In this book, Hugh Richard Slotten explores the institutional and cultural history of science in the United States. The main focus of the book is an analysis of the activities of Alexander Dallas Bache--great grandson of Benjamin Franklin. Bache played a central role in the organization of a number of key scientific institutions, including the American Association for the Advancement of Science, The Smithsonian Institution, and the National Academy of Sciences. In the middle of the nineteenth century, Bache became the most important leader of the scientific community through his control of the United States Coast Survey, which he superintended from 1843 until his death in 1867. Under Bache's command, the Coast Survey became the central scientific institution in antebellum America. Using richly detailed archival records, Slotten pursues an analysis of Bache and the Coast Survey that illuminates important themes in the history of science in the United States, including the interrelationship among political culture, patterns of patronage, and the institutional practice of science in the United States.

Anthropologist Diane E. King has written about everyday life in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, which covers much of the area long known as Iraqi Kurdistan. Following the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's Ba'thist Iraqi government by the United States and its allies in 2003, Kurdistan became a recognized part of the federal Iraqi system. The Region is now integrated through technology, media, and migration to the rest of the world. Focusing on household life in Kurdistan's towns and villages, King explores the ways that residents connect socially, particularly through patron-client relationships and as people belonging to gendered categories. She emphasizes that patrilineages (male ancestral lines) seem well adapted to the Middle Eastern modern stage and viceversa. The idea of patrilineal descent influences the meaning of refuge-seeking and migration as well as how identity and place are understood, how women and men interact, and how "politicking" is conducted. In the new Kurdistan, old values may be maintained, reformulated, or questioned. King offers a sensitive interpretation of the challenges resulting from the intersection of tradition with modernity. Honor killings still occur when males believe their female relatives have dishonored their families, and female genital cutting endures. Yet, this is a region where modern technology has spread and seemingly everyone has a mobile phone. Households may have a startling combination of illiterate older women and educated young women. New ideas about citizenship coexist with older forms of patronage. King is one of the very few scholars who conducted research in Iraq under extremely difficult conditions during the Saddam Hussein regime. How she was able to work in the midst of danger and in the wake of genocide is woven throughout the stories she tells. Kurdistan on the Global Stage serves as a lesson in field research as well as a valuable ethnography.

This book traces the history of formative, enduring concepts, foundational in the development of the health disciplines. It explores existing literature, and subsequent contested applications. Feminist legacies are discussed with a clear message that early sociological and anthropological theories and debates remain valuable to scholars today. Chapters cover historical events and cultural practices from the standpoint of 'difference'; formulate theories about the emergence of social issues and problems and discuss health and illness in light of cultural values and practices, social conditions, embodiment and emotions. This collection will be of great value to scholars of biomedicine, health and gender.

Spanish popular culture is one of the richest in the world. The absence of an efficient ruling class has allowed the people to stamp their personality on all major aspects of the country's life. This book describes the peculiar Spanish feeling for death and tragedy in popular religious practices, music and the bullfight; the fiesta sense of life, so foreign to the work ethic of other Western countries; the oral tradition that has managed to survive into the post-industrial age with its creative use of slang, proverbs and obscenity; popular literature, the press, radio, television and the movies.

Students and scholars will appreciate the first comprehensive treatment of Spanish popular culture in a single volume. The author has done first-hand research in all the major regions of Spain and has compiled a list of major archives and resource centers. An extensive bibliography on the major fields of popular Spanish culture is included at the end of each chapter.

Lewis Island in Lambertville, New Jersey, is the site of the Lewis Fishery, the last haul seine American shad fishery on the nontidal Delaware River. The Lewis family has fished in the same spot since 1888 and operated the fishery through five generations. The extended Lewis family, its fishery's crew, and the Lambertville community connect with people throughout the region, including environmentalists concerned about the river. It was a Lewis who raised the alarm and helped resurrect a polluted river and its biosphere. While this once exclusively masculine activity is central to the tiny island, today men, women, and children fish, living out a sense of place, belonging, and sustainability. In Another Haul: Narrative Stewardship and Cultural Sustainability at the Lewis Family Fishery, author Charlie Groth highlights the traditional, vernacular, and everyday cultural expressions of the family and crew to understand how community, culture, and the environment intersect. Groth argues there is a system of narrative here that combines verbal activities and everyday activities. On the basis of over two decades of participation and observation, interviews, surveys, and a wide variety of published sources, Groth identifies a phenomenon she calls ""narrative stewardship."" This narrative system, emphasizing place, community, and commitment, in turn, encourages environmental and cultural stewardship, tradition, and community. Intricate and embedded, the system appears invisible, but careful study unpacks and untangles how people, often unconsciously, foster sustainability. Though an ethnography of an occupation, the volume encourages readers to consider what arises as special about all cultures and what needs to be seen and preserved.

Comprised of 24 newly commissioned chapters, this defining reference volume on Latin America introduces English-language readers to the debates, traditions, and sensibilities that have shaped the study of this diverse region.* Contributors include some of the most prominent figures in Latin American and Latin Americanist anthropology* Offers previously unpublished work from Latin America scholars that has been translated into English explicitly for this volume* Includes overviews of national anthropologies in Mexico, Cuba, Peru, Argentina, Ecuador, Bolivia, Colombia, and Brazil, and is also topically focused on new research* Draws on original ethnographic and archival research* Highlights national and regional debates* Provides a vivid sense of how anthropologists often combine intellectual and political work to address the pressing social and cultural issues of Latin America

This book offers an in-depth description and analysis of Chinese coin-like charms, which date back to the second century CE and which continued to be used until mid 20th century. This work is unique in that it provides an archaeological and analytical interpretation of the content of these metallic objects: inscriptive, pictorial or both. As the component chapters show, these coin-like objects represent a wealth of Chinese traditional folk beliefs, including but not limited to family values, social obligations and religious desires. The book presents a collection of contributed chapters, gathering a diverse range of perspectives and expertise from some of the world's leading scholars in the fields of archaeology, religious studies, art history, language and museology. The background of the cover image is a page from Guang jin shi yun fu , a rhyming dictionary first published in the ninth year of the Kangxi Reign (1652 CE). The metal charm dates back to the Song Dynasty (960-1279 CE), depicting two deities traditionally believed to possess the majic power of suppressing evil spirits. The stich-bound book in the foreground is a collection of seal impressions from the beginning of the 20th century. Its wooden press board is inscribed da ji xiang by Fang Zhi-bin in the year of bing yin (1926 CE).

Diasporas large-scale ethnic migrations have been a source of growing concern as we try to understand the nature of community, identity and nationalism. Traditionally, diaspora communities have been understood to be pariah communities, and most work on diasporas has focused on specific groups such as the Jewish or African Diaspora. This book is unique in arguing against traditional interpretations and in taking a comparative look at a range of diasporas, including the Jewish, Arab, Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Maltese, Greek and Armenian diasporas.Taking the past four centuries into consideration, the authors examine diaspora trading networks across the globe on both a regional and international level. They investigate the common patterns and practices in the enterprises of diaspora peoples and entrepreneurs. The regions covered include Western Europe, the Mediterranean, South West Asia and the Indian Ocean, and South East Asia. Global networks of diaspora trading groups were crucial to international trade well before the twentieth century, yet because they were not part of established institutions they have remained elusive to economists, sociologists and historians.Through an understanding of diaspora trading networks, we learn not only about diaspora communities but also about the roots of the modern global economy.

This thought-provoking book is an exploration of the ways religion and diverse forms of mobility have shaped post-apartheid Johannesburg, South Africa. It analyses transnational and local migration in contemporary and historical perspective, along with movements of commodities, ideas, sounds and colours within the city. It re-theorizes urban 'super-diversity' as a plurality of religious, ethnic, national and racial groups but also as the diverse processes through which religion produces urban space. The authors argue that while religion facilitates movement, belonging and aspiration in the city, it is complicit in establishing new forms of enclosure, moral order and spatial and gendered control. Multi-authored and interdisciplinary, this edited collection deals with a wide variety of sites and religions, including Christianity, Islam, Hinduism and Judaism. Its original reading of post-apartheid Johannesburg advances global debates around religion, urbanization, migration and diversity, and will appeal to students and scholars working in these fields.

This ethnographic study of a mixed-occupancy housing estate near the centre of London refocuses the scholarly conversation around social housing in the UK after the 1980 Housing Act. As well as examining the long-term consequences of 'Right to Buy,' such as shortages in local authority stock and neighbourhood gentrification, James Rosbrook-Thompson and Gary Armstrong investigate the changes wrought on the social fabric of the individual estate. Drawing on four years of ethnographic fieldwork, the authors explore the estate's social mix and, more specifically, the consequences of owner-occupiers, council tenants and private renters sharing a cramped inner-city neighbourhood. Mixed-Occupancy Housing in London: A Living Tapestry humanizes the academic discussion of class, race, and gender in social housing through the occupants' tales of getting by, getting along and getting out.

This book analyses a unique leisure world that has been built around a newly emerging phenomenon known as urban exploration; the art of exploring human-made environments which are generally abandoned or hidden from sight of the public eye. Drawing on Michel Foucault's concept of heterotopia, Bingham provides a detailed and critical investigation of urban exploration as a form of leisure that is about the coming together of drifting performers who, in their celebration of 'rebellion' and 'deviance', are determined to find a sense of meaning and belonging. The research considers the influence of consumer capitalism on urban explorers, and the wider social, economic and political context that shapes ideas of belonging and identity in the twenty-first century. By doing this, the book analyses urban exploration as an activity that has emerged in a time when human ideas about culture, individuality and community have transformed, and 'solid' modernity is gradually disintegrating around us. This multi and interdisciplinary work will appeal to people with an interest in 'abnormal' or 'deviant' leisure, as well as academics from sociology, anthropology, social geography, leisure studies, cultural studies, sport and recreation and tourism.

Indian indigenous societies are especially known for their elaborate rituals, which offer an excellent chance for studying religion as practice. However, few detailed ethnographic works exist on the ritual practices of these societies. Based on long-term ethnographic fieldwork in Jharkhand, India this book offers insights into contemporary, previously not described rituals of the Santal, one of the largest indigenous societies of Central India. Its focus lies on culturally specific notions of place as articulated and created during these rituals. In three chapters the book discusses how the Santal "make place" on different local, regional and global levels through their rituals: They reaffirm their ancestral roots in their land during large sacrificial rituals. They offer sacrifices to the dangerous deities of the forest in exchange for rain. And they claim their region to be a "Santal region" through large festivals celebrated in sacred groves, which they link to national and global discourses of indigeneity and environmentalism. Through an analysis of the rituals of a specific society, this book addresses broader issues. It presents an example of how to study religion as a practical activity. It portrays culture-specific perceptions of the environment. And last, the book underlines the potential that lies in choosing place as a lens to study social phenomena in context.

Play & Culture Studies is a bi-annual, peer-reviewed series published by the Association for the Study of Play. For forty years The Association for the Anthropological Study of Play (TAASP), now The Association for the Study of Play (TASP) has served as the premier professional organization in academia dedicated to interdisciplinary research and theory construction concerning play. During that time TASP has promoted the study of play, forged alliances with various organizations advancing the cause for play, organized yearly meetings to disseminate play research, and produced an impressive catalog of play research through a variety of publications. Volume 13 of the Play and Culture Studies Series highlights contributions that reflect upon the rich forty-year history of TASP, that explore current research examining the field of play, and that advance future directions for play research.

Explores the meaning of writing in the post postmodernist moment when master narratives have been questioned and the very act of representing others has been problematized, and discusses some of the key theoretical debates emerging in the aftermath of what came to be known as the postmodernist crisis.

When the author first went to Botswana in the early 1980s to study the impact a major land reform had on rural life in this impoverished African country, social theory and ethnographic practice seemed solid and convincing. A decade later, and again in 1999, she returned to Bostwana and to the Tswapong people whose lives she had shared, and she encountered not only a rapidly shifting social reality, but she also began to ask questions that stemmed from and were shaped by theoretical frames quite different from those she had employed in her earlier work.

At the center of the narrative that runs through this study is a critical reflexive discussion that explores the tension between data recorded at a particular historical moment and the interpretive frames offered to make sense of such data.

The technological capacity to transform biology - repairing, reshaping and replacing body parts, chemicals and functions - is now part of our lives. Humanity is confronted with a variety of affordable and non-invasive 'enhancement technologies': anti-ageing medicine, aesthetic surgery, cognitive and sexual enhancers, lifestyle drugs, prosthetics and hormone supplements. This collection focuses on why people find these practices so seductive and provides ethnographic insights into people's motives and aspirations as they embrace or reject enhancement technologies, which are closely entangled with negotiations over gender, class, age, nationality and ethnicity.

Moving, slowing down, or watching others moving allows people to cross physical, symbolic, and temporal boundaries. Exploring the imaginative power of liminality that makes this possible, Liminal Moves looks at the (im)mobilities of three groups of people - street monkey performers in Japan, adolescents writing about migrants in Italy, and men accompanying their partners in Switzerland for work. The book explores how, for these 'travelers', the interplay of mobility and immobility creates a 'liminal hotspot': a condition of suspension and ambivalence as they find themselves caught between places, meanings and times.

Focusing on Greater Khartoum following South Sudanese independence in 2011, In-Betweenness in Greater Khartoum explores the impact on society of major political events in areas that are neither urban nor rural, public nor private. This volume uses these in-between spaces as a lens to analyze how these events, in combination with other processes, such as globalization and economic neo-liberalization, impact communities across the region. Drawing on original fieldwork and empirical data, the authors uncover the reshaping of new categories of people that reinforce old dichotomies and in doing so underscore a common Sudanese identity.

Ethnography in the Raw describes the author's encounters with the Philippine family into which he has married, his wife's friends and acquaintances, and their lives in a remote rural village in the rice basin of Luzon, about 130 miles northeast of Manila. The book links detailed descriptions of his Philippine family with cultural practices such as circumcision, marriage and cockfights combined with theoretical musings on the concepts of sacrifice, social exchange, patron-client relations, food, and religious symbolism. It is both anthropological fieldwork 'in the raw,' and an incisive analysis of contemporary Philippine society and culture.

This edited volume provides a long-overdue synthesis of the current directions in culture theory and represents some of the very best in ongoing research. Here, culture theory is rendered as a jigsaw puzzle: the book identifies where current research fits together, the as yet missing pieces, and the straight edges that frame the bigger picture. These framing ideas are two: Roy D'Andrade's concept of lifeworlds-adapted from phenomenology yet groundbreaking in its own right-and new thinking about internalization, a concept much used in anthropology but routinely left unpacked. At its heart, this book is an incisive, insightful collection of contributions which will surely guide and support those who seek to further the study of culture.

This book offers a new perspective into the world of international schools and the lucrative industry that accompanies it. It examines how the notion of the 'global' becomes a successful commodity, an important social imaginary and a valuable identity marker for these communities of privileged migrants and host country nationals. The author invites the reader on an ethnographic journey through an international school community located in Germany - illuminating the central features that define and maintain the sector, including its emphasis on 'globality', engagement with the concept of 'Third Culture Kid', and its wider contentious relationship with the 'local'. While much attention is placed on 'global citizenship', international school communities experience degrees of isolation, limited mobility, over-protection and dependency on the school community- impacting their everyday lives, inside and outside the school. This book is guided by larger questions pertaining to the education and mobilities of 'migrant' youths and young adults, as well as the notion of what it means to be 'global' today.

Provides an exciting approach to some of the most contentious issues in discussions around globalization--bioscientific research, neoliberalism, governance--from the perspective of the "anthropological" problems they pose; in other words, in terms of their implications for how individual and collective life is subject to technological, political, and ethical reflection and intervention.
Offers a ground-breaking approach to central debates about globalization with chapters written by leading scholars from across the social sciences.
Examines a range of phenomena that articulate broad structural transformations: technoscience, circuits of exchange, systems of governance, and regimes of ethics or values.
Investigates these phenomena from the perspective of the "anthropological" problems they pose.
Covers a broad range of geographical areas: Africa, the Middle East, East and South Asia, North America, South America, and Europe.
Grapples with a number of empirical problems of popular and academic interest -- from the organ trade, to accountancy, to pharmaceutical research, to neoliberal reform.

The influential jurist Hans Kelsen 1881-1973] here applies his concept of the distinction between society and nature. He shows how primitive man developed his interpretation of nature, through the laws of retribution and of causality, to a modern concept of nature and society. He holds that the gradual emancipation of the law of causality from the principle of retribution is "the emancipation from a social interpretation of nature. The process shows a relation between social and natural science which is very important from the point of view of intellectual history." (Introduction p. viii) Extensively annotated. Kelsen is known for his theory of pure positive law, as postulated in General Theory of Law and State, which is also available in a reprint edition from The Lawbook Exchange.

All communication involves acts of stance, in which speakers take up positions vis-a-vis the expressive, referential, interactional and social implications of their speech. This book brings together contributions in a new and dynamic current of academic explorations of stancetaking as a sociolinguistic phenomenon. Drawing on data from such diverse contexts as advertising, tourism, historical texts, naturally occurring conversation, classroom interaction and interviews, leading authors in the field of sociolinguistics in this volume explore how linguistic stancetaking is implicated in the representation of self, personal style and acts of stylization, and self- and other-positioning. The analyses also focus on how speakers deploy and take up stances vis-a-vis sociolinguistic variables and the critical role of stance in the processes of indexicalization: how linguistic forms come to be associated with social categories and meanings. In doing so, many of the authors address critical issues of power and social reproduction, examining how stance is implicated in the production, reproduction and potential change of social and linguistic hierarchies and ideologies. This volume maps out the terrain of existing sociolinguistic and linguistic anthropological research on stance, synthesizes how it relates to existing theoretical orientations, and identifies a framework for future research.