Heads up! David Vine on C-SPAN this weekend

by Barbara Miller

In three C-SPAN airings this weekend, David Vine discusses his research on the presence of a US military base on the island of Diego Garcia in the Chagos Archipelago in the Indian Ocean. In his book, Island of Shame: The Secret History of the U.S. Military Base on Diego Garcia, Vine describes how the establishment of the base involved the forcible eviction of the 1500-2000 residents by the Americans and British in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The exiled Chagossians now live in poverty and social marginalization in Mauritius, the Seychelles, England, and elsewhere while the base on Diego Garcia continues to be important to US military efforts as a launch pad for aircraft used in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Vine’s research included interviews with many Chagossian refugees, and his book includes their voices. He also provides a critical review of “the bases of empire,” “the strategic island concept,” and the use of military secrecy. Near the end of the book, he offers his views on “what we must do” to redress the damage, prevent future harm, and enable the refugees to return to their homeland immediately.

David Vine is assistant professor of anthropology at American University and an advocate for the Chagossian movement for a right of return. His book has received wide coverage including a major article in the New York Review of Books and high praise for his meticulous research, clear exposure of the links between imperialism and racism, and unflinching stand for the rights of the refugees to return.

Photo, “Diego Garcia (very small island)”, from Flickr via Creative Commons.

Dr. Omar McDoom @ GW on Thursday

To all our readers in the D.C. area, Dr. Omar McDoom, lecturer of political science at the London School of Economics (and a GW Elliott School alum), will give a presentation as part of our Culture in Global Affairs Research and Policy program. Details below. Hope to see some of you there.

“Why They Killed: Security, Authority, and Opportunity in Rwanda’s Genocide”

Presented by Dr. Omar McDoom

Thursday, September 17, 7:00 – 8:30 p.m.

1957 E Street NW, Lindner Family Commons (6th Floor)

To RSVP, email grahamhc@gwu.edu

Are teens subconscious online racists?

Guest post by Chenkai Zhu

In a recent talk titled “The Not-So-Hidden Politics of Class Online,” Danah Boyd used ethnographic methods to study the ways American teenagers engage social media websites like MySpace and Facebook. Boyd suggested that when teens choose one social network over the other, they reveal as much about their own self image as their choice did about the demographics of the community.

Take a look at the comments Boyd records in the section titled “MySpace vs. Facebook,” which respond to her questions, “Do social networking choices have unintentionally racialized effects?” and “Do these choices accurately reflect race-based divisions in real life?” Many of the teens say their network-selection is based on practical, technical and aesthetic preferences, not racial or class-oriented ones.

But it seems to me that a person’s race, ethnicity and class surely shape her or his practical, technical, and aesthetic preferences. How could it be otherwise?

Boyd challenges us to recognize that our everyday practices on the internet – from the way we type to the layouts we prefer, even our sense of humor and aesthetic taste – separate us along racial and social lines from people we have never known, seen, or interacted with.

For me, the bottom line is: Are social networking choices political? Ethnographic methods, which can get beyond the surface of what people say about what they do and why they do it, often reveal patterns that may be subconscious. Ethnographic data can be a rude awakening, but it can reveal to us the unintended effects of our choices.

Chenkai Zhu is a junior at The George Washington University majoring in international affairs and Asian studies. She spent the summer of 2007 in Shaoxing, southern China, conducting ethnographic research on how tourism and urban development have affected residents of the city. Her research was funded by a Cotlow Award from GW’s Anthropology Department. She is currently interested in the ways Sino-Latin American relations can influence indigenous peoples in the Andes.

Photo, “My social network…,” via Flickr user luc legay, courtesy of Creative Commons.

Chimpanzees eat the ants, and we eat the chimpanzees

By Barbara Miller

Chimpanzees and other nonhuman primates possess a range of cultural skills that enhance their lives. Depending on the species and location, these learned and shared capabilities include nest building, tool use to access choice food items such as ants and honey, greetings including the “raised hand clasp,” food preparation such as washing an item before eating it, and use of a leaf by males after sex for wiping off their penis.

Crickette Sanz, a professor of primatology at Washington University in Saint Louis, has devoted years to studying wild chimpanzee populations in the Goualougo Triangle, Republic of Congo. She and her co-authors have recently published important new findings about a “tool set” that chimpanzees use to access and eat army ants. The chimpanzees in several different communities use a wooden tool made from a sapling to perforate the ant nest. Then they use the flexible stem of a particular herb as a “wand” for attracting the ants from their nest so that the chimpanzees can eat them.

The more primatologists study nonhuman primates in the wild, especially the great apes, the more evidence they produce about the richness of nonhuman primate culture. But theirs is a race against time. Or, more aptly, a race against us and the ravages of “civilization” and consumerism.

The authors note: “Further research is needed to determine the ecological and social factors shaping the diverse and complex tool technology of these apes. There is an immediate need to conduct this research, as the conservation status of Great Apes in the Congo Basin is jeopardized by mechanical logging, bushmeat hunting, and disease epidemics…” (p. 6). Destruction of the habitat is also having detrimental effects on the ant population, especially army ants.

Protecting the chimpanzees and ants for science is definitely important and rational from the point of view of science. But isn’t there a larger reason? Shouldn’t the habitats, chimpanzees, and even the ants be protected for their own sake? And what about the local people whose ancestors have long lived in the region? If science can provide some muscle for organizations that lobby for regional habitat protection, then that’s certainly a good thing. An image of David and Goliath comes to my mind, with science facing off against massive commercial interests and greedy governments. But, after all, the small guy won.

Sanz, and a co-author, David Morgan, provide some practical insight into the complicated and urgent questions of preservation in a report prepared for the IUCN/SSC Primate Specialist Group, titled Best Practice Guidelines for Reducing the Impact of Commercial Logging on Wild Apes in West Equatorial Africa (2007).

What can we do? Change our consumption practices to rely more on pre-used items and to rely more on less stuff in general. Support organizations that work to protect the habitats where great apes and other primates live, as well as the indigenous/local populations:

The Great Ape Trust

Survival International

Cultural Survival

Map of Goualougo Triangle by David Morgan. Photo by Crickette Sanz. Special thanks for permission to use their images.

Anthro in the news 8/19

Paul Farmer, trained as both a medical doctor and a cultural anthropologist, has been under consideration as the new director of the United States Agency for International Development. Check out the Congressional Quarterly coverage here and the Foreign Policy coverage here.
Ashraf Ghani, former anthropology professor at Johns Hopkins University and World Bank professional, is running for president of Afghanistan. Ghani — one of 40 challengers for the presidency this year — faced off in a debate Sunday against the incumbent Hamid Karzai and former planning minister Ramazan Bashardost, ahead of Thursday’s election.
Nancy Scheper-Hughes, professor of anthropology at the University of California at Berkeley, played a major role in exposing the organ trafficking ring with connections in New Jersey.
Michael Dove, professor of social ecology and anthropology at Yale University, published an op-ed in The New York Times exploring the possible effects on President Obama of his mother being a cultural anthropologist.