France as terrorist target
ATTN (France) published an article documenting recent terrorist attacks in France along with commentary from cultural anthropologist John Bowen’s article in Time. January 8, 2015, following the Hebdo attack. Bowen, who teaches at Washington University in St. Louis, wrote that the causes of the many attacks in France are complex and include France’s longstanding connections with Islam and its large Muslim population which is 7.5 percent of the total.
Sickness and the city
The Financial Times reported on findings from a study led by researchers at University College London (UCL), which sheds light on why most diabetes sufferers live in cities. Risk factors include increased junk food consumption, lack of safe spaces for exercise, social isolation, and economic inequalities. The research was based on interviews with diabetics and those at risk of the disease in five cities: Copenhagen, Houston, Mexico City, Shanghai, and Tianjin. The goal is to develop policies to break the link between diabetes and urbanization. The article provides commentary from David Napier, professor of medical anthropology at UCL, who said that, by focusing on medical factors, traditional research has failed to capture “the social and cultural drivers” that made urban populations especially vulnerable to type 2 diabetes, the type often linked to obesity. Napier noted that policymakers and urban planners must come up with strategies to promote healthier living in cities to avoid accelerating the growth of diabetes and other chronic conditions such as heart disease and cancer.
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