Independent instances of "souvenir" Asian skulls from the Tampa Bay area

In the summer of 1984, police in Pinellas County, Florida, confiscated six identically colored imported Asian skulls (in a shipping case) from a private citizen. In May 1988, in nearby Hillsborough County, police confiscated a very similar skull from another private citizen, who allegedly had found it in an abandoned house. Aside from slight color differences between the six found in Pinellas County and the one found in Hillsborough County, the skulls are virtually identical in their osteological characteristics and condition and in the vital statistics derived from each. Each skull is as clean and dry as those typically sold by commercial scientific supply outlets in the United States. Each is edentulous (primarily premortem), between approximately 20 and 60 years of age at death, and morphologically Asian. Five of the seven are morphologically male, one is morphologically female, and one is a mosaic with respect to gender-related features. Police, medical examiners, coroners, and forensic anthropologists should be aware of such "souvenir" specimens, in the event that they encounter similar skulls. Discriminant function analyses for race and sex yield considerably conflicting results, which underscores the need for using extreme caution when interpreting forensic science estimates based on such techniques.     

Transition from paper to paperless: DOD'S CALS system

When technology is transferred from one context to another, it is an established principle that innovation must take place. Even though a technology is well situated in one context, it must be adoptively redesigned for another. The sharper the difference in contexts, the greater the adaptation. This paper describes a program to transfer technology among a very diverse group of organizations: contractors to the US Department of Defense (DOD). Specifically, it describes how the technology of electronic communication, including electronic- data interchange (EDI), is being pursued by both the DOD and its supporters.     

Book reviews

Transcaucasian Boundaries John F. Wright, Suzanne Goldenberg and Richard Schofield (editors) London: UCL Press, 1996, 248pp, £40 and £14.95

The Russian Policy Debate on Central Asia Irina Zviagelskaia London: Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1995, X, 41 pp, £12.50

CIS Integration Trends: Russia and the Former Soviet South Mark Webber London: Royal Institute of International Affairs, 1997, IX, 72 pp, £12.50 Both distributed by Plimbridge Distributors Ltd, Estover Road, Plymouth. Devon PL6 7PZ, and in North America by the Brookings Institutional Press, Washington DC.

Russia and Azerbaijan: A Borderland in Transition Tadeusz Swietochowski New York: Columbia University Press, 1995, xvi, 290 pp, $34.95

The Soviet Socialist Republic of Iran, 1920–1921 Cosroe Chaqueri Pittsburgh, Pa: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1995, xvii, 649 pp, $75.00

Bibliography of Islamic Central Asia Yuri Bregel (editor and compiler) Bloomington, Indiana: Research Institute for Inner Asian Studies, Indiana University, 1995, in three volumes: Pt. I, LXXTV+773 pp; Pt. II, XLIII+774–1512 pp; Pt. III, XXXII+1513–2276 pp, $299

Mohieddin Alempour. A Tajik Visionary Baqer Moin (editor) London: BBC Persian Service, Bush House, 1997, illus, 140 pp, £20

Tatar Costume M. Zavyalova Kazan: Zaman Publishers Fund Turan, 1996, illus, 252 pp, $50     

Book reviews

Ash Amin and John Tomaney (eds), Behind the Myth of European Union: Prospects for Cohesion (Routledge, London, 1995), 334 pp., ISBN 0–415–13078–6 (pb)

Stephen Gundle and Simon Parker (eds), The New Italian Republic: Front the Fall of the Berlin Wall to Berlusconi (Routledge, London, 1996), 334 pp., ISBN 0–415–12161–2 (hb), 0–415–12162 (pb)

Donald Sassoon, One Hundred Years of Socialism: The West European Left in the Twentieth Century (I. B. Tauris, London, 1996), 965 pp., ISBN 1–85043–879‐X

Geoff Mulgan, Connexity: How to Live in a Connected World (Chatto & Windus, London, 1997), 280 pp., ISBN 0–7011–6396–8