Social and Cultural Anthropology Commons^™

Growth In Snapping Turtle, Chelydra Serpentina (Testudines: Chelydridae) In Northern Indiana, John B. Iverson, Geoffrey R. Smith, Jessica E. Rettig

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Wetland Construction, Restoration, And Integration: A Comparative Review, Douglas J. Spieles

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Physical Intimate Partner Violence, Childhood Physical Abuse And Mental Health Of U.S. Caribbean Women: The Interrelationship Of Social, Contextual, And Migratory Influences, Krims K. Lacey, Regina Parnell, Sasha R. Drummond-Lewis, Maxine Wood, Karen Powell Sears

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

For The Children? A Mixed Methods Analysis Of World Bank Structural Adjustment Loans, Health Projects, And Infant Mortality In Latin America, Shiri Noy

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Review Of Festkultur Und Gedächtnis: Die Konstruktion Einer Deutschamerikanischen Ethnizität 1848-1914, By Heike Bungert, Carol A. Leibiger

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Defining Choices Redefined: Heroic Life Narratives Of Taiwanese Buddhist Monastics, Hillary Crane

Faculty Publications

The Taiwanese Buddhist monastics in this study confront negative stereotypes that dominate within their wider societal context, and they challenge these stereotypes by positing counter-narratives. After exploring the monastics’ interest in proselytizing both to me and to a wider audience as a context that influences the interview encounter, this chapter focuses on the monastics’ response to negative stereotypes and their endeavors to craft a new, positive image of monastics. I argue that they employ the heroic trope of the da zhangfu (大丈夫, ‘great man’) to reconceive as heroic the life choices they have made that wider Taiwanese society characterizes as …

Reducing Vulnerabilities Among Female Migrants In The United States And Spain, Rachel Newcomb, Sarajane Renfroe

Faculty Publications

Migrants who establish connections in the host culture, particularly through nonprofit organizations, are more likely to integrate successfully into host societies (Martinez Garcia and Jariego 2002). Yet, anthropologist Maria Olivia Salcido and sociologist Cecilia Menjívar have noted, “gender hierarchies are embedded in the formulation, interpretation, and implementation of immigration laws, as experienced by immigrants” (2013:336). Our research, which compares two field sites in Apopka, Florida and Barcelona, Catalonia, demonstrates that despite the presence of vibrant organizations in both places, legal barriers in the U.S. hamper social integration by preventing women from accessing basic services necessary for survival. The criminalization of …

Knowledge, Access And Practice: Understanding The Affordable Care Act From The Voices Of Somali Immigrant Women In The United States, Fareeda Griffith

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Analysis Of Endocrine Response To Perceived Difference In Cross-Cultural Interactions, Carole Woolford-Hunt, Marlene Murray, Tevni Grajales Guerra, Kristina Beenken-Johnson

Faculty Publications

We live in a world where awareness of ethnic and cultural diversity is an ever increasing reality. Business and education turn to the social sciences to inform them about how to manage and optimize cross-cultural interactions. Although much research has been done on the impact of cross-cultural interactions on a wide range of variables, one less researched area is the endocrine response to cross-cultural interactions. In this study we set out to investigate the endocrine response to cross cultural interactions and the impact of these interactions on perceived differences. To do so we measured the pre and post levels of …

Interpersonal Conflict Among Caribbean Couples In Jamaica, Guyana And The United States, Krim K. Lacey, Letroy O. Cummings, Karen Powell Sears, Niki Matusko, Rohan D. Jeremiah, James S. Jackson

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Relationship Of Social And Economic Factors To Mental Disorders Among Population-Based Samples Of Jamaicans And Guyanese, Krim K. Lacey, Karen Powell Sears, Tazhmoye V. Crawford, Niki Matusko, James S. Jackson

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

A Nation Divided: Science, Religion, And Public Opinion In The United States, Shiri Noy, Timothy L. O'Brien

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Human Library Visit., Xiaoming Xu

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Animism Among Western Buddhists, Daniel S. Capper

Faculty Publications

Myriad instances of animist phenomena abound in the Buddhist world, but due to the outdated concepts of thinkers such as Edward Tylor, James George Frazer, and Melford Spiro, commonly scholars perceive this animism merely as the work of local religions, not as deriving from Buddhism itself. However, when one follows a number of contemporary scholars and employs a new, relational concept of animism that is based on respectful recognition of nonhuman personhoods, a different picture emerges. The works of Western Buddhists such as Stephanie Kaza, Philip Kapleau Roshi, and Gary Snyder express powerful senses of relational animism that arise specifically …

Substance Use, Mental Disorders And Physical Health Of Caribbeans At-Home Compared To Those Residing In The United States, Krim K. Lacey, Karen Powell Sears, Ishtar O. Govia, Ivy Forsythe-Brown, Niki Matusko, James S. Jackson

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Writing About Aj Pop B'Atz': Bruce Grindal And The Transformation Of Ethnographic Writing, Sarah Ashley Kistler

Faculty Publications

The works of Bruce Grindal teach us many things about anthropology’s humanistic tradition. With examples such as Redneck Girl and “Postmodernism as Seen by the Boys at Downhome Auto Repair,” Bruce Grindal demonstrated how we can creatively engage our ethnographic writing to reflect lived experiences. In this article, I examine Bruce’s influence on my ethnographic writing and collaborative research in the Maya community of San Juan Chamelco, Guatemala. Since 2006, I have worked collectively with a group of Chamelqueños to investigate the story of their local hero, Aj Pop B’atz’. In the sixteenth century, Aj Pop B’atz’ welcomed Spanish invaders …

Droughts, Floods, And Wildfires: Paleo Perspectives On Disaster Law In The Anthropocene, Ryan Stoa

Faculty Publications

Humanity’s impact on the earth has become so pronounced that momentum is building toward adopting a new term for the modern geological age — the “Anthropocene.” The term signifies that human activity has reached a scale that it is now a planetary force capable of shaping ecosystems and natural processes. And yet, anthropocentric natural resources management and environmental lawmaking in the United States reveals a lack of control in managing natural systems and fostering resilience to extreme events. These systems do not easily conform to the whims of reactionary environmental policies. Droughts, floods, and wildfires, in particular, are often conceptualized …

From Balinghou To Jiulinghou, China's Millennials Come Of Age, Robert L. Moore, Zhao Chang

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

An Investigation Of Somali Women’S Beliefs, Practices, And Attitudes About Health, Health Promoting Behaviors And Cancer Prevention, Shelley A. Francis, Fareeda Griffith, Kendall A. Leser

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Unintended Consequences: Reverberations Of Special Immigrant Juvenile Status, Lauren Heidbrink

Faculty Publications

This paper details the socio-legal factors that shape the relationship between the child, the family, and the state, and the ways unaccompanied migrant children’s lives have come to be defined and contested. The legal identity of migrant children is socially situated within a history that intertwines social movements of helping professionals, legal jurisdictions characterized by increasingly intolerant approaches to juveniles, and shifts in the treatment of unauthorized migrant youth under immigration law over time. In a globalized world, this triangular relationship between children, families, and the state becomes increasingly complex and dynamic. Social policies and legal norms often lag far …

Recasting The Agency Of Unaccompanied Youth, Lauren Heidbrink

Faculty Publications

This is Chapter 6 of Emerging Perspectives on Children in Migratory Circumstances: Selected Proceedings of the Working Group on Childhood and Migration June 2008 Conference, published by Drexel University Department of Culture & Communication. Click for full-text.

Excerpt from the book abstract:

Most of the pieces provide in depth points of view from child migrant perspectives—data that is often difficult to obtain and portray sensitively. Child-centered data is exceptionally valuable in helping us to grasp the micro-forces by which childhood is changing through migration and how children experience or activate agency under trying conditions...Lauren Heidbrink [discusses] Spanish speakers in …

Flirting With Conversion: Negotiating Researcher Non-Belief With Missionaries, Hillary K. Crane

Faculty Publications

This article discusses Crane’s research in a Taiwanese Buddhist monastery. Crane came to the field as a former Catholic, which provided a particular lens through which to perceive the phenomena she researched. Beyond the difficulties of having one's research interests misinterpreted by the community one is researching and the ambiguities that result from remaining open to conversion when studying religious communities, Crane examines the further difficulty confronted when researching religious personnel who have an interest in representing their religious ideals both to and through the researcher. The article examines Crane’s time in the Buddhist monastery and explores her personal ambivalence …

Las Políticas De Salud Del Banco Mundial, Shiri Noy

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

On Swearwords And Slang, Robert Moore

Faculty Publications

Slang lexemes and swearwords are commonly discussed in conjunction with each other as though they were slightly different versions of the same phenomenon. However, they clearly are not, as a careful consideration of their different prototypical functions reveals. Each of these lexical categories has a central or core function, and in each case this function is linked to the obligatory expression of affect. Different kinds of affect are entailed in the prototypical uses of slang and of swearwords, but in the case of both of these lexical types, this affect is incompatible with the formality and deference of honorifics, or, …

Review Of Liquid Bread, Edited By Wulf Schiefenhövel And Helen Macbeth, Carol A. Leibiger

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Resistance Through Transformation? The Meanings Of Gender Reversals In A Taiwanese Buddhist Monastery, Hillary Crane

Faculty Publications

This chapter demonstrates that Taiwanese Buddhist nuns resist the limitations of traditional Han gender ideologies by drawing on opportunities offered within those traditional gender constructions—opportunities that allow them to define themselves in opposition to the limited female gender characteristics and roles they reject. Crane argues that we should not interpret these nuns' masculine identification simply as resisting dominant Han gender ideologies. Instead, the nuns embrace the traditional, sexist Han ideologies, even to the point of exaggeration—portraying women not only as dangerous to the spiritual cultivation of others, but also of limited spiritual ability. They define the negative characteristics of women …

Deep East Texas Grave Markers: Types, Styles, And Motifs, Nancy Adgent, Perky Beisel, George Avery

Faculty Publications

Grave markers are often the only physical evidence of a person’s existence and offer opportunities for even ordinary people to ‘speak’ from the grave. Sometimes the deceased selects the marker or leaves instructions for its composition.

In modern times, the grieving family typically chooses the type, style, motif, and inscription according to commercial availability, aesthetic appeal, and budgetary constraints. A cemetery visitor will likely have no idea of the actual circumstances that caused a particular marker to have its shape, design, and decorative elements.

Like other possessions, markers are subject to fashion trends and since the advent of mass production …

Deep East Texas Grave Markers: Types, Styles, And Motifs, Nancy Adgent, Perky Beisel, George Avery

Faculty Publications

Grave markers are often the only physical evidence of a person’s existence and offer opportunities for even ordinary people to ‘speak’ from the grave. Sometimes the deceased selects the marker or leaves instructions for its composition.

In modern times, the grieving family typically chooses the type, style, motif, and inscription according to commercial availability, aesthetic appeal, and budgetary constraints. A cemetery visitor will likely have no idea of the actual circumstances that caused a particular marker to have its shape, design, and decorative elements.

Like other possessions, markers are subject to fashion trends and since the advent of mass production …

The House In The Market: How Q’Eqchi’ Market Women Convert Money And Commodities Into Persons And Personhood, Sarah Ashley Kistler

Faculty Publications

Recent research argues that globalization in Latin America sometimes results in the homogenization of culture and loss of indigenous identity. This paper, however, explores how Q’eqchi’-Maya market women in San Juan Chamelco, Guatemala, generate Q’eqchi’ personhood by embracing the conflicts of value introduced by the confrontation of globalization with longstanding Q’eqchi’ values. I argue that in Chamelco, market women are mediators of value who participate in global capitalism to reinforce the categories that structure indigenous life. Q’eqchi’ women engage in marketing activities not only to accrue capital resources, but also to maintain local values, centered on the junkab’al or “house,” …

Reflections On Sudanese Languages Of War And Peace, Richard A. Lobban

Faculty Publications

This pap er started as a casual reflection and was not especially scholarly in style, mainly following the 2009 Sudan Studies Association conference theme of war and peace.(1) It just sought to explore some linguistic concepts of war and peace in some Sudanese languages for which I had dictionaries at hand. I had no a priori views or hypotheses and was motivated mainly by my curiosity into Sudanese linguistics. As this survey has evolved, patterns emerged about these concepts that nudged me to look more at the context and etymology . The result is incomplete, but hopefully heuristic . A …