional scheme yet, since the academic environment in which they operate has facets that establish the difference within the family environment itself. The theoretical model assumed for the analysis of the discourse was relevant since it helped identifying the typology of the leadership and to reflect on the traditional scheme assigned to women and explained by the approach of the gender perspective. A broader corpus and the integration of more variables would deepen the type of leadership exercised or exercised by the rectors in Mexico.

The main purpose of this work is to study the secular variation in stature of Late Holocene human populations that inhabited the centre of Argentina. It is expected to find a variation in height and a decrease in sexual dimorphism throughout the Holocene, associated with changes in lifestyle and subsistence practices, related to the transition from hunting and gathering lifestyle to a mixed economy, that complement hunt and gatherer with de food production. The sample is composed of 42 individuals (18 females, 24 males), all with associated radiocarbon information through AMS that places them between 4058-387 14C years BP. The results show high average statures for females (163.4 cm for the femur) and medium for men (168.3 cm for the femur). Contrary to the initial expectations, an increase in sexual dimorphism over time is suggested, as a result of a negative secular tendency in women and with a slight increase tendency in height among men. The observed trends, in different regions and by sex, can not be explained according to a single explanatory factor. Rather, the conjunction of environmental and genetic causes may intervene in the processes that model the size of individuals, over time.

The Chenque I site is a hunter-gatherer’s cemetery located in the center-south area of La Pampa province (Argentina), whose range of use is 1050 to 290 years BP. It presents various forms of burial with an MNI of 236 and various body treatments. This represents an unusual diversity of mortuary practices during the final late Holocene in the Pampean region. However, there was only one secondary burial recorded, Burial N° 28, with evidence of thermal alteration in human osteological remains. In this paper we analyze the implications of the thermal alteration of the bodies through the analysis of the macroscopic bony characteristics and the archaeological context of the Burial N° 28. The results indicate that the process of thermo alteration of human remains was complex and intentional, and would have been carried out in different stages that include combustion in another space (other than burial), the collection of the remains, the assembly of the funeral bundle, their transfer and the final deposit at Chenque I site.