Anthropology Commons^™

“Babies Aren’T Persons”: A Survey Of Delayed Personhood, David F. Lancy

Sociology, Social Work and Anthropology Faculty Publications

To better understand attachment from a cross-cultural and historical perspective, I have amassed over 200 cases from the ethnographic and archaeological records that reveal cultural models (D'Andrade and Strauss 1992) of infancy. The 200 cases represent all areas of the world, historical epochs from the Mesolithic to the present and all types of subsistence patterns (Appendix 1). The approach is inductive where cases with similar models of infancy are clustered into archetypes. My principal finding from this analysis is that, in the broadest overview, infants are, effectively, placed on probation and not immediately integrated into the society. Attachment failure is …

'Deviant' Burials In Archaeology, Jesslyn E. Hodgson

Anthropology Publications

The term ‘deviant’ is used to describe burials that deviate from the normative burial rites of a given society, at a given point in time. The problem with applying such a term to the archaeological record rests predominantly in the fact that the term ‘deviant’ has a negative connotation. This negative connotation insinuates that the individual in the burial context may have been viewed by their society in a negative light, however, through analysis of case studies it is shown that many ‘deviant’ burials are not in fact burials of people viewed as deviant, but ‘different’ burials given to people …

Differences In Intergenerational Fertility Associations By Sex And Race In Saba, Dutch Caribbean, 1876–2004, Julia Jennings, Paul W. Leslie

Anthropology Faculty Scholarship

This study examines the intergenerational transmission of fertility behavior in Saba, Dutch Caribbean from 1876 to 2004 using reconstituted genealogies. Pearson product-moment correlation coefficients of several fertility measures and event-history models of age at first birth are used to explore relationships between the fertility of mothers and their children. The strength of intergenerational fertility ties varies by race and gender. Individuals that are better positioned to realize their fertility preferences have the strongest intergenerational associations, while individuals with the most limited reproductive options have the weakest intergenerational associations. This evidence supports hypotheses that posit the intergenerational transmission of attitudes, goals, …

Socioeconomic Differences In Body Mass Index, Neighborhood Satisfaction, Stress, And Perceived Racism Among African Americans In Metropolitan Detroit, Corey Zolondek

Wayne State University Dissertations

This exploratory study tested the research hypothesis that among African Americans in Metropolitan Detroit, neighborhood satisfaction, stress and perception of racism influence obesity differently based on income. The three expected results for the data were as follows: income does not have a link to obesity; links between BMI and the study variables (neighborhood satisfaction, stress, and perceived racism) vary according to income category; and the study variables (neighborhood satisfaction, stress, and perceived racism) influence the variability of BMI differently according to income category. The results indicate that there are no income differences in how the study variables influence obesity. Therefore, …

The Diagnosis Narratives & The Healing Ritual, James Peter Meza

Wayne State University Dissertations

ABSTRACT

THE DIAGNOSIS NARRATIVES & THE HEALING RITUAL

by JAMES PETER MEZA

December 2013

Advisor: Dr. Andrea Sankar

Major: Anthropology (medical)

Degree: Doctor of Philosophy

The goal of this dissertation was to describe healing practices in the setting of clinical encounters between patients and doctors. The theoretical background for this research began with the theory of the mind and using concepts from cognitive anthropology described the anthropological self as distinguished from person or identity. Additionally, the conceptual framework of cognitive anthropology was used to describe narrative theory. Narrative theory in the form of the narrative structure of experience, particularly the …

Public Buildings And Civic Benefactions In Western Rough Cilicia: Insights From Signaling Theory, Luann Wandsnider

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

In the Hellenistic and Roman world of the eastern Mediterranean, Greek and Greco-Roman cities came to be defined by their physical cityscape. These buildings were constructed by specific city institutions, such as the council and the assembly, and financed through city funds, mass subscription and, importantly, public benefactions. Public benefactions, which also included support for festivals and competitions, were made by certain elite and usually wealthy individuals to the benefit of a defined community of citizens (and sometimes non-citizens, as in the case of fortification walls). Institutions within the benefiting community, again the council and the assembly, acknowledged these gifts …

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 …

The Adjustment Of Asian American Families To The U.S. Context: The Ecology Of Strengths And Stress, Yan Ruth Xia

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

The number of Asian American families is on the rise. Asian American families are a diverse group. This chapter focuses on Asian American families that migrated to the United States in the last three decades. This chapter challenges the media’s depiction of them as a Model Minority. Because of this stereotype, many challenges that this group encounters may not gain adequate attention. The chapter examines their strengths and resiliency, along with the ecology of stress that influences family dynamics.

Emotion Meaning-Making: Identity, Discourse And Social Interaction Among Arab Immigrant Healthcare Providers, Anne Katz

Wayne State University Dissertations

This dissertation sought to deepen understandings of emotion and its role in human personal and social life by exploring how a group of Arab immigrant health care providers, involved in the diagnosis and treatment of mental illness in one clinic in the United States, assign meaning to emotion. Affectively charged and fluid, often involving conditions of disruption and dislocation, the experience of migration offers a fertile place in which to examine the roles that social and interpretive practices play in constituting emotional experience. Due to increases in patterns of migration associated with globalization, mental health diagnoses are often arrived at …

Sharing And Sustaining Maya Environmental Heritage In Southern Belize, Rebecca K. Zarger, Kristina Baines

Publications and Research

This paper documents an approach to sharing and sustaining Maya environmental and cultural heritage through the development of a primary school curriculum and associated activities in order to bring cultural knowledge and practices to formal school settings. Methods include long-term ethnographic research on environmental knowledge and practices in two Maya communities in Toledo; participatory workshops with educators; iterative consultations with district educators, community leaders, and families; and community for a focus on discussions of how and whether such information could be integrated into formal schooling. Curricula and content for workbooks, radio shows, and field guides are comprised of both generalized …

Personal Profile: Amanda Ndemo Archeological Accessibility Through 3-D Laser Scanning, Rebekah Rifareal

AUCTUS: The Journal of Undergraduate Research and Creative Scholarship

The familiar signs that chide visitors to refrain from touching historical artifacts in museums would have no place in Dr. Bernard Means’ Virtual Curation Laboratory. Thanks to the innovative, fast-paced world of 3-D scanning, senior Amanda Ndemo had an archeological site at her fingertips, all while staying in Richmond for the VCU Honors Summer Undergraduate Research Program (HSURP).

Sabry, Somaya Sami, Arab-American Women’S Writing And Performance: Orientalism, Race, And The Idea Of The Arabian Nights, Jeana Jorgensen

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

No abstract provided.

Computational Analysis Of The Body In European Fairy Tales, Scott Weingart, Jeana Jorgensen

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

This article explores how digital humanities research methods can be used to analyze the representations of gendered bodies in European fairy tales, a flexible and pervasive genre that has influenced Western children's education and acquisition of gender identity for centuries. By blending the theoretical and methodological concerns of folkloristics, gender studies, and large-scale scientific research, this article demonstrates the utility of cross-disciplinary collaboration in asking traditional questions of traditional materials with new methods. To facilitate this research, a hand-coded database listing every reference to a body or body part in the 233 fairy tales was created. Analysis revealed strong indications …

Sorting Out Donkey Skin (Atu 510b): Toward An Integrative Literal-Symbolic Analysis Of Fairy Tales, Jeana Jorgensen

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

This article debates the merits of fairy tale interpretive frameworks that privilege the psychological and symbolic, versus those that utilize a literal and feminist orientation. Using ATU 510B as a test case, for its intriguing blend of real-world elements and the fantastic, the author suggests that a synthesis of literal and symbolic theories allows for the fullest understanding of the polyvalent meanings of tale, which is particularly problematic due to its depictions of incest. Drawing examples from canonical as well as contemporary versions of ATU 510B, various psychoanalytic and feminist interpretations of the tale type are put to the test, …

The Black And The White Bride: Dualism, Gender, And Bodies In European Fairy Tales, Jeana Jorgensen

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

Fairy tales are one of the most important folklore genres in Western culture, spanning literary and oral cultures, folk and elite cultures, and print and mass media forms. As Jack Zipes observes: ‘The cultural evolution of the fairy tale is closely bound historically to all kinds of storytelling and different civilizing processes that have undergirded the formation of nation-states.’¹⁴³ Studying fairy tales thus opens a window onto European history and cultures, ideologies, and aesthetics.

Sibyl 2013, Otterbein University

Otterbein University Yearbooks

No abstract provided.

Resurrecting Old Pattonia: Uncovering The Lifeways Of A 19th Century Shipping Port Community, Zachary M. Overfield

Sociology & Anthropology Theses - Archive

An East Texas steamboat landing community, known as Pattonia, operated from 1843 to the late 19th century. Here I attempt to identify what socioeconomic stratification and consumerism on the landscape meant for the daily lives of Pattonia's past occupants. In order to address this question, I interpret the architectural features that once stood at Pattonia and their spatial organization. Additionally, I conduct a ceramic analysis of two household assemblages with unknown occupants in order to determine their relative socioeconomic status and reconstruct the social landscape of Pattonia. These methods enable a greater understanding of the unique historical and social significance …

Study Abroad And Identity: The African American Experience, Alicia Ranney

Capstone Collection

Not all students are alike, nor should they be treated as 'one size fits all' in study abroad. Students have different backgrounds, goals, and expectations of what they will gain from an international academic experience. Minority students face different types of challenges in study abroad than their non-minority counterparts.

This paper seeks to answer the question “does study abroad change the identity of African American students?” and examines the challenges of identity and racism and how those two factors may decrease participation rates of African Americans in study abroad. Students from Marygrove College in Detroit, Michigan were surveyed before and …

Preliminary Validation Of Handheld X-Ray Fluorescence (Hhxrf) Spectrometry: Distinguishing Osseous And Dental Tissue From Non-Bone Material Of Similar Chemical Composition, Heather Zimmerman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Forensic anthropologists normally examine bone from a variety of medicolegal contexts. The skeletal remains may in some cases be highly fragmented or taphonomically modified, making it difficult to sort bone from non-bone material. In these cases, the forensic anthropologist may rely on microscopic or destructive chemical analyses to sort the material. However, these techniques are costly and time-intensive, prompting the use of nondestructive analytical methods in distinguishing bone and teeth from non-bone materials in a limited number of cases. The proposed analytical techniques are limited in that they rely on an examination of the major elements in the material, and …

Understanding Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years Of Solitude: An Analysis With A Lens For History And Anthropology, John D. Norcross

A with Honors Projects

One Hundred Years of Solitude is a work of fiction, but the
happenings of this novel directly parallel the regional history of the
Caribbean coast of Colombia along with its interactions with Bogotá (the
capitol of Colombia) and the surrounding nation. In an area of the world
where any post-colonial history is remarkably fluid and an accurate precolonial
history is almost non-existent, Garcia Marquez’s account of
historical happenings within the realm of fiction is remarkably
significant.

The Clothing Culture Of Parkland College, Abigail Brooks

A with Honors Projects

An ethnography of the clothing choices of students at Parkland College, a community college in Central Illinois.

Houses In A Landscape: Memory And Everyday Life Mesoamerica ‐ By Hendon, Julia A. [Review Of The Book Houses In A Landscape: Memory And Everyday Life In Mesoamerica, By J. A. Hendon], Jennifer P. Mathews

Sociology & Anthropology Faculty Research

A review of the book Houses in a Landscape: Memory and Everyday Life in Mesoamerica in which the author uses the material remains found in and around ancient Maya domestic spaces in three settlements in Honduras, Hendon to examine aspects of everyday life.

A New Plant Record For Iowa: Lactuca Hirsuta (Asteraceae), Thomas L. Eddy

Journal of the Iowa Academy of Science: JIAS

A new record of a native vascular plant, Lactuca hirsuta Muhlenberg ex Nuttall var. sanguinea (Bigelow) Fernald, is reported for Iowa. A specimen was collected in 1983 by the author during a study of the Swaledale railroad prairie in Cerro Gordo County, north central Iowa (Eddy 1988). The plant was inexplicably excluded in the species catalogue when a Swaledale railroad flora was published in 1988; thus, this “new” Iowa record in 2013 was collected 30 years prior. The voucher specimen was “re-discovered” by Dr. Neil A. Harriman at the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh (OSH), and its identification verified.

Queering Ghana: Sexuality, Community, And The Struggle For Cultural Belonging In An African Nation, William D. Banks

Wayne State University Dissertations

In this dissertation, I provide an analysis of the social practices of a queer community in southern Ghana known as Saso people. Drawing on in-depth interviews with indigenous religious priests, I focus specifically on practices of leadership and kinship, sexual initiation, and engagement and marriage. I interpret these practices as a set of strategies deployed by Saso people to articulate a sense of cultural belonging in contemporary Ghana. In so doing, I make a contribution to the scant ethnographic literature on queer African communities, while demonstrating the value of priests as research subjects. My ethnographic fieldwork, as well as that …

Re: Archaeology In The Gordon?, Heather A. Wholey, Gerard Hertel

Gordon Natural Area Archaeology Project Documents

No abstract provided.

`Open' For Collective Business: The Governance Of Contemporary Economic Cooperatives In A Corporate Q'Eqchi' Maya Town, Michael Frederic Young

Theses and Dissertations

This article examines the governance of a Q'eqchi' Maya community located on multiple margins who are cooperatively managing several businesses. I do so by first situating this study within the context of Guatemalan history wherein cooperatives were first promoted in various economic and environmental zones only to be subsequently viewed as subversive and targeted by the military. The community within this study is located in the Izabal Department, a region far less affected by Guatemala's genocidal past. I argue that the cooperative businesses created by this community have allowed for a selective incorporation of market-based relations that mitigate the commonly …

A Study Of Anthropomorphic Figurines In The Neolithic Of Southwest Asia And Southeastern Europe, Carl T. Feagans

Sociology & Anthropology Theses - Archive

Anthropomorphic figurines resemble people, very often the people who created them. Thus, these figurines stand to provide insight into their cultures perhaps from the perspective of the original members of the culture. Researchers in figurine studies often speculate on the purposes of figurines and attempt to interpret their meanings. This study attempts to examine anthropomorphic figurines of the Neolithic in Southwest Asia and Southeastern Europe through cataloged and compared physical characteristics of the figurines themselves gathered from published data into a relational database. Figurine data are then imported into statistical software for analysis. The data produced in this study support …

Geospatial Virtual Heritage: A Gesture-Based 3d Gis To Engage The Public With Ancient Maya Archaeology, Heather Richards-Rissetto, Jim Robertsson, Jennifer Von Schwerin, Giorgio Agugario, Fabio Remondino, Gabrio Girardi

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

This paper presents our research to develop a gesture-based 3D GIS system to engage the public in cultural heritage. It compares two types of interaction—device-based vs. natural interaction— and summarizes the beta-testing results of a 3D GIS tool for archaeology, called QueryArch3D, in which participants used device-based interaction (i.e. mouse and keyboard). It follows with a description of the gesture-based system—that we developed in response to these beta-tests. The system uses QueryArch3D and Microsoft’s Kinect to enable people use body movements (in lieu of keyboard or mouse) to navigate a virtual reality landscape, query 3D objects, and call up photos, …

Sedentism, Social Change, Warfare, And The Bow In The Ancient Pueblo Southwest, Paul F. Reed, Phil R. Geib

Department of Anthropology: Faculty Publications

In the ancient American Southwest, use of the bow developed relatively rapidly among Pueblo people by the fifth century AD. This new technology replaced the millennia-old atlatl and dart weaponry system. Roughly 150 years later in the AD 600s, Pueblo socioeconomic organization began to evolve rapidly, as many groups adopted a much more sedentary life. Multiple factors converged to allow this sedentary pattern to emerge, but the role of the bow in this process has not been fully explored. In this paper, we trace the development of the bow and discuss its role as sedentism emerged and social changes occurred …

Dog Burials Associated With Human Burials In The West Indies During The Early Pre-Columbian Ceramic Age (500 Bc-600 Ad), Sandrine Grouard, Sophia Perdikaris, Karyne Debue

School of Global Integrative Studies: Faculty Publications

Across the Caribbean, the widespread presence of canine remains at archaeological sites from the Saladoid period raises questions about the role of “man’s best friend.” Dog (Canis familiaris) remains have been found located in both refuse middens and burials adjacent to human graves in a number of sites in the French Antilles and Barbuda, West Indies. This paper will critically examine dog remains and discuss the varied duality of the dog’s role in the Saladoid world: from food source to lifelong companion. The importance of dogs within Amerindian sites from Saint Martin, the Guadeloupe archipelago, Martinique and Barbuda …