Gift-giving is extremely important in Japanese society, not only at personal and household levels, but at the national and macroeconomic levels as well. This book is the first in English to document the extraordinary scale, complexity, and variation of giving in contemporary Japan. Gift-Giving in Japan is based on eighteen months' fieldwork in the Tokyo metropolitan area, as well as short-term research in other parts of Japan. The core of the study is the experience of family representatives of different ages, classes, genders, occupations, neighborhoods, and religions. The author also interviewed experts, including the author of gift-giving etiquette books, Buddhist and Shinto priests, department store and funeral home employees, and workers at Tokyo's Tsukiji fish market. She participated in neighborhood festivals, election rallies, house-building rites, and other ceremonies of which gift-giving was an integral part. Recent anthropological interest in drawing a strong contrast between commodities and gifts both reflects and reinforces the conception of the gift as part of the giver and the related distinction between the realm of the gift and the realm of the marketplace. The author argues that Japanese practices of giving and receiving challenge assumptions related to this idea of the gift.

Although the debate over same-sex marriage in the United States has ended, no one seems to know what lies on the horizon. The conversation about what marriage could be like in the future is no longer confined to academics. In his dissent in Obergefell, Chief Justice Roberts linked the constitutionally-mandated legal recognition of same-sex marriage to the possibility that states may also have to recognize multi-person intimate relationships as well to avoid discriminating against plural marriage enthusiasts. The popularity of television shows like TLC's Sister Wives and HBO's Big Love suggests that Americans no longer can be dismissive of the possibility that in the foreseeable future, marriage could, and perhaps should, look very different than it does today. Rather than settling the question of whether states ought to abolish marriage, make it more inclusive, contractual, or call it something else, this book exposes readers to some of the normative, legal, and empirical questions that Americans must address before they can deliberate thoughtfully about whether to keep the marital status quo where monogamy remains privileged. Unlike much of the debate over same-sex marriage, they exchange reasons with one another as they discuss marital reform. This book is for ordinary Americans, their elected representatives, and judges, to help them ultimately decide whether they want to continue to define marriage so narrowly, make it more inclusive to avoid discrimination, or have the state leave the marriage business. This edited, interdisciplinary volume contains eight original contributions, all of which illuminate important but often neglected areas of the topic.

In much of Melanesia, the process of social reproduction unfolds as a lengthy sequence of mortuary rites - feast making and gift giving through which the living publicly define their social relations with each other while at the same time commemorating the deceased. In this study Robert J. Foster constructs an ethnographic account of mortuary rites in the Tanga Islands, Papua New Guinea, placing these large-scale feasts and ceremonial exchanges in their historical context and demonstrating how the effects of participation in an expanding cash economy have allowed Tangans to conceive of the rites as 'customary' in opposition to the new and foreign practices of 'business'. His examination synthesizes two divergent trends in Melanesian anthropology by emphasizing both the radical differences between Melanesian and Western forms of sociality and the conjunction of Melanesian and Western societies brought about by colonialism and capitalism.

How men and women interact, the respect young show old and old show young, and who doffs their hat to whom provides a telling window on American cultural history. Bowing to Necessities is the chronologically most wide-ranging study of its kind, covering the long period of 1620 to 1860. Working through two centuries of conduct literature, Professor Hemphill provides a wonderful retelling of American history to the Civil War, illuminating crucial connections between evolving class, gender, and age relations along the way.

Scottish Highlanders, and their descendants all over the world, are no better and no worse than any other people where "sinful" behaviour is concerned. Standards of morality and social conventions changed dramatically during the 19th century - and most of the people engaged in recording and commenting upon Highland life and tradition were puritanical ministers and priests who left out the racy bits. So, while there are many useful books that provide a wide range of Scottish Gaelic vocabulary to express many aspects of daily life - except, for the most part, the topics covered in this book.

Scotland and Southern Appalachia have always shared a strong connection. Many of the first people to permanently settle in the Appalachian mountains came from the Scottish highlands seeking religious and other freedoms. Many descendants of those first settlers from Scotland still make their homes in Southern Appalachia and attribute many aspects of their culture to their Scottish heritage. This book explores the parallels and connections between Scotland and Southern Appalachia, with special attention to the interplay between revivals of folk culture, native languages, and dialects in Scotland and Appalachia since the 1970s. It covers contemporary Scottish and Appalachian cultural movements, particularly the links between cultural revivals and identity politics, and contains substantial references that increase its value as an authoritative scholarly work on the convergence of the cultures.

"Exotic Appetites" is a far-reaching exploration of what Lisa Heldke calls "food adventuring": the passion, fashion and pursuit of experimentation with ethnic foods. The aim of Heldke's critique is to expose and explore the colonialist attitudes embedded in our everyday relationship and approach to foreign foods. "Exotic Appetites" brings to the table the critical literatures in postcolonialism, critical race theory, and feminism in a provocative and lively discussion of eating and "ethnic" cuisine. Chapters look closely at the meanings and implications involved in the quest for unusual restaurants and exotic dishes, related restaurant reviews and dining guides, and ethnic cookbooks.

Americans love to eat. They are also deeply religious. So it’s no surprise that food has an important place in the religious lives of Americans.. They eat in worship services. They drink coffeein church basements. They feed neighbors and strangers in the name of their god. For countless American Protestants, food and church are inseparable. From dry cookies and punch at coffee hour to potlucks and spaghetti dinners, Whitebread Protestants looks at the role food plays in the daily life of white mainline Protestant congregations.

This book is a far-reaching exploration of what the Heldke calls 'food adventuring': the passion, fashion and pursuit of the experimentation with ethnic foods. Exotic Appetites brings to the table the critical literatures on colonialism and anticolonialism, on racism and antiracism, and on feminist theory, in a provocative discussion of eating and 'ethnic' food. Chapters examine the meanings and socio-political implications involved in the quest for new and interesting restaurants and exotic dishes, restaurant reviews and dining guides and ethnic cookbooks.

On December 21, 1972, sixteen young survivors of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 were rescued after spending ten weeks stranded at the crash site of their plane, high in the remote Andes Mountains. The incident made international headlines and spawned several best-selling books, fueled partly by the fact that the young men had resorted to cannibalism to survive.

Matt Rossano examines this story from an evolutionary perspective, weaving together findings and ideas from anthropology, psychology, religion, and cognitive science. During their ordeal, these young men broke "civilized" taboos to fend off starvation and abandoned "civilized" modes of thinking to maintain social unity and individual sanity. Through the power of ritual, the survivors were able to endure severe emotional and physical hardship. Rossano ties their story to our story, seeing in the mortal rituals of this struggle for survival a reflection of what it means to be human.

This original and authoritative text reveals how chivalry was part of the problem of violence in medieval Europe, not merely it's solution. If one ideal was to internalize restraint in knights, chivalry also worshipped hands-on violence, as a close reading of chivalric literature shows. In a developing society, chivalric ideals and practices were both praised and feared by those who sought its reform.

The "ordines coronationis" are essentially the scripts for the coronation of Frankish and French sovereigns. Combining detailed religious, ceremonial, and political material, they are an extraordinarily important source for the study of individual rulers or dynasties, as well as for the study of kingship, queenship, and the evolution of political institutions. Complete in two volumes, Richard A. Jackson's is the first full edition of these texts, including all the "ordines" from the early thirteenth century through the end of the fifteenth century, a period during which the texts shift from Latin to the vernacular, and the institutions of kingship become distinctively French.

Since 1966, Kwanzaa has been celebrated as a black holiday tradition an annual recognition of cultural pride in the African American community. But how did this holiday originate, and what is its broader cultural significance?

Kwanzaa: Black Power and the Making of the African-American Holiday Tradition explores the political beginning and later expansion of Kwanzaa, from its start as a Black Power holiday, to its current place as one of the most mainstream of the black holiday traditions. For those wanting to learn more about this alternative observance practiced by countless African Americans and how Kwanzaa fits into the larger black holiday tradition, Keith A. Mayes gives an accessible and definitive account of the movements and individuals that pushed to make this annual celebration a reality, and shows how African-Americans brought the black freedom struggle to the American calendar.

Clear and thoughtful, Kwanzaa is the perfect introduction to what is now the quintessential African American holiday.

Heads of state today mark their rites of passage with splendid ceremonial, from Reagan's inaugural to Andropov's funeral. Such spectacles continue to be a prominent part of modern political systems, of varied ideological hue, but their precise meaning and importance often remain unclear. These specially commissioned essays address the central problem in the understanding of royal rituals, the relation between power and ceremonial. These contributions, from historians and anthropologists, examine a wide range of societies.

"The Absence of Grace" is a study of male fantasy, representation anxiety, and narratorial authority in two sixteenth-century books, Baldassare Castiglione's "Il libro del Cortegiano" (1528) and Giovanni Della Casa's "Galateo" (1558). The interpretive method is a form of close reading the author describes as reconstructed old New Criticism, that is, close reading conditioned by an interest in and analysis of the historical changes reflected in the text. The book focuses on the way the "Courtier" and "Galateo" cope with and represent the interaction between changes of elite culture and the changing construction of masculine identity in early modern Europe. More specifically, it connects questions of male fantasy and masculine identity to questions about the authority and reliability of narrators, and shows how these questions surface in narratorial attitudes toward socioeconomic rank or class, political power, and gender.
The book is in three parts. Part One examines a distinction and correlation the "Courtier" establishes between two key terms, (1) "sprezzatura, " defined as a behavioral skill intended to simulate the attributes of (2) "grazia, " understood as the grace and privileges of noble birth. Because "sprezzatura" is negatively conceptualized as the absence of grace it generates anxiety and suspicion in performers and observers alike. In order to suggest how the binary opposition between these terms affected the discourse of manners, the author singles out the titular episode of "Galateo, " an anecdote about table manners, which he reads closely and then sets in its historical perspective. Part Two takes up the question of "sprezzatura" in the gender debate that develops in Book 3 of the "Courtier, " and Part Three explores in detail the characterization of the two narrators in the "Courtier" and "Galateo, " who are represented as unreliable and an object of parody or critique.

"a must for any specialist and advanced practitioner's bookshelf." Journal of Interpersonal CareThis book focuses on what happens after a death has taken place. Drawing on social theory and anthropology, contributors examine responses to death as they occur within the unique set of cultural, social and historical circumstances which characterizes post-war society. The book does not just document and make sense of contemporary practices but also critically reviews the ways grief, mourning and death ritual have been approached by academics and practitioners in the field. It does this by combining substantial reviews with shorter illustrative examples of grief, mourning and death ritual as they are manifest in specific settings and with defined groups. These illustrative examples include personal and institutional responses to death at different points in the life cycle, and responses to different sorts of death - the death of children and death in disasters for example. The examples include commentaries on bereavement work and on changes in both the funeral industry and memorialization practices.Grief, Mourning and Death Ritual is aimed at advanced students in sociology, anthropology and psychology with an interest in death, dying and mortality. It is also directly relevant to those concerned with loss and how to respond to it. The book is therefore suitable for use on courses in nursing, palliative care, social work and counselling.

"The Absence of Grace" is a study of male fantasy, representation anxiety, and narratorial authority in two sixteenth-century books, Baldassare Castiglione's "Il libro del Cortegiano" (1528) and Giovanni Della Casa's "Galateo" (1558). The interpretive method is a form of close reading the author describes as reconstructed old New Criticism, that is, close reading conditioned by an interest in and analysis of the historical changes reflected in the text. The book focuses on the way the "Courtier" and "Galateo" cope with and represent the interaction between changes of elite culture and the changing construction of masculine identity in early modern Europe. More specifically, it connects questions of male fantasy and masculine identity to questions about the authority and reliability of narrators, and shows how these questions surface in narratorial attitudes toward socioeconomic rank or class, political power, and gender.
The book is in three parts. Part One examines a distinction and correlation the "Courtier" establishes between two key terms, (1) "sprezzatura, " defined as a behavioral skill intended to simulate the attributes of (2) "grazia, " understood as the grace and privileges of noble birth. Because "sprezzatura" is negatively conceptualized as the absence of grace it generates anxiety and suspicion in performers and observers alike. In order to suggest how the binary opposition between these terms affected the discourse of manners, the author singles out the titular episode of "Galateo, " an anecdote about table manners, which he reads closely and then sets in its historical perspective. Part Two takes up the question of "sprezzatura" in the gender debate that develops in Book 3 of the "Courtier, " and Part Three explores in detail the characterization of the two narrators in the "Courtier" and "Galateo, " who are represented as unreliable and an object of parody or critique.

Although so much of the life we care about takes place at home, this private space often remains behind closed doors and is notoriously difficult for researchers to infiltrate. We may think it is just up to us to decorate, transform and construct our homes, but in this book we discover a new form of 'estate agency', the active participation of the home and its material culture in the construction of our lives. What do the possessions people choose to take with them when moving say about who they are, and should we emphasize the mobility of a move or the stability of what movers take with them? How is the home an active partner in developing relationships? Why are our homes sometimes haunted by 'ghosts'?.This intriguing book is a rare behind-the-scenes expose of the domestic sphere across a range of cultures. Examples come from working class housewives in Norway, a tribal society in Taiwan, a museum in London, tenants in Canada and students from Greece, to produce a genuinely comparative perspective based in every case on sustained fieldwork. So Japan, long thought to be a nation that idealizes uncluttered simplicity, is shown behind closed doors to harbour illicit pockets of disorganization, while the warmth inside Romanian apartments is used to expel the presence of the state.Representing a vital development in the study of material culture, this book clearly shows that we may think we possess our homes, but our homes are more likely to possess us.

As the saying goes, everyone loves a parade. But never more so than in 1950s America, when flag waving, martial pomp, and staged ceremony were presented and often perceived as America's last best defence against the communist threat. Historian Richard Fried, author of Nightmare in Red, ploughs new ground with this exploration of the often absurd lengths the average citizen in McCarthyite America went to to help shore up patriotism and fend off the threat of the Red Menace.

The book offers an innovative theoretical account of the causes, nature and extent of the movement of international migrants between affluent and poorer countries. The book also provides a conceptual study of migration decision-making and the dynamics of international movement.

This book is a study of the origins and development of cult practice at Olympia and Delphi. It traces changing patterns of activity through the material record, and challenges many assumptions about the nature and role of the archaeological data. Dr Morgan considers the economics of dedication, technology and the organization of craft production, which provide insights into the behaviour of producers and purchasers of material dedicated at sanctuaries. Her study is exceptional for the emphasis placed upon the two sites in their contemporary local contexts and their changing roles in society. The progression of state formation is discussed through the relationship between changes in dedicatory practice during the eighth century and the changing needs of communities. The book concludes with a detailed study of the wider roles of Olympia and Delphi as two major sanctuaries in Archaic Greece, considering their relationships with other sites and their place in the Greek festival calendar.

Dancing through Time presents a rich and incisive analysis of person, time, and identity among the Karawari speakers of Ambonwari village in the East Sepik Province, Papua New Guinea, through the examination of everyday practices, language, social institutions, kinship, myths, spirit-things, rituals, and dances. In addition to its descriptive value, the book offers a fresh theoretical approach to the study of Melanesian cultures.

Where does 'the self' in 'myself' begin and end? And what do ideas of 'spirit' tell us about the nature of human selfhood? To investigate these poorly understood matters, veteran anthropologist, neo-shaman and paranormal healer Roy Willis spent five months in a remote part of northern Zambia exploring human consciousness in a fascinating and sometimes terrifying series of adventures.
This absorbing book tells the story of Willis' and his three local colleagues' quest, as they participate in and film rituals of ecstatic union with nature spirits and talk in depth with experts in managing the awesome powers of a world beyond the ordinary. The narrative follows the research team's day-to-day involvement with rituals of spirit revelation, healing, and exorcism, their encounters with the evil powers of sorcery, and the sometimes troubled relations between team members.
The African healers in this book emerge both as exceptional individuals and as pioneering explorers of consciousness. Their experience is surprisingly congruent with our present sense of multiple and shifting selfhoods in the age of global electronic communication.

Where does 'the self' in 'myself' begin and end? And what do ideas of 'spirit' tell us about the nature of human selfhood? To investigate these poorly understood matters, veteran anthropologist, neo-shaman and paranormal healer Roy Willis spent five months in a remote part of northern Zambia exploring human consciousness in a fascinating and sometimes terrifying series of adventures. This absorbing book tells the story of Willis' and his three local colleagues' quest, as they participate in and film rituals of ecstatic union with nature spirits and talk in depth with experts in managing the awesome powers of a world beyond the ordinary. The narrative follows the research team's day-to-day involvement with rituals of spirit revelation, healing, and exorcism, their encounters with the evil powers of sorcery, and the sometimes troubled relations between team members. The African healers in this book emerge both as exceptional individuals and as pioneering explorers of consciousness. Their experience is surprisingly congruent with our present sense of multiple and shifting selfhoods in the age of global electronic communication.