ISIS – Page 2 – anthropologyworks

Managing the Himalayan Viagra harvest

The International Business Times carried an article about the harvesting of the plant in two isolated Tibetan communities that is the basis for Viagra. The medicinal fungus is fetching big money in the Chinese market. The fungus used as an aphrodisiac, yartsa gunbu (Ophiocordyceps sinensis) results from a fungal infection in ground-burrowing ghost moth caterpillars. Research from Washington University in St. Louis reports on the unique management plan to conserve the natural resource. Most villages in the region earn 80% of their annual income during the caterpillar fungus spring harvest season. Continue reading “Anthro in the news 11/10/14” →

Sunni-Shi’a war not likely

Cultural anthropologist William Beeman of the University of Minnesota wrote an article in Highbrow Magazine stating that the many factions among Sunnis and Shi’as in the Middle East will act to limit the possibility of an all-out war:

“The success of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in capturing large territories in Syria and Northern Iraq, and now threatening Baghdad, has raised once again the specter of a Sunni-Shi’a war in the Middle East. Such a scenario is possible, but unlikely. That’s because Sunni and Shi’a believers throughout the world are divided into many factions living under different social conditions and with different religious, social and political agendas. These differences greatly reduce the possibility of the emergence of a coalition of either group into a single bloc opposing the other.” Continue reading “Anthro in the news 6/24/14” →