Mesoamerican urbanism revisited: Environmental change, adaptation, resilience, persistence, and collapse.

Urban adaptation to climate change is a global challenge requiring a broad response that can be informed by how urban societies in the past responded to environmental shocks. Yet, interdisciplinary efforts to leverage insights from the urban past have been stymied by disciplinary silos and entrenched misconceptions regarding the nature and diversity of premodern human settlements and institutions, especially in the case of prehispanic Mesoamerica. Long recognized as a distinct cultural region, prehispanic Mesoamerica was the setting for one of the world's original urbanization episodes despite the impediments to communication and resource extraction due to the lack of beasts of burden and wheeled transport, and the limited and relatively late use of metal implements. Our knowledge of prehispanic urbanism in Mesoamerica has been significantly enhanced over the past two decades due to significant advances in excavating, analyzing, and contextualizing archaeological materials. We now understand that Mesoamerican urbanism was as much a story about resilience and adaptation to environmental change as it was about collapse. Here we call for a dialogue among Mesoamerican urban archaeologists, sustainability scientists, and researchers interested in urban adaptation to climate change through a synthetic perspective on the organizational diversity of urbanism. Such a dialogue, seeking insights into what facilitates and hinders urban adaptation to environmental change, can be animated by shifting the long-held emphasis on failure and collapse to a more empirically grounded account of resilience and the factors that fostered adaptation and sustainability.

Shifts in the conflict-coexistence continuum: Exploring social-ecological determinants of human-elephant interactions.

In Morogoro Region of south-central Tanzania, loss of crops and safety concerns due to elephants compromises livelihoods in many rural communities relying on subsistence agriculture. Using a social-ecological system framework to examine conflict-coexistence between people and elephants, this paper explores drivers that influence human-elephant interaction and subsistence farmer attitudes towards elephants in 10 villages from three different districts. Surveys and interviews document experiences interacting with elephants along with direct and indirect costs incurred in sharing the landscape, revealing different tolerance levels by residents of subject communities towards elephants that have important implications for elephant conservation. Rather than uniformly negative beliefs about elephants, analyses reveal that over the past decade a shift has occurred from largely favorable to unfavorable. The variables influencing attitudes included amounts of crops lost to elephants, perceived benefits from elephants, amounts of crops lost to other causes, perceived trend of human-elephant conflict (HEC) in the past three decades and level of education. Villager tolerance varied by level of income, perception on how the community coexists with elephants, amounts of crops lost to elephants and compensation. The study contributes to understanding how HEC is affecting the relationship between people and elephants, revealing a shift in the conflict-coexistence continuum from positive to broadly negative and identifying characteristics underlying varying tolerance towards elephants in different communities. Rather than a static condition, HEC emerges under specific conditions at particular times and places through varying, uneven interactions between rural villagers and elephants. In communities vulnerable to food insecurity, such conflict exacerbates existing problems of poverty, social inequality, and feelings of oppression. Addressing the causes of HEC, when possible, will be essential to elephant conservation as well as to improving the wellbeing of rural villagers.

Mapping the planet's critical natural assets.

Sustaining the organisms, ecosystems and processes that underpin human wellbeing is necessary to achieve sustainable development. Here we define critical natural assets as the natural and semi-natural ecosystems that provide 90% of the total current magnitude of 14 types of nature's contributions to people (NCP), and we map the global locations of these critical natural assets at 2 km resolution. Critical natural assets for maintaining local-scale NCP (12 of the 14 NCP) account for 30% of total global land area and 24% of national territorial waters, while 44% of land area is required to also maintain two global-scale NCP (carbon storage and moisture recycling). These areas overlap substantially with cultural diversity (areas containing 96% of global languages) and biodiversity (covering area requirements for 73% of birds and 66% of mammals). At least 87% of the world's population live in the areas benefitting from critical natural assets for local-scale NCP, while only 16% live on the lands containing these assets. Many of the NCP mapped here are left out of international agreements focused on conserving species or mitigating climate change, yet this analysis shows that explicitly prioritizing critical natural assets and the NCP they provide could simultaneously advance development, climate and conservation goals.

Linguistic diversity and conservation opportunities at UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Africa.

Africa contains much of Earth's biological and cultural-linguistic diversity, but conserving this diversity is enormously challenging amid widespread poverty, expanding development, social unrest, and rapidly growing human population. We examined UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) Natural World Heritage Sites (WHSs) on continental Africa and nearby islands-48 protected areas containing globally important natural or combined natural and cultural resources-to gauge the potential for enlisting Indigenous peoples in their conservation. We used geographic information system technology to identify instances where Natural WHSs co-occur with Indigenous languages, a key indicator of cultural diversity. And, we compared the geographic ranges for 4 taxa and selected freshwater species with occurrence of all Indigenous languages within Natural WHSs and subsections of WHSs covered by the geographic extent of Indigenous languages to measure the correlation between linguistic and biological diversity. Results indicated that 147 languages shared at least part of their geographic extent with Natural WHSs. Instances of co-occurrence where a WHS, a language, or both were endangered marked localities particularly deserving conservation attention. We examined co-occurrence of all languages and all species, all languages and endangered species, and endangered languages and endangered species and found a correlation between linguistic and biological diversity that may indicate fundamental links between these very different measures of diversity. Considering only endangered species or endangered languages and species reduced that correlation, although considerable co-occurrence persisted. Shared governance of government-designated reserves is applicable for natural WHSs because it capitalizes on the apparent connection between culture and nature. Natural WHSs in Africa containing speakers of Indigenous languages present opportunities to conserve both nature and culture in highly visible settings where maintaining natural systems may rely on functioning Indigenous cultural systems and vice versa.

Diversidad Lingüística y Oportunidades de Conservación en los Sitios de Patrimonio Mundial UNESCO en África Resumen África contiene mucha de la diversidad biológica, cultural y lingüística de la Tierra, aunque conservar esta diversidad es un reto enorme debido a la pobreza extendida, el desarrollo en expansión, la inestabilidad social y el rápido crecimiento de la población humana. Examinamos los Sitios de Patrimonio Mundial (SPM) de la UNESCO (Organización de las Naciones Unidas para la Educación, Ciencia y Cultura) en África continental y en las islas aledañas-48 áreas protegidas que contienen recursos naturales o una combinación de recursos culturales y naturales de importancia mundial-para conocer el potencial para enlistar a los pueblos indígenas como parte de su conservación. Usamos tecnología de sistemas de información geográfica para identificar las instancias en donde coincidieron los SPM Naturales con los lenguajes indígenas, un indicador importante de la diversidad cultural. También comparamos la distribución geográfica de cuatro taxones y seleccionamos especies de agua dulce con incidencias en todos los idiomas indígenas dentro de los SPM Naturales y las subsecciones de los SPM para medir la correlación entre la diversidad biológica y la diversidad lingüística. Los resultados indicaron que 147 lenguajes comparten al menos una parte de su distribución geográfica con los SPM Naturales. Las instancias de coincidencia en donde un SPM, un lenguaje o ambos se encuentran en peligro marcaron a las localidades particularmente merecedoras de atención para su conservación. Analizamos la coincidencia de todos los lenguajes y todas las especies, todos los lenguajes y todas las especies en peligro, y los idiomas en peligro y las especies en peligro y encontramos una correlación entre la diversidad lingüística y la diversidad biológica que podría indicar conexiones fundamentales entre estas dos medidas muy diferentes de la diversidad. Cuando sólo se consideró a las especies en peligro o a los lenguajes en peligro y a las especies en peligro en conjunto, esa correlación se vio reducida, aunque persistió una coincidencia considerable. La administración compartida de las reservas designadas por el gobierno puede aplicarse a los SPM naturales porque capitaliza la conexión aparente entre la cultura y la naturaleza. Los SPM Naturales en África que incluyen a hablantes de lenguajes indígenas representan una oportunidad para conservar a la cultura y a la naturaleza en escenarios altamente visibles en donde mantener los sistemas naturales puede depender de los sistemas culturales indígenas funcionales y viceversa.

Co-occurrence of linguistic and biological diversity in biodiversity hotspots and high biodiversity wilderness areas.

As the world grows less biologically diverse, it is becoming less linguistically and culturally diverse as well. Biologists estimate annual loss of species at 1,000 times or more greater than historic rates, and linguists predict that 50-90% of the world's languages will disappear by the end of this century. Prior studies indicate similarities in the geographic arrangement of biological and linguistic diversity, although conclusions have often been constrained by use of data with limited spatial precision. Here we use greatly improved datasets to explore the co-occurrence of linguistic and biological diversity in regions containing many of the Earth's remaining species: biodiversity hotspots and high biodiversity wilderness areas. Results indicate that these regions often contain considerable linguistic diversity, accounting for 70% of all languages on Earth. Moreover, the languages involved are frequently unique (endemic) to particular regions, with many facing extinction. Likely reasons for co-occurrence of linguistic and biological diversity are complex and appear to vary among localities, although strong geographic concordance between biological and linguistic diversity in many areas argues for some form of functional connection. Languages in high biodiversity regions also often co-occur with one or more specific conservation priorities, here defined as endangered species and protected areas, marking particular localities important for maintaining both forms of diversity. The results reported in this article provide a starting point for focused research exploring the relationship between biological and linguistic-cultural diversity, and for developing integrated strategies designed to conserve species and languages in regions rich in both.

Agricultural capacity and conservation in high biodiversity forest ecosystems.

Agricultural development is a leading cause of habitat destruction that increasingly threatens global biodiversity. To help understand the likelihood and implications of agricultural expansion in areas of high conservation importance, this article examines agricultural suitability in forested portions of biodiversity hotspots and tropical wilderness areas, regions with especially rich concentrations of species found nowhere else. The study employs geographic information system technology to examine suitability for six crop categories in selected conservation localities worldwide: those portions of regions containing high biodiversity, protected areas (e.g. national parks) within these regions, and 10-km bands around the protected areas that are dominated by forest. Analyses reveal low suitability for most crop categories under both commercial and subsistence scenarios, with a few exceptions. In most cases, adequate planning can enable the coexistence of agriculture and biodiversity without compromising either.

Changing migration patterns in the Federated States of Micronesia.

"This article traces the changing role of migration in the Federated States of Micronesia during the twentieth century. We begin with a brief geographical, historical, and cultural overview of each state in the country, summarizing demographic change over the past 70 years and providing a foundation for understanding much of the area's past and present human mobility. Attention then turns to migration within the Federated States, focusing on data from censuses conducted in 1930, 1973, and 1980 and using supplemental information when possible. Emigration to destinations outside the country is examined briefly. Finally, we discuss potential causes and impacts of mobility in this emerging island nation."

Changing regional demography in the Federated States of Micronesia: contrasting planning challenges in an emerging Pacific nation.

"Island nations consisting of small landmasses separated by large expanses of ocean face particularly severe challenges in their quest for economic and social development. In this paper, planning concerns in one such nation, the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM), are examined. The study opens with a description of each of the four separate states in the FSM.... Regional aspects of FSM development are then examined by a statistical analysis of the geographical distribution of population in the individual states.... The study concludes with an assessment of the regional challenge of developing the FSM into an economically and culturally sustainable nation."