Myths are best understood as a convergence of voices from across times and cultures. They are the instruments through which authors and audiences seek to grapple with questions about the fundamental nature of the universe. The answers, however, constantly change in light of changing circumstances such as the interface between western and non-western cultures, or cataclysmic events. The authors argue that these societies' worldviews assume that the process of flow between events, rather than the nature of the events, is critical to a model of human sociality.

Boundaries, whether of a ritual, physical, or social nature, are perceived as constantly broken by the exchange of ideas across time, space, and peoples. Our understanding of such issues as gender relations and the body, social change, imagination, play, and the conceptualization of power is furthered by probing how it is that myth is both expressive as well as constitutive of human thought on these topics.

Starry Nights: Critical Structural Realism in Anthropology offers nothing less than a reinventing of the discipline of anthropology. In these six essays - four published here for the first time - Stephen Reyna critiques the postmodern tenets of anthropology, while devising a new strategy for conducting research. Combative and clear, Starry Nights provides an important critique of mainstream anthropology as represented by Geertz and the postmodern legacy, and envisions a mode of anthropological research that addresses social, cultural and biological questions with techniques that are theoretically rigorous and practically useful.

Mary Douglas's innovative explanations for styles of human thought and for the dynamics of institutional change have furnished a distinctive and powerful theory of how conflicts are managed, yet her work remains astonishingly poorly appreciated in social science disciplines. This volume introduces Douglas's theories, and outlines the ways in which her work is of continuing importance for the future of the social sciences. Mary Douglas: Understanding Human Thought and Conflict shows how Douglas laid out the agenda for revitalizing social science by reworking Durkheim's legacy for today, and reviews the growing body of research across the social sciences which has used, tested or developed her approach.

Provides comprehensive coverage of everything that students and practitioners need to know about working in the field of forensic anthropology Forensic anthropology has been plagued by questions of scientific validity and rigor despite its acceptance as a section in the American Academy of Forensic Sciences nearly half a century ago. Critics have viewed it as a laboratory-based applied subfield of biological anthropology, and characterised it as emphasising methodology over theory. This book shows that these views are not only antiquated, but inadequate and inaccurate. Forensic Anthropology: Theoretical Framework and Scientific Basis introduces readers to all of the theoretical and scientific foundations of forensic anthropology -- beginning with how it was influenced by the early theoretical approaches of Tyler, Morgan, Spencer and Darwin. It instructs on how modern forensic science relies on an interdisciplinary approach -- with research being conducted in the fields of archaeology, physics, geology and other disciplines. This modern approach to theory in forensic anthropology is presented through the introduction and discussion of Foundational, Interpretive and Methodological theories. Sections cover: Bias and Objectivity in Forensic Anthropology Theory and Practice; The Theory and Science Behind Biological Profile and Personal Identification; Scientific Foundation for Interpretations of Antemortem, Perimortem, and Postmortem Processes; and Interdisciplinary Influences, Legal Ramifications and Future Directions. Illustrates important aspects of the theory building process and reflects methods for strengthening the scientific framework of forensic anthropology as a discipline Inspired by the "Application of Theory to Forensic Anthropology" symposium presented at the 67th annual meeting of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences Chapters written by experts in the field who were presenters at the symposium Forensic Anthropology: Theoretical Framework and Scientific Basis is ideal for university courses in anthropological science, forensic science, criminal science and forensic archaeology.

Traditionally, Historical Archaeology has had a North American or European stance, focusing on the interplay between historical documents and the archaeological record. For Africa, with its non-traditional historical sources, this interplay is not as applicable. These sources also inform the period of contact with Europeans, during which the shape of the modern continent was inexorably defined. By focusing on such sources, it becomes possible to present historical understandings which access African experiences with outsiders and other African populations.

This volume explores the range of interactions between the historical sources and archaeology that are available on the African continent. The contributions, written by a range of experts on different aspects of African archaeology, present the underlying issues such as:
- The conflict and collaboration in the foundation of modern Africa;
- African trading communities maintaining their independence from Europe;
- The impacts of the Atlantic slave trade.

This represents the first consideration of historical archaeology over the African continent as a whole and therefore provides an important review for African archaeologists and historians. This seminal volume also explores Africa's place in global systems of thought and economic development for historical archaeologists and historians alike.

This thirty fourth volume in the REA series contains fourteen chapters by a variety of researchers touching on a wide range of topics in economic anthropology and covering a vast geographical area. The chapters are divided into four sections: one focusing on commodities and their social meanings and values, one organized around the anthropological investigation of business systems and practices, one concentrating on the economic importance of productive land in culture and society, and finally one that showcases a variety of new research on the economic anthropology of Latin America. Geographic areas featured in the volume include Africa (Kenya and Mauritius), Europe (Britain, Germany, and Romania), North America (Mexico and Guatemala), South America (Brazil), East Asia (Japan), and Western Asia (Jordan). Standing apart from these four sections is a special feature essay by noted anthropologist Sidney Greenfield that calls for a reevaluation of the global capitalist system as it stands today.

Irian Jaya is the official name of the western half of New Guinea, a province of Indonesia since the 1960s. Its inhabitants are generally untouched by civilization, and most of their hundreds of native languages and cultures remain unstudied. Van Enk and de Vries gained access to one of the most isolated parts of Irian Jaya in order to study the Korowai, a tribe in southern Irian Jaya. The Korowai still use stone tools, live in tree-houses, and have no knowledge of the outside world. Van Enk and de Vries provide the first study of the Korowai language and culture. They reproduce oral texts that show patterns of grammar, discourse, and culture, and discuss the phonological, morphological, and syntactical aspects of the language. In the process, van Enk and de Vries reveal a number of key semantic fields and conceptual patterns such as kinship, counting, the role of lunar phases, and Korowai cosmology.

The general theme of "Social Dimensions in the Economic Process" is an old one in economic anthropology. On the abstract end it involves, first, the degree of social content of individual transactions and, second, how economic processes relate to social structure. More specifically, the theme relates to matters such as the need for trust resulting in personalized systems of economic transactions, and how institutions shape economic arrangements. In five parts, the first two parts deal with the social content and consequences of economic relations. Parts III and IV address particular institutions, the household and agrarian relations. The volume ends in Part V with chapters linked to globalization.

Starry Nights: Critical Structural Realism in Anthropology offers nothing less than a reinventing of the discipline of anthropology. In these six essays - four published here for the first time - Stephen Reyna critiques the postmodern tenets of anthropology, while devising a new strategy for conducting research. Combative and clear, Starry Nights provides an important critique of mainstream anthropology as represented by Geertz and the postmodern legacy, and envisions a mode of anthropological research that addresses social, cultural and biological questions with techniques that are theoretically rigorous and practically useful.

What is the place of pluralism in the context of a dominant religion? How does the perception of religion as "tradition" and "culture" affect pluralism? Why do minorities' demands for recognition often transform into exclusion? Through her ethnography of a multireligious community in rural Poland, Agnieszka Pasieka demonstrates how we can better understand the nature of pluralism by examining how it is lived and experienced within a homogenous society. Painting a vivid picture of everyday interreligious sociability, Pasieka reveals the constant balance of rural inhabitants between ideas of sameness and difference, and the manifold ways in which religion informs local cooperation, relations among neighbors and friends, and common attempts to "make pluralism." The book traces these developments through several decades of the community's history, unveiling and exposing the paradoxes inscribed into the practice and discourse of pluralism and complex processes of negotiation of social identities.

The collapse of the Soviet Union and its totalitarian system has resulted in instability and conflict among its many ethnic groups. In this volume, a distinguished group of scholars from the Russian Center for Strategic Research and International Studies examines the ethnic conflicts roiling Central Asia and Transcaucasia today--the roots and dynamics of these conflicts, their possible consequences, and the possibilities for resolution. The analyses are based upon extensive field studies, interviews, local press accounts, and other sources unavailable in the West. The work presents an inside view of the conflicts, describes the forces involved, and provides a prognosis for future developments in the region.

Religion has experienced growing importance in recent years, and interest in the anthropological study of religion has increased as well. This reference book offers a much-needed overview of the most significant topics and concerns in the field. Chapters by expert contributors examine such matters as snake handling, magic and ritual, shamanism, and the role of religion in particular cultures. Chapters contain extensive documentation, and a bibliography concludes the volume. The anthropological study of religion is at a crossroads. While fewer textbooks on the anthropology of religion are published each year and much of what is available is decades old, religion is playing an increasingly prominent role in society. Scholars from many fields are reading anthropological works on religion with great interest, and such works are cited frequently in books and articles in a range of disciplines. Religion has been found in all societies studied by anthropologists and is one of the hallmarks of human creativity. This reference book provides a much-needed overview of the most important topics and trends in the anthropology of religion. Chapters by expert contributors examine the varied manifestations of religion in diverse cultural contexts. Among the topics surveyed are shamanism, snake handling, rituals in particular cultural traditions, religion and altered states of consciousness, and the role of science in religion and anthropology. Chapters contain extensive documentation, and a bibliography concludes the volume.

Wolfgang Glatzer Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universitiit Franlifurt am Main, Germany ABSTRACT Challenges for the quality of life in the contemporary world were the focus of the Fifth International Quality of Life-Conference in Frankfurt am Main in the year 2003, hosted and organized by the Interna tional Society for Quality of Life Studies. The first part of this introductory article is concerned with a general assessment of contemporary quality of life research. At present, the concept of quality of life is a kind of umbrella which keeps together a reasonable number of international social scientists who have similar research interests. The second part of the introduction describes the topics of this book: The five chapters are concerned with the societal goal discussion on quality of life, the scientific monitoring of quality of life, the economic challenges for quality of life, its cultural challenges, and finally the options and restrictions for improving quality of life. Altogether, the contributions are related to present interna tional investigations and discussions of basic questions of quality of life. ATTENTION FOR QUALITY OF LIFE Challenges for the quality of life in the contemporary world were the focus at the Fifth International Quality of Life-Conference in Frankfurt am Main in the year 2003, hosted and organized by the International Society for Quality of Life Studies. There are new threats and new prospects for the quality of life in each generation, and securing and improving quality of life is a never-ending task."

This work examines the valley of the Urubamba River in terms of vertical zonation, Incan impact on the environment, plant use, the history of exploration and the notion of discovery, the idea of land reform, and cultural contact with the European world. Winding its path northward from the Andean Highlands to the Amazon, the valley has served as the stage of pre-Columbian civilizations and focal point of Spanish conquest in Peru. "Gade left behind not only a superb body of scholarly work, but a network of colleagues and students who remain indebted to his example. This book should serve as an inspiration for all scholars who wish to pursue the Sauerian, counter enlightenment or post development agendas of understanding and respecting particular places in all their historical and cultural complexity, including ambiguities and contradictions." -- The Geographical Review, American Geographical Society

Using original religious-philosophical texts and sociological research, the author explores the various dimensions of the Virasaiva religious tradition. His sociological analyses of the monastic organization and social structure, the family and the community, the roles of women, and the future of the community emphasize the intricate relationship between religion and the social system. This study of a largely unknown religious community demonstrates how the followers of Virasaivism, known as Lingayats, have been adapting to the changing milieu in North America while retaining the religion's core values. Dr. Chekki shows the interplay between tradition and modernity as the Virasaivas attempt to maintain a distinct identity while adopting the ways of modern culture.

To this date, efforts to document the scholarly contributions of exclusively African American criminologists are nonexistent. This is a reference work which offers contemporary Afrocentric perspective on critical issues of crime and justice by focusing on the contributions of African American criminologists whose interests and responses to crime arguably differ from those of mainstream white criminologists. This reference will be of interest to undergraduate and graduate students and faculty in criminal justice and practitioners in policy making.

Most of the abstracts can be cross-referenced to publications within mainstream criminal justice journals. In addition, selected books, manuscripts, and an array of state and government documents are included and provide rare Afrocentric perspectives on issues of crime and justice. In the process, it credits many Caucasians and ethnic minorities as important contributors to a given publication. This reference book consists of five chapters: (1) an introductory article on issues that define (and confront) African American criminologists, (2) an alphabetical listing of published abstracts for each contributing author, (3) selected references to each publication, (4) an appendix containing titles to doctoral dissertations for all contributing African American scholars, and (5) an author and subject index.

Anthropology begins in the encounter with the 'exotic': what stands outside of-and challenges-conventional or established understandings. This volume confronts the distortions of orientalism, ethnocentrism, and romantic nostalgia to expose exoticism, defined as the construction of false and unsubstantiated difference. Its aim is to re-found the importance of the exotic in the development of anthropological knowledge and to overcome methodological dualisms and dualistic approaches. Chapters look at the risk of exoticism in the perspectivist approach, the significant exotic corrective of Levi-Strauss vis-a-vis an imperializing Eurocentrism, our nostalgic relationship with the ethnographic record, and the attempts of local communities to readapt previous exoticized referents, renegotiate their identity, and 'counter-exoticize.' This volume demonstrates a range of approaches that will be valuable for researchers and students seeking to effectively establish comparative methodological frameworks that transcend issues of relativism and universalism.

Human Origins brings together new thinking by social anthropologists and other scholars on the evolution of human culture and society. No other discipline has more relevant expertise to consider the emergence of humans as the symbolic species. Yet, social anthropologists have been conspicuously absent from debates about the origins of modern humans. These contributions explore why that is, and how social anthropology can shed light on early kinship and economic relations, gender politics, ritual, cosmology, ethnobiology, medicine, and the evolution of language.

Human Origins brings together new thinking by social anthropologists and other scholars on the evolution of human culture and society. No other discipline has more relevant expertise to consider the emergence of humans as the symbolic species. Yet, social anthropologists have been conspicuously absent from debates about the origins of modern humans. These contributions explore why that is, and how social anthropology can shed light on early kinship and economic relations, gender politics, ritual, cosmology, ethnobiology, medicine, and the evolution of language.

Political struggle situated within and between cleavages based on sexuality, gender, and age is examined in this volume. The collection offers cutting edge work that challenges traditional notions of what is political sociology and what constitutes political behavior. Political activism organized around identities of transgender, intersex, lesbian, gay, and old age demonstrates the increasing importance of identity politics for political sociologists and social movements scholars alike.

The authors combined in this volume teach students and scholars of political sociology the continued significance of questions related to the culture wars and art as an agent of change, the role of political opportunity and threat in social movements, transgender and intersex political activism, the advantages and disadvantages of late-life liberal political activism, and how everyday life or just living constitutes social movement activity. The readings raise important questions regarding the intersection of sexual minority, race, and gender. Additionally, the readings explore ???identity politics??? from the vantage of several different contexts using a variety of methodological approaches and theoretical views. The authors hope this volume will stimulate other political sociologists and social movement scholars to further explore political behavior that is based upon and motivated by some of the most intimate aspects of our lives.

The authors combine a theoretical reassessment of how we understand, study and analyze processes of identification with detailed case studies of the discourses of three-generation families living in split-border communities along the former Iron Curtain, talking about themselves and other social groups, about their way of life and their experiences past and present.