General

In this book, Gregory Salter traces how artists represented home and masculinities in the period of social and personal reconstruction after the Second World War in Britain. Salter considers home as an unstable entity at this historical moment, imbued...

Beyond Observation is structured by the argument that the 'ethnographicness' of a film should not be determined by the fact that it is about an exotic culture - the popular view - nor because it has apparently not been authored - a long-standing academic...

What is it like to have lived with bulimia for most of your life? To have a mother who is retarded? To fight a health insurance company in order to survive breast cancer? Carolyn Ellis and Arthur P. Bochner have assembled innovative pieces which tackle...

This book draws on the experience of international anthropologists from Italy, the Himalayas, Northern England, Bangladesh and Indonesia. Being There examines the close relationships anthropologists establish with friends and informants in the field...

Anthropology originated as the study of 'primitive' cultures. But the notion of 'primitive' exposes presumptions of 'civilized' superiority and the right of the West to speak for 'less evolved' others. With the fall of Empire, anthropology became suspect...

The salmon that symbolize the Pacific Northwest's natural splendor are now threatened with extinction across much of their ancestral range. In studying the natural and human forces that shape the rivers and mountains of that region, geologist David...

Taboo looks at the ethnographer and sexuality in anthropological fieldwork and considers the many roles that sexuality plays in the anthropological production of knowledge and texts. How does the sexual identity that anthropologists have in their "home"...

Bioprospecting--the exchange of plants for corporate promises of royalties or community development assistance--has been lauded as a way to develop new medicines while offering southern nations and indigenous communities an incentive to preserve their...

Fifty million people in the world today are victims of forced relocation caused by wars and violence. Whole new countries are being created, occupied by Afghan refugees, displaced Columbians, deported Rwandans, exiled Congolese, fleeing Iraqis, Chechens,...

In almost every military intervention in its history, the US has made cultural mistakes that hindered attainment of its policy goals. From the counterproductive strategic bombing of Vietnam to the misguided accidental burning of the Koran in Afghanistan,...

How people conceive of happiness reveals much about who they are and the values they hold dear. Drawing on ethnographic insights from diverse field sites around the world, this book offers a unique window onto the ways in which people grapple with...

The description for this book, The Poetics of Manhood: Contest and Identity in a Cretan Mountain Village, will be forthcoming.Reviews"The Cretan mountain-dwellers are in particular famous for their sustained resistance to Turkish rule and then to German...

The Concept of the Goddess explores the function and nature of goddesses and their cults in many cultures, including:* Celtic* Roman* Norse* Caucasian* Japanese traditions.The contributors explore the reasons for the existence of so many goddesses in the...

Traits that signal belonging dictate our daily routines, including how we eat, move, and connect to others. In recent years, "fat" has emerged as a shared anchor in defining who belongs and is valued versus who does not and is not. The stigma surrounding...

This book was originally published in 1935. For some years past the scientific study of primitive peoples has experimented in a variety of directions for new methods of investigation. Criticism of the comparative method, of which Sir James Frazer is...

'Other Kinds of Dreams' provides an invaluable insight into the political activity of black and Asian women in the UK both inside and outside the black and Asian communities. The book breaks new ground by: * destroying the misconception that black and...

When Siraj, the ruler of Bengal, overran the British settlement of Calcutta in 1756, he allegedly jailed 146 European prisoners overnight in a cramped prison. Of the group, 123 died of suffocation. While this episode was never independently confirmed,...

"Mafia" has become an indigenous South Asian term. Like Italian mobsters, the South Asian "gangster politicians" are known for inflicting brutal violence while simultaneously upholding vigilante justice-inspiring fear and fantasy. But the term also...

The images of migrants and refugees arriving in precarious boats on the shores of southern Europe, and of the makeshift camps that have sprung up in Lesbos, Lampedusa, Calais and elsewhere, have become familiar sights on television screens around the...

One Discipline, Four Ways offers the first book-length introduction to the history of each of the four major traditions in anthropology - British, German, French, and American. The result of lectures given by distinguished anthropologists Fredrik Barth,...

Cryptozoology is best understood as the study of animals which, in the eyes of Western science, are extinct, unclassified or unrecognised. In consequence, and in part because of its selective methods and lack of epistemological rigour, cryptozoology is...

Set in the enchanted mountain of a spirit-queen presiding over an unnamed, postcolonial country, this ethnographic work of ficto-criticism recreates in written form the shrines by which the dead--notably the fetishized forms of Europe's Others, Indians...

The French missionary-linguist Emile Petitot (1838-1916) spent twenty years near the Arctic Circle in Canada, publishing numerous works on First Nations languages and practices. Over time, however, he descended into delirium and began to summon imaginary...

This study considers the extent to which economic modernisation has transformed the rural community. In doing so it discusses whether the distinctive character of rural identity has been eroded by powerful and distant political and cultural forces. This...

Eco-Warriors was the first in-depth look at the people, actions, history and philosophies behind the "radical" environmental movement. Focusing on the work of Earth First!, the Sea Shepherds, Greenpeace, and the Animal Liberation Front, among others, Rik...

This book explores the broad territory of design anthropology, covering key approaches, ways of working and areas of debate and tension. It understands design as fundamentally human centred and argues for a design anthropology based primarily on...

Marcel Mauss's writings on techniques and technology are at the forefront of an important anthropological and sociological research tradition, and they also highlight the theoretical and ideological challenges surrounding this field of study. A selection...

In the past decade, South Africa's "miracle transition" has been interrupted by waves of protests in relation to basic services such as water and electricity. Less visibly, the post-apartheid period has witnessed widespread illicit acts involving...

Social and Cultural Anthropology for the 21st Century: Connected Worlds is a lively, accessible, and wide-ranging introduction to socio-cultural anthropology for undergraduate students. It draws on a wealth of ethnographic examples to showcase how...

This workbook is loaded with exercises, how-to sections and checklists, all designed to serve as a supplemental support for students to apply the principles and concepts learned from the textbook it accompanies. With instructions and explanations written...

The concept of "cultural transmission" is central to much contemporary anthropological theory, since successful human reproduction through social systems is essential for effective survival and for enhancing the adaptiveness of individual...

"Language ideologies" refers to the representation, whether explicit or implicit, of the intersection of language and human beings in a social world. This collection of essays examines definitions and conceptions of language in a wide range of...

Learn the methodology, skills, techniques, tools and applications of Linguistic Anthropology with THE ANTHROPOLOGY OF LANGUAGE: AN INTRODUCTION TO LINGUISTIC ANTHROPOLOGY. This highly readable introductory text emphasizes the kinds of intriguing...

Burial sites have long been recognized as a way to understand past civilizations. Yet, the meanings of our present day cemeteries have been virtually ignored, even though they reveal much about our cultures. Exploring an extraordinarily diverse range of...

This is the first full--scale study of the work of Clifford Geertz, who is one of the best--known anthropologists in the world today. In a lively and accessible introduction to his work, Fred Inglis situates Geertza s thought in the context of his life...

In Marking Time, Paul Rabinow presents his most recent reflections on the anthropology of the contemporary. Drawing richly on the work of Michel Foucault, John Dewey, Niklas Luhmann, and, most interestingly, German painter Gerhard Richter, Rabinow offers...

Comparison is fundamental to evolutionary anthropology. When scientists study chimpanzee cognition, for example, they compare chimp performance on cognitive tasks to the performance of human children on the same tasks. And when new fossils are found,...

Androgynous Objects explores the way meaning is encoded in material culture by focusing on the androgynous symbolism of the looped string bag, or bilum, of the Telefol people of Central New Guinea. The web of meanings 'woven' into the bag is shown to...

Gambling is both a multi-billion dollar international industry and a ubiquitous social and cultural phenomenon. It is also undergoing significant change, with new products and technologies, regulatory models, changing public attitudes and the sheer scale...

Digital Anthropology, 2nd Edition explores how human and digital can be explored in relation to one another within issues as diverse as social media use, virtual worlds, hacking, quantified self, blockchain, digital environmentalism and digital...