• Poverty and black market in organs
The New York Times reported on the rise in human organ trafficking in eastern Europe as being related to economic stress in the region. It mentioned the work of Nancy Scheper-Hughes, professor anthropology at the University of California at Berkeley, and founder of Organ Watch.

• U.S. middle class stuff
The New York Times carried an article about the U.S. middle class and possessions. It draws on a study conducted from 2001 to 2005 of 32 middle-class families in Los Angeles, led by the U.C.L.A. Center on the Everyday Lives of Families. The article includes an interview with Anthony Graesch, assistant professor of anthropology at Connecticut College, who was a graduate student when the study was conducted. The households in the study are all dual-earner households in a range of ethnic groups, neighborhoods, incomes and occupations, with at least two children. Findings are presented in a book coming out this week, called Life at Home in the 21st Century, by Graesch and co-authors Jeanne Arnold, Enzo Ragazzini, and Elinor Ochs. One finding is that women’s stress-hormone levels spiked when confronted with family clutter more than men’s. And another: there is a direct relationship between the number of magnets on the refrigerator and the amount of stuff in a household. [Blogger’s note: my house is overloaded with stuff including books, wall art, pottery, and countless odds and ends collected/accumulated over decades; however, not a single fridge magnet…my lovely stainless-steel looking fridge does not allow magnets to adhere!].

• Visual anthropologist at work
The Jakarta Post provides an interview of Yogyakarta-based anthropologist Muhammad Zamzam Fauzani. For him, movies are an effective tool to promote positive social change. Zamzam attended Gadjah Mada University, then received a Ford Foundation scholarship for a Master’s degree at the University of Manchester. Zamzam said he chose Manchester because he regarded the city as the starting point for social revolution in the world. Zamzam returned to Yogyakarta to put the theories he learned at university into practice. Together with his longtime anthropologist friend, Dian Herdiany, he founded Kampung Halaman, Indonesia’s Youth Community Media in 2006. The organization aims to empower the younger generation in the use of media. Now a doctoral candidate in a Dutch university, he hopes to continuously ignite positive change in society as an anthropologist and researcher who works with visual media. So far, he has won many awards, including the prestigious U.S. National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Award, which was handed to him directly by First Lady Michelle Obama at the White House in 2011. In 2012, he won the Young Researcher Award from the Indonesian Academy of Sciences.

• Landmark lecture in Lagos
Sandra Barnes,  Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania, delivered a public lecture in Lagos, organized by the Obafemi Awolowo Institute of Government and Public Policy in collaboration with the Lagos State University. The lecture was on Mushin in Lagos: The Past and the Present. Serving and former governors, traditional rulers, local government officials, academics, students and Lagosians were expected to attend the lecture. Professor Barnes has deep and extensive Nigerian experience, beginning with her prize-winning 1986 book, Patrons and Power: Creating a Political Community in Metropolitan Lagos.

• Take that anthro degree and…
…become a latent fingerprint analyst. Lauren Zephro, who just earned a doctorate in anthropology from the University of California at Santa Cruz, has worked as the latent fingerprint examiner for the Sheriff’s Office of San Jose, California, since 2008. Her dissertation, “Determining the Timing and Mechanism of Bone Fracture,” tackled some forensic techniques that she felt could be improved. She earned a B.A. in anthropology from the University of California at Santa Cruz and an M.A. in anthropology from the University of Tennessee at Knoxville.

Continue reading “Anthro in the news 07/02/12” →

• Global migration and remittances not in crisis
The Ghanaian Chronicle reviewed a new book on migration and remittances, published by the World Bank, on the effects of the global financial crisis of 2008-2009. Findings are that migrant workers are not streaming back home, despite worsening employment prospects and anti-immigration rhetoric in some destination countries. The book is co-edited by Dilip Ratha, Manager of the Bank’s Migration and Remittances Unit, Ibrahim Sirkeci, professor of Transnational Studies and Marketing at Regent’s College, London, and Jeffrey Cohen, associate professor of anthropology at Ohio State University. Cohen is also co-author of the book’s first chapter on remittance flows and practices during the crisis.

• Asian immigration to the U.S. rising
A study from the Pew Research Center shows that Asian Americans are now the United States’ fastest-growing ethnic group, overtaking Latinos. Asian Americans are also the country’s best educated and highest-income ethnic group. The Pew study combines recent census and economic data with an extensive, nationally representative survey of 3,500 Asian Americans. An article in the Los Angeles Times discussing the study quotes Tritia Toyota, a former Los Angeles television reporter who is now an adjunct professor of anthropology and Asian studies at UCLA: “This really opens up a conversation and sheds light on a community that is extremely heterogeneous and very complex.”

• Ethnocentrism and University of Virginia leadership
Paul Stoller, professor of anthropology at West Chester University in Pennsylvania, published an article in the Huffington Post linking the recent firing of University of Virginia President Teresa Sullivan to what anthropologists call ethnocentrism: “It is a clear example of how ethnocentric thinking produces devastating social, political and educational results. Most anthropologists say that you are ethnocentric when you use your own set of rules, procedures and beliefs to make judgments about other people who don’t share your view of the world.” Stoller goes on to explain his perspective on two kinds of ethnocentrism: (1) “my way or the highway” ethnocentrism which says: I more powerful than you, so you have to do things my way; and (2) “if only they’d leave me alone” ethnocentrism which works with this logic: I know you have more power (money, arms, influence) than I do, but I am morally superior to you, which means that I’ll just have to learn to live with your incredibly stupid life ways. Read his article and find out which variety applies to the University of Virginia situation.

• Take that anthropology degree and…
…become an online entrepreneur connecting services with people seeking services. With Spain’s crisis deepening, its citizens are not waiting for its institutions and leaders to deliver a recovery. They are turning to cooperative economic models: bartering, professional exchanges, ethical banking, and crowdfunding. Nurya Lafuente found her niche here. In 2008, with a degree in social education and anthropology, she could find no work. So she created an online company called Yo Voy (which translates to “I go”). Hundreds of people contact her and tell her what service they can offer, and she connects them with people who need that service. She charges an hourly wage for the time it takes her to make the connection or to do the work herself: filing immigration papers, paying a traffic fine, or organizing a party. She says, “I don’t know how to do anything, but I know where to find everything…I specialize in making things work for others.”

• Stonehenge the United Nations of its times
After 10 years of archaeological investigations, researchers conclude that Stonehenge was built as a monument to unify the peoples of Britain, following a long period of conflict and regional difference between eastern and western Britain. Its stones are thought to have symbolized the ancestors of different groups of earliest farming communities in Britain, with some stones coming from southern England and others from west Wales. The research teams, from the universities of Sheffield, Manchester, Southampton, Bournemouth and University College London, all working on the Stonehenge Riverside Project (SRP), explored not just Stonehenge and its landscape but also the wider social and economic context of the monument’s main stages of construction around 3,000 BC and 2,500 BC.

Continue reading “Anthro in the news 6/25/12” →

• Being a citizen anthropologist
In an essay in the Huffington Post, Julia Hammett described her involvement in the Occupy movement in Reno, Nevada, and her role as a citizen anthropologist: “I have been an Occupier in Occupy Reno (OR) since it began last October. Many view Occupy as a youth movement, with Occupy Wall Street (OWS) as its epicenter, because of the financial meltdown; but its traditions are deep-rooted in human history, and Occupiers target social injustice worldwide. Each occupation acts independently according to its own governing processes, yet Occupiers are interconnected through social networking…” Hammett is a professor of anthropology at Truckee Meadows Community College in Reno. She earned her M.A. and Ph.D. at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill and has conducted research in four regions of North America: California, the Great Basin, the Southeastern United States, and the American Southwest. Her research combines ecological, archaeological and historical data to analyze landscapes and land use patterns

• What is anthropology?
S.L. Malik, head of the anthropology department at Delhi University, published an article in The Hindustan Times describing the scope of anthropology.

• It’s getting older all the time: European cave art
An international team led by Alistair W. G. Pike of the University of Bristol has determined that the red disk in the cave known as El Castillo, Spain, is at least 40,800 years old. That makes it the earliest cave art in Europe, 4,000 years older than the paintings at Chauvet, France. In a report published online in the journal Science, Pike and his colleagues noted that the El Castillo art is “nonfigurative and monochrome (red), supporting the notion that the earliest expression of art in Western Europe was less concerned with animal depiction and characterized by red dots, disks, line and hand stencils.” [Blogger’s note: the new/older dates prompt serious rethinking of the accepted narrative of the winner modern humans arriving in Europe (very smart, great tools) versus the loser Neanderthals (not so smart, not such great tools) who supposedly succumbed in the face of the smarter incomers…but…maybe not such a simple takeover story?].

• Baby talk the gorilla way
Mother gorillas use “baby talk” in their facial and hand gestures when communicating with their infants, according to Eva Maria Luef of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, She filmed 120 hours of footage of gorillas at the Leipzig Zoo and two wild animal parks in Britain. The footage shows that adult female gorillas use more tactile gestures when playing with infants than they use with other adults, suggesting that “…older animals possess a certain awareness of the infants’ immature communication skills.” The research has been published in the American Journal of Primatology.

• Bonobo genome mapped, and so?
The media hopped on the news that scientists have now mapped bonobo DNA. According to a report from MSNBC, findings indicate what we already knew: modern humans (us) “are as close genetically to the peace-loving but little-known bonobo as we are to the more violent and better understood chimpanzee.” The study, published in the journal Nature, says that bonobos and chimpanzees share 99.6 percent of their genomes. Yet bonobos and chimps have distinctly different behaviors. Bonobos display what might be thought of as our better angels, said Duke University anthropologist Brian Hare. [Blogger’s note: I am sure there is a lot missing here in the msnbc coverage, and other mainstream media coverage, in terms of the bonobo genome…and what it might mean for human evolution].

• Excuse me, are you a woman?
Some female athletes who will be competing at the Olympic Games this summer are undergoing treatment to make them less masculine. Others are being secretly investigated for “displaying overly manly characteristics.” Sport’s medical officials are attempting to quantify and regulate the hormonal difference between male and female athletes. Caster Semenya, the South African runner who was so fast and muscular that many suspected she was a man, hit the news three years ago. Now similar cases are emerging all over the world. Semenya, banned from competition for 11 months while authorities investigated her gender, is back, vying for gold. She and other women like her face a complex question: Does a female athlete whose body naturally produces unusually high levels of male hormones, allowing them to put on more muscle mass, have an “unfair” advantage? In a move critics call “policing femininity,” recent rule changes by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), state that for a woman to compete, her testosterone must not exceed the male threshold. In South Africa, ground zero of the debate, about 1 per cent of the population are born “intersex.” Semenya, who remains the unwilling poster girl for the issue, says: “I have been subjected to unwarranted and invasive scrutiny of the most intimate and private details of my being.” Elaine Salo, anthropology professor at the University of Pretoria who has a poster of Semenya on her office door, says: “She’s truly a hero and a leader and a role model in this country. I don’t think we celebrate her enough…What is athletics if not the ability of the biological body to extend itself?”

• Progress for Chagos dawning at Downing Street?
The U.K. has a great opportunity based on realpolitik and human rights to restore the Chagos archipelago to its rightful owners according to Sean Carey, regular anthropologyworks contributor, in an article in The Guardian. A recent meeting at 10 Downing Street may indicate hope for Chagos.

• French-Tuareg relations
An article that discusses French-Tuareg relations quotes from the blog, Bridges From Bamako, in which Bruce Whitehouse, an anthropologist at Lehigh University in the U.S., noted: “It’s certainly true that the Tuareg have a sympathetic following among the French and that rebel spokesmen have frequently appeared in the French media.” In a shock announcement on Saturday, May 26, the secular MNLA (National Movement for the Liberation of the Azawad) announced its merger with Ansar Dine, an al Qaeda-linked Islamist group, declaring that the two groups had agreed to turn northern Mali into an Islamist state. Days later, as analysts were attempting to study the implications of the new development, a top MNLA official emailed a statement that categorically rejected the organization’s merger with Ansar Dine due to differences over the two groups’ interpretations of sharia law… hours later representatives from both groups insisted their organizations were still bound by the May 26 in-principle agreement. “The situation has been changing almost every minute; it’s very dynamic,” said Jeremy Keenan, a professorial research associate and cultural anthropologist at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. According to Keenan, the real question is: “In the beginning, we were hearing that the MNLA controlled between 2,000 and 3,000 men returning from Libya, whereas Ansar Dine had only about 100 to 200 fighters. So, where are the MNLA’s great, battle-hardened fighters?” The question has to do with a region the size of France, where various groups control different areas within a city. The question remains: does the MNLA have Islamist or al Qaeda links?

• The importance of baskets
The Sequim Gazette of western Washington state highlighted a new book on baskets of the Olympic Peninsula with focus on the culture and artistic abilities of local American Indian tribes. Cultural anthropologist Jacilee Wray of Olympic National Park hopes readers will gain a new appreciation for basketry and the local craftsmen who have created baskets for centuries through her book, From the Hands of a Weaver: Olympic Basketry through Time. She has worked for years compiling it with help from researchers and tribal basket makers to explore the history and how-to-process of baskets within the Elwha Klallam, Jamestown S’Klallam, Port Gamble S’Klallam, Skokomish (Twana), Quinault, Hoh, Quileute and Makah tribes.

Continue reading “Anthro in the news 6/11/12” →

• Nuclear militarism: Review of Nuclear Savage
Barbara Rose Johnston reviewed the film Nuclear Savage in CounterPunch, launching her comments with a question to the reader about how to make sense of recent nuclear news about toxicity in Japan. Some extracts: “… Nuclear Savage: The Islands of Secret Project 4.1 is a poignant, provocative, and deeply troubling look at lingering and lasting effects of nuclear disaster and the human consequences of US government efforts to define, contain, and control public awareness and concern. Nuclear Savage recounts the experiences of the Marshallese nation in the years following World War II, as they played host to the US’s Pacific Proving Grounds and served as human subjects in the classified, abusive pseudoscience that characterized the US government medical response to civilian exposures from the 1954 Bravo Test, the largest and dirtiest hydrogen bomb detonated by the United States…in the populated nation of the Marshall Islands.” And… “It is this story of human subject experimentation with unwitting subjects that forms the core of the Nuclear Savage film, illustrating both the abusive disregard and human consequences of experiments that violate US law, the Nuremburg Code, and Article 7 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights which states that ‘no one shall be subject without his free consent to medical or scientific experimentation.'” Barbara Rose Johnston is a cultural anthropologist and senior research fellow at the Center for Political Ecology. She is currently assisting to document the human rights consequences of nuclear militarism in the Marshall Islands, and supporting advocacy efforts to bring Marshallese citizens to Geneva so their voices can be heard.

• Remembering Mabo
It has been 20 years since Australia’s High Court “Mabo decision” which overturned the doctrine that the land belonged to no one before white settlement. Native title groups are still struggling and many indigenous groups lack the tools to benefit when their claims for native title of their lands are recognized. Toni Bauman, an anthropologist and co-editor of a book to be launched at the upcoming anniversary celebration, says that while groups have done very well out of agreements, many “are really, really struggling.”

• Michigan’s Abu Ghraib?
Brian McKenna, assistant professor at the University of Michigan at Dearborn, published an article in CounterPunch describing his experiences teaching introductory anthropology in a women’s prison in Michigan. He says, “Every prison has a story. We need prison stories (investigative journalism) for every town in America. And we need more prison teachers.”

• More cultural anthropologists needed in T&T
An article in The Trinidad Express notes a major gap between the “uniqueness and potential for Trinidad and Tobago to become a well known area of study and role model for other nations” and the lack of cultural anthropologists to “uncover, record and preserve our national heritage.” Further, the image of anthropology as useful needs to be promoted: “Anthropology as a discipline is scorned and in my own experience includes blank stares and mutterings about ‘a waste of time’. It is definitely not a waste of time to understand where we came from, why we are the way we are and where we are going.” [Blogger’s note: the author of this article is not an anthropologist but is an MSc candidate in International Relations at the London School of Economics.]

• Social capital in spaghetti dinners
The Superior Telegram carried an article about an anthropologist’s focus on “ubiquitous spaghetti dinners” in the Northland in her class on Community Anthropology. Deb Augsburger, assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Superior, noticed how many social benefits involved spaghetti dinners, so she decided to use it as an example in her classes: “…these meals that are very important…they mean a lot, they have a lot of symbolism…and they’re forms of social interaction and support.”

Continue reading “Anthro in the news 6/4/12” →

• “We” are not normal
According to a new study, hunter-gatherer and horticultural populations have significantly lower age-related increases in blood pressure and less risks of atherosclerosis than “modern” populations. Researchers followed 2,296 indigenous adults in 82 Tsimane (pron: see-mah-nay) villages in Bolivia’s Amazon lowlands. An article in the Wall Street Journal quotes Michael Gurven, study author and anthropology professor and chairman of the University of California-Santa Barbara’s Integrative Anthropological Sciences Unit, as saying: “Surprisingly, heart disease and stroke aren’t necessarily inevitable with age.”  The research indicates that lifestyle factors of the Tsimane include substantial physical activity and lots of fruits and vegetables in the diet, both of which protect them from what the article refers to as “normal aging phenomena, high blood pressure and hardening of the arteries.” [Blogger’s note: it’s disheartening and scary that so many people still take “us” moderns as the “norm”…let’s hope that being studied and otherwise connected to “us” doesn’t damage the Tsimane’s health.]

• Film series on global mental illness
“Afflictions: Culture & Mental Illness in Indonesia” is the first film series to look at mental illness in the developing world. It is an award-winning compilation of six films about the lives of men, women and children living with schizophrenia, bi-polar disorder, anti-social personality disorder and Tourette’s syndrome in Bali and Java. Directed by anthropologist and documentary filmmaker Dr. Robert Lemelson, “Afflictions” is screening as an official selection at conferences and festivals worldwide and is available for purchase at Amazon. See article.

• Co-sleeping in question
The Huffington Post carried an essay by Rickey Bower, former fire fighter and current health care consultant, with a B.A. in Anthropology from Marquette University and pursuing graduate education. Bower was inspired by the recent cover of TIME showing a woman breast-feeding her 3-year-old son, President Obama’s recent statement that same-sex marriages do not weaken families, and Gia M. Hamilton’s blog about being a single parent. Bower takes the discussion forward by examining parent-child co-sleeping practices in America. Continue reading “Anthro in the news 5/28/12” →

• Goodby Dartmouth
The Huffington Post carried an article about a speech by World Bank President-Elect Jim Yong Kim at the Chicago Dartmouth Club, on May 9, where he stated that it was “incredibly painful” for him to step down after barely three years as the Ivy League’s first Asian-American college president. He becomes World Bank Group President July first. Dr. Kim is a physician, public health activist, and cultural anthropologist.

• Hello anthropology
The Chronicle for Higher Education included an article (closed access) about Glenn Petersen, professor of anthropology at Baruch College. He is quoted as saying, “I had no idea, as my plane dodged antiaircraft fire in the skies above the Tonkin Gulf, that our aircraft carrier’s voyage home would bring me a much greater and more meaningful adventure. I have long understood that my time in Vietnam was the backdrop for my career in anthropology, and that it was the tropical islands I encountered on that trans-Pacific trip home that inspired me to choose the field.

• Family matters: parenting while single
The Huffington Post carried an article by Gia M. Hamilton, an applied and visual anthropologist on single parenthood. She says, “It is not enough that I am bold enough to bring a child into this chaotic world, but three, well now that’s just downright obscene. I will add that more than eyebrows raise when I talk about possibly having more… “Children?” I am asked. My response is always the same, “Why yes, of course, I love being a parent… it’s the hardest most rewarding job I’ve ever had and I do it for free!” Hamilton, a native of New Orleans, is the founding director of Gris Gris Lab, Inc., a holistic consulting group and creativity lab that explores issues of community building and sustainability through art and culture, education, urban agriculture, urban planning and the intersection of these industries in areas across the United States. For the past thirteen years she has applied her training by re-organizing niche community groups using Social Magic, a process developed to assess, engage and facilitate change. “Social Magic, put simply is the ability of the community to effectively utilize and leverage the resources and assets already present.” Her most recent projects as the ethnographer and curator of The Black Boy Experiment include an in depth cross cultural and multidisciplinary study and visual analysis of the childhood differences of black male youth. Hamilton studied cultural anthropology at New York University and Applied Anthropology at CUNY Graduate Center. She and her Social Magicians can be reached by email at gia@grisgrislab.com or follow her on twitter @grisgrislab. Continue reading “Anthro in the news 5/21/12” →