Anthropology Commons^™

Beyond The Indicators: Community-Defined Sustainability In Bario, Sarawak, Rhonwyn Hagedorn

Capstone Collection

This study examines how Kelabit community members in Bario, Sarawak, Malaysian Borneo define and practice sustainability within community-based tourism (CBT), and how these local understandings align with or diverge from the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The study used a thematic analysis drawing on fifteen semi-structured interviews with Kelabit community members, supplemented by tourist questionnaires and document analysis of online tourism materials. Four themes emerged: sustainability as collective stewardship; community decision-making and collaboration; cultural identity as the core of tourism; and equity, participation, and the limits of growth. Findings suggest that Kelabit community members hold a holistic, relational, and …

From Prairie To Practice: Environmental Controls And A Forensic Taphonomic Framework In Southeastern Nebraska, Jessica F. L. Gammage

Nebraska Academy of Sciences: Programs and Proceedings

Forensic taphonomy examines the postmortem processes that affect human remains, but much of the existing research has been developed in environments that differ significantly from those encountered in the Central Great Plains. This creates limitations when applying established models to regions like southeastern Nebraska, where decomposition is shaped by tallgrass prairie ecosystems, loess-derived soils, and strong seasonal variability. Addressing this gap is important for improving the accuracy and reliability of medicolegal interpretations.

This study evaluates how environmental conditions influence decomposition in southeastern Nebraska and proposes a regionally grounded framework for forensic taphonomic research. Drawing on existing literature, regional ecological data, …

Photo Essay: Affective Infrastructures Of Migration In Mindanao, Philippines, Marion Breteau

Asia Pacific Perspectives

This photo essay explores the affective infrastructures that sustain and shape return migration between the Philippines and the Arab Gulf states. By affective infrastructures, I refer to the material, moral, economic, and relational arrangements that make migration possible, and that continue to structure life after return. Rather than addressing migration as a linear trajectory (departureemployment-return), the essay presents it as processual, and encrypted in houses, debts, bodies, aspirations, and memories. The fieldwork is grounded in Tampakan, a rural municipality in South Mindanao, a region that contains one of the largest Filipino emigration basins to the Gulf. Illustrating how return reshapes …

Mountain Development In Nepal: Settlements, Infrastructure, And Economic Transformation, Keshav Bhattarai, Ambika P. Adhikari

Himalayan Research Papers Archive

As Nepal urbanizes, expands infrastructure, strengthens local governments, and explores deeper connectivity with India and China, climate change is increasing floods, landslides, heat, and water insecurity. Rapid internal migration, rising disaster risks, youth outmigration, and dependence on remittances are also revealing the limits of conventional urban development, especially in the mountainous region. The central challenge for Nepal is no longer just to accommodate growing towns and cities, but to build settlements that are safe, productive, environmentally resilient, and capable of sustaining long-term prosperity.

This paper argues that Nepal's urban future must be guided by a new development paradigm centered on …

"Help Me Live It The Way You Do": Grounding Singaporean Responses To The Rorschach Situation, Casey Y. Lee

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Contemporary research on the Rorschach and culture is striking for the latter’s disappearance as a variable of significance (Meyer et al., 2015; Meyer et al., 2007; Mihura et al., 2013; Viglione & Hilsenroth, 2001). This erasure is chronicled and reproduced in the narratives of universal objectivity, of extensive international meta-analyses, of replications, of standardized norms (Ritzler, 2004; Smith et al., 2018; Smith et al., 2020; Weiner, 2004). A different story emerges, however, when we ask, how has culture disappeared? The proposed study is a multimethod qualitative analysis of Singaporean responses to the Rorschach, aimed at generating sensitive yet critical discourses …

Tales, Traditions, And Tides: The Little Logan River And Its Role In Cache Valley's History, Culture, And Conservation, Emily A. Kovacic

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

The Little Logan River (LLR) plays a vital role in the cultural, historical, and ecological landscape of Cache Valley, Utah. Amid growing concerns raised by the Logan River Watershed Project (LRWP), which threatens to alter the river’s environment, this project seeks to understand the significance of the LLR as a cultural and recreational asset through collected oral histories. Building on folkloric perspectives of place-based storytelling, this thesis introduces the idea of vivus locum, or “that place which is alive,” through the example of the LLR to the study of folkloristics. The concept of vivus locum emphasizes the importance of …

The Legend Of The Bear Lake Monster, Melissa Anderson Asay

All Graduate Reports and Creative Projects, Fall 2023 to Present

The Bear Lake Monster is a legend that has persisted for centuries. This monster is rooted in Shoshone oral traditions and hold the potential to be based off of fossils found in the Shoshone territory. This living legend was later amplified by Mormon settlers. One settler in particular, Joseph C. Rich, played a significant role in shaping its narrative. Though he eventually admitted to fabricating sightings to encourage settlement, belief in the creature remains alive today. The serpent’s presence in local lore has undeniably influenced the Bear Lake region, shaping both its identity and tourism industry. This legend serves as …

Sari-Sari Stores As Community Pharmacies? A Qualitative Exploration Of Sari-Sari Stores Selling Medicines In The Philippines, Melissa Louise M. Prieto, Gamaliel P. Galigao, Ana Rica S. Navarra-Cruz, Louise Gabriel R. Jimenez, Gideon Lasco

Medical Anthropology

Background and Objective. Despite laws prohibiting the sale of pharmaceuticals outside licensed pharmacies, sari-sari stores continue to informally sell medicines, bridging access challenges especially in remote areas. The study explores the roles and perceptions of sari-sari stores as informal medicine providers. Methods. The study draws on ethnographic insights from key informant interviews with fourteen (14) sari-sari store owners or tinderas, probing into medicines sold in sari-sari stores and their perceived effectiveness. Data were analyzed using thematic analysis. Results. Sari-sari stores serve as informal yet critical points of access to common medicines for everyday illnesses, especially in remote areas where …

The Relativity Of Education: Student Perspectives On Artificial Intelligence In Community College, Ashley Greta Magana

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This hermeneutic phenomenological study examined how diverse community college students experience and make meaning of the integration of generative artificial intelligence (AI) into their educational contexts. Although AI is quickly transforming higher education through automated grading, personalized learning systems, and new models of assessment, the discourse surrounding its implementation remains dominated by administrators, faculty, and institutional stakeholders, while the perspectives of students, specifically community college students who are often historically underrepresented and economically marginalized, are systematically excluded. Most existing research is quantitative and centered on universities, leaving a critical gap in qualitative understanding of the most diverse population in higher …

Witchcraft Dialogues : Anthropological And Philosophical Exchanges, George Clement Bond, Diane M. Ciekawy

Ohio University Press Open Access Books

Witchcraft Dialogues analyzes the complex manner in which human beings construct, experience, and think about the occult. It brings together anthropologists, philosophers, and sociologists, from diverse social and cultural backgrounds, to engage the metaphysical properties of witchcraft and sorcery and to explore their manifestations in people’s lived experiences.

While many Africanist scholars shun the analysis of witchcraft as an appropriate domain of investigation, the experiences, thoughts, activities, and powers that witchcraft encompasses have become increasingly the source of interest and debate. Concepts of witchcraft and the phenomena to which they are applied express something fundamental to the human condition and …

The Effects Of Working With Unidentified Migrant Remains: Caregiving, Border Security, And Human Rights On The U.S.–Mexico Border, Jennifer Delaine Huddleston

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation explores how migrant death and the handling of unidentified remains operate within U.S. border governance, focusing on caregivers, forensic anthropologists, and volunteer search-and-recovery teams who recover, document, and try to identify the dead along the U.S.–Mexico border. Using classic grounded theory and reflexive visual ethnography, the study includes interviews, field observations, and documentary photography conducted in South Texas, covering Brooks, Maverick, and Webb Counties.

Instead of viewing migrant deaths as accidental humanitarian tragedies, this dissertation situates caregivers’ daily work within a historical trajectory of deterrence-based border policies, from Prevention Through Deterrence to modern state-led enforcement regimes. It demonstrates …

'We Will Be Here': Modeling Hunting Community Narratives In Avanersuaq, Greenland, Talor Stone

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

The Inughuit, a small Indigenous population in Northwest Greenland with a rich history of subsistence hunting in one of Earth’s harshest environments, have long been portrayed in Western media and academic literature as symbols of vulnerability and resilience, often depicted more as icons of climate change and a culture under threat than as actual people with hopes and aspirations. Indigenous voices are strikingly absent from these Western accounts.

As the Arctic gains prominence amid rapid growth in climate discourse, regional geopolitics, and tourism, the implications of these representations become increasingly significant. When Western crisis narratives dominate discourse and shape regulatory …

“We Want To Make You A Better Man”: African American Men With Dual Membership In Black Greek Letter Organizations And Prince Hall Masonic Lodges, Lakesha Rae Denton

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines the rationale and experiences of Black men who have initial membership within a black Greek letter organization as an undergraduate, who also join Masonic Lodges. The study was guided by one research question: 1) what the rationale is pertaining to Black men, who are initially members of Black Greek letter organizations as an undergraduate, that also join a Masonic lodge, therefore granting them dual membership status. The study was important because the value of BGLO’s has declined due to hazing and lack of leadership and guidance. Black men are not being developed as they should and while …

Hunger, Famine, And Eating Habits, Robert Dirks

Faculty Publications – Sociology and Anthropology

This paper explores how hunger and famine affect various eating habits, including commensal relations within households, shared attitudes toward eating with unfamiliar people, and typical ways of expressing appetite. Drawing on data collected from 124 societies worldwide, it provides a comparative perspective on the influence of food insecurity and nutritional stress on common, everyday eating habits. Analysis shows that chronic nutritional deficiencies and historical experiences with famine are associated with less inclusive, less amiable mealtime behaviors. Discussion offers explanations for the occasional persistence of such patterns despite ample food supply and considers the impact of nutrition alongside other factors likely …

Situs Lida Ajer Dalam Konteks Supererupsi Erupsi Toba, Zulianikha S. Putri, Arni Nazirawati, Alia Fatima

Multikultura

The Toba eruption approximately 74,000 years ago was one of the largest volcanic events of the Quaternary and is often associated with the catastrophic hypothesis, which argues that the event caused extreme global cooling and severe reductions in human populations. However, recent studies suggest that its impacts were less destructive than previously assumed. This paper examines the position of Lida Ajer Cave within the context of the Toba eruption through a literature review of archaeological, geological, and paleoenvironmental publications. The review shows that the presence of Homo sapiens at Lida Ajer, dated to approximately 73,000–63,000 years ago, places the site …

Myth As A System Of Meaning: Naturalization In The Expression “Ojo Lungguh Ning Tengah Lawang, Mengko Ora Ilok”, Sara Dwi Anjani, Triaswarin Sutanarihesti

International Review of Humanities Studies

The phrase “ojo lungguh ning tengah lawang, mengko ora ilok” is a traditional prohibition still known and applied in everyday life by Javanese people. This phrase not only functions as a rule of behavior, but as part of a system of cultural meaning passed down from generation to generation. This study aims to explain how Javanese people of different generations understand this phrase and how it functions as a myth in social life. This study employs a qualitative approach utilizing Roland Barthes’s semiotic framework and the identity perspectives of Mary Bucholtz and Kira Hall. Data were collected through …

Voters’ Perception Of Nigeria’S Electoral Process: An X-Ray Of The 2023 Presidential Election, Omamurhieme Julia Akpodovhan, Chukwuma Anyanwu Dr

International Review of Humanities Studies

In its six decades of post-independence, Nigeria has experienced the best and worst in military and democratic governance fluctuating from one to the other. It has purportedly settled into a democracy but with highly flawed electoral processes. This paper interrogates the February 25, 2023 Presidential election with a view to assessing the perception of voters in the exercise to determine whether there has been an improvement or otherwise in the status quo of how previous elections were conducted. Drawing from historical antecedents, participant observation and opinion poll research techniques, the authors relied on information from five of ten polling booths …

Onomatopoeia In The Digital Comic The Wormworld Saga (2010), Nur Kholidah, Julia Wulandari

International Review of Humanities Studies

This study examines the forms and meanings of onomatopoeia derived from concrete sounds in the digital comic The Wormworld Saga. The study aims to explore the use of onomatopoeia in The Wormworld Saga and to describe its forms and meanings using a descriptive qualitative method. This study analyzes the forms of onomatopoeia based on the categories proposed by Gross (1988) and analyzes their meanings based on the classification proposed by Körtvélyessy and Štekauer (2024). The results show that there are 54 onomatopoeia classified as concrete sounds. In terms of form, the most common onomatopoeia are non-word forms, accounting for 41 …

Constructing Geisha Representation: Textual Analysis Of Memoirs Of A Geisha On Social Media X, Khadijah Hamumpuni Setyawan, Rouli Esther Pasaribu

International Review of Humanities Studies

Geisha are professional entertainers who have mastered Japanese traditional arts and often appear in various media covering Japanese culture. However, there are frequent misunderstandings about geisha outside Japan. The release of the Japanese-produced film Shogun has sparked discussions about older films from the west that are set in Japan, such as Memoirs of a Geisha. This study aims to analyze the representation of geisha in Memoirs of a Geisha (2005) and how that representation is constructed and reinterpreted by Japanese and Western audiences through the social media platform X. Using textual analysis, this study examines the movie as a cultural …

Reinforcing Media Governance In Indonesian Dynamic Cyber Space, Poppy Setiawaty Nurisnaeny, Hendra Kaprisma, Chrisna Yudhawinata, Sudirman Sudirman

International Review of Humanities Studies

Following the rapid change in technology development, the Indonesian mass media have undergone a digital transformation. This digital mass media and its users have evolved, assimilated, and integrated themselves to fit in the cyber world. This distinguishing feature distinguishes them from traditional mass media. The cyber environment's infinite international boundaries are both advantageous and disadvantageous, as it is difficult to govern digital activity outside Indonesia's jurisdiction. This unregulated environment became a breeding ground for cybercrime, making the digital space unsafe for individuals and threatening national security. In response to this issue, the Indonesian government has enacted various laws and policies, …