Rebecca Meyers, Ph.D. candidate in Anthropology at Brown University and
Dartmouth 03 LALACS
"'Corn is Food, not Contraband': Discourses and Practices of Legality on
the Mexico-Guatemala Border."
May 12, 2008
John Schoeberlein
Changing Understandings of Islam in Post-Soviet Central Asia
February 21, 2008
Nurit Bird-David
Feeding Nayaka Children and English Readers: The Relational Aspect of Child
Feeding in "The Giving Environment" and the Problem of Writing about it in
English
February 14, 2008
Christopher Ball, McKennan Postdoctoral Fellow in Anthropology
Genres of Territorialization in the Brazilian Upper Xingu
November 15, 2007
Professor Ball will discuss interethnic negotiation over the construction of
a hydroelectric dam near the Xingu Indigenous Park in Brazil. He will highlight
how different speech genres are used to different ends by indigenous and
national Brazilian participants,and he wiIl analyze the connections between
these cultural ways of speaking and cultural models of space and territory.
Richard Begay (D'87)
Director of Historic Preservation
Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians
Listening to the Voices: Working with Indigenous Communities
Student presentations
Jacob Appelbaum '07: "Transforming Culture in a Modern World: Local Agency
and Change in Tokelau"
This thesis explores cultural responses to modernization and globalization
on Nukunonu, Tokelau. Nukunonu is the middle of the three coral atolls of
Tokelau, a territory of New Zealand located roughly 250 miles north of Samoa in
western Polynesia. Tokelau has undergone rapid changes in recent decades,
acquiring new technologies and ideas as well as establishing new connections
with the outside world. Many anthropologists studying cultural change and
modernization have described both processes as negative ones. They see
globalization as bulldozing indigenous culture, leading to cultural loss and
homogenization, increasing poverty, creating problems of alcoholism, and
harming the environment. Tokelau provides an important counter-example to these
studies. Its culture has changed but has not been lost. This thesis will
challenge other negative examinations of globalization and modernization by
exploring Tokelau's unique circumstances. (Sponsored by the the Claire Garber
Goodman Fund).
Jacob Aguiar '07: "Quartzite Deposits and Folsom Lithics from Gunnison
Basin, Colorado: Proveniencing Stone Tool REmains at the Mountaineer Site"
Quartzite was chosen by prehistoric people throughout the world for stone
tools due to its workability and durability, as well as its presence in almost
all regions inhabited by humans. Despite this fact, there has been relatively
little study devoted to quartzite lithic materials. The 5GN.1EQ site of the
Upper Gunnison Basin is a quartzite quarry that shows evidence of extensive
human modification. Scattered atop bedrock of fairly homogenous, fine grained
off-white to grey quartzite is colored material. Much of the colored, non-grey,
stone appears to be a product of human modification. Numerous flakes, as well
as worked cobbles, of various colors are present atop the plateau. To test
whether the scattered stone originated in the bedrock or was manuported from
another location, Laser Ablation Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry
(LA-ICP-MS) was conducted on in situ and modified samples. LA-ICP-MS confirmed
that the scatter and bedrock are quite similar in concentrations of the Rare
Earth Elements (REE). To test the possibility of prehistoric annealing, heating
trials were conducted with the intent of inducing color change in in-situ
samples that would mimic the colors found atop the bedrock. Finally, Raman
Spectroscopy was conducted on scatter colored samples, as well as in-situ
samples (those that were unheated and others that were heated in the lab at
various temperatures and durations of time). Even though a color change did not
occur in in-situ samples at temperatures achievable in aboriginal fires,
perhaps a chemical or textural change occurred that is detectable with Raman
Spectroscopy. If so, Raman Spectroscopy could have valuable applications in
heat treatment studies. (Sponsored by the Claire Garber Goodman Fund).
Karen Jorge '07: "The Experiences of Women Living with HIV in Rural Vermont
and New Hampshire"
In my thesis, I explore the experiences of women living with HIV in rural
New England. Through their narratives, I discuss how their diagnosis of being
HIV positive affects their lives and influences how they construct their
identities in different situations. In particular, I examine construction of
identity in the contexts of social relationships, larger communities, medical
interactions, and in their roles as mothers and partners. In doing so, I
explore issues of actual and feared rejection, acceptance and support, and the
multiple layers of stigma that the women encounter. This allows me to trace
their self-described identities and compare them with the identities forced
upon them by others, as well as the marginality that they both resist and
accept. In discussing the women’s narratives, I identify similarities and
differences in the various women’s lives, and unpack the specificities of their
individual situations that cause these comparable and contrasting experiences
to arise. (Sponsored by the the Claire Garber Goodman Fund).
Kathleen Boyne '07: "Cultural Factors Influencing High Childhood Obesity
Rates in Chicago"
Cities nationwide have experienced rising rates of childhood obesity leading
to increased health concerns and a critical need for more research. Focusing on
more in-depth cultural factors, I looked to the primarily African-American
community of North Lawndale on Chicago's west side to construct a framework
that revealed a system of interrelated cultural elements likely influencing the
alarmingly high rate of 51%. Through general participant observation,
attendance at two weight management clinics, interviews, journals kept by
children, surveys of food resources, and mapping certain community features I
was able to examine the reality of combating such an 'epidemic.' (Sponsored by
the the Claire Garber Goodman Fund).
Esther Perman '07: "Creating Cultural Identity Through the Urban Maori
Marae"
The marae, a ceremonial building complex, is a physical statement of Maori
identity, kinship, and connection to the land. Architecture, carvings of
ancestors, and special protocol are used to construct this statement. Use of
the space for life celebrations, teaching, debates, and hosting visitors
reinforces the identity of the Maori through transmission of culture.
Traditionally built by Maori within a clan, marae have been built in urban
spaces in which new institutions of association have replaced kinship networks.
This change of users, along with other social processes of urbanization, has
influenced the design and use of marae in Auckland and Wellington, New Zealand.
In this paper, I examine three urban marae in academic and museum settings:
Hotuniu at the Auckland War Memorial Musuem, Waipapa at the University of
Auckland, and Rongomaraeroa at Te Papa Tongarewa in Wellington. I discuss how
each is used to assert Maori identity in contemporary New Zealand. (Sponsored
by the the Claire Garber Goodman Fund).
OFF HUMAN NATURE
Jonathan Marks
University of North Carolina - Charlotte
May 14, 2007
The concept of "human nature" is a pre-Darwinian one, but has been adopted
by sociobiologists and evolutionary psychologists as a Darwinian
rallying-point. Predicated on an unproblematic separation of "nature" from
"culture," however, aspects of "human nature" have proven far easier to assert
than to demonstrate. Nevertheless, it remains popular in the media, fueled by
the rise of evolutionary psychology in popular science and its increasing
legitimization in mainstream science. I will argue that there is no "human
nature" separable from culture, and that consequently the concept of "human
nature" is itself fundamentally anti-Darwinian.
This event was sponsored by the Robert A. 1925 and Catherine L.
McKennan Fund for Anthropology, and
The Department of Anthropology
Alternative Life History Reconstructions of the Robust
Australopithecines
Alan Shabel (Dartmouth '92)
Department of Integrative Biology University of California, Berkeley
Alan Shabel's work centers on the intersection of paleontology,
modern ecology, and anthropology. He seeks to reconstruct the ecological and
faunal context of human emergence during the Plio-Pleistocene. Current evidence
shows that Paranthropus arose about 2.6 million years ago, and Homo appeared
soon after. These two hominids lived together in the same habitats for over one
million years. How did two such closely related organisms coexist on the same
landscape for so long?
"Gender and the Political Uses of Language in Morocco"
Dr. Fatima Sadiqi Research Associate and Visiting Professor of Women's
Studies and Islamic Religious Studies, Divinity School, Harvard
University
October 3, 2006
Fatima Sadiqi is professor of Linguistics at Mohamed ben Abdallah University
in Fez, Morocco, and director of its Center for Studies and Research on Women.
Her books include Women, Gender, and Language in Morocco (Leiden: Brill
2003) and Grammaire de Berbère (Paris: Harmattan, 1997), and she has
published over sixty articles on language and women's issues in
Morocco. She is editor-in-chief of Languages and Linguistics, a former
Fulbright scholar, and is currently a visiting scholar at the Women's Studies
in Religion Program at Harvard University. She also teaches regularly in
Dartmouth's Foreign Study Program in Fez, Morocco.
The interplay between gender, sexual identity and language raises issues of
power, social inequalities and social norms. Lan-guage plays a crucial role in
social structure and hierarchy and its political use resides in exploiting
polysemy, inherent in language, in order to achieve ideological effect. Being a
multilingual Muslim country, Morocco offers an interesting case study in this
respect because of its four major languages: Standard Arabic, Moroccan Arabic,
Ber-ber and French. Each of these languages carries specific social mean-ings
that significantly interact with gender, politics, and religious power. Whereas
Standard Arabic may be termed “male”, Berber is “female”, and Moroccan Arabic
and French are both “male” and “female” but with highly distinctive social
overtones.
This event was sponsored by:
the Robert A. McKennan Fund of the Department of Anthropology at Dartmouth
College,
the John Sloan Dickey Endowment for International Understanding, and
the Rockefeller Center for Public Policy and the Social Sciences.
The Past as Ideology: Archaeological Knowledge and the Break-Up of the
USSR
Philip L. Kohl Professor of Anthropology Kathryn Wasserman Davis
Professor of Slavic Studies Director, IPARC (International Program for
Anthropological Research in the Caucasus) Wellesley College
October 10, 2006
The world-renown archaeologist, Professor Philip Kohl, discussed some
distinctive features of Soviet archaeology, including its complex and
contradictory relationship with Soviet nationalities policy, its official use
of Marxist evolutionary theory, and its focus on ethnogenesis and the
determination of archaeological cultures. He also explored the role of
intellectuals in separatist political movements that began during the Gorbachev
era, presenting several examples of how the remote past was and still is used
to justify claims to specific territories and/or provide meaningful frameworks
of understanding in a world set free from its former state-sponsored
ideology.
Thesis Presentations and Goodman Presentations
May 17 and May 18, 2006
Hawaiian Identity: Turning Back to Religious Roots
(Professor Welsch)
This project explores how “traditional” religion is being used to create a
contemporary Hawaiian identity on the Big Island of Hawaii. Are Hawaiians using
“traditional” religion to mobilize themselves into cohesive social groups? Is
“traditional” religion a substitution of Christianity? Or is “traditional”
religion a reaction to Christian New Life Churches? Is the practice of
“traditional” religion limited to a narrow demographic group or is it a broader
movement? This study will survey three historical religious sites on the Big
Island of Hawaii over an eight-week period during the early winter of 2006.
Research will consist of observation, participant observation and informal
interviews. The data collected will provide information on who is participating
(age, gender, educational level. etc.), what their activities consist of, how
traditionally based these activities are, and some sense of their reason for
engagement. This project will form the basis of a senior thesis.
Urban Witchcraft in Venezuela: A Religious Marketplace of
opportunity and Competition (Professor Watanabe)
My thesis is to analyze ethnographically a modern brujo ("spiritual
worker") in the urban setting of Caracas, Venezuela. My primary source of
information will be my ethnographic field notes/gathered during ten weeks of
fieldwork, which were mostly spent living and working alongside a thirty-two
year-old brujo named Guillermo Sandoval. The thesis will focus
specifically on Guillermo's relationship with his social, economic and
spiritual environment, in an effort to illuminate the intricate ties between
the practice of brujeria and the environmental conditions that
perpetuate its existence. I will also examine the religious system at the heart
of Guillermo's personal brand of brujeria. The various religious
styles which he incorporates into his practice create a complex syncretic web
of rituals and beliefs. Guillermo's constantly transforming practice defies
many common conceptions of religion. This thesis will undoubtedly raise
questions about the underlying belief system behind the shifting trends of
Venezuelan brujeria.
From Bodies to Beliefs: A Question in Medical Anthropology
Using Ancient Egyptian Mummies (Professor Welsch, Professor
Korey)
The thesis studies the applicability of modem medical anthropology to the
Ancient world, and populations known only through archaeology. In particular,
Ancient Egyptian conceptions of illness will be studied through an examination
of the treatments of disease visible on mummified remains. Using CAT scans and
plain film x-ray of select mummies currently being held in the collections at
the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and the Manchester Museum of
England, an in depth examination will be made to determine both disease and
possible human interventions. Relating the findings from diagnostic imaging to
artwork and literature, I will attempt to establish bridges from the bodies to
the beliefs of the Ancient Egyptians.
Unidas Para Vivir Mejor (UPAVIM): A Case Study in
Deconstructing the Complexities of Development in the Squatter Settlements of
Guatemala City (Guatemala) (Professor Watanabe)
My thesis focuses on a grassroots cooperative, Unidas Para Vivir Mejor
(United for a Better Life or UPAVIM), located in the squatter settlements of
Guatemala City, Guatemala. UPAVIM focuses on community aid programs ranging
from medical, economic, and educational all of which are indispensable for the
marginalized community. In my research I found three distinct groups co-exist
within the organization. Consequently these three groups have different views
on the purpose and needs of the organization. These three views represent the
problems endemic to development organizations discussed in post-developmental
approaches: the differentiation between top-down processes versus bottom-up
processes of development. By recognizing post-developmental literature and its
applicability to my research, my thesis will address the greater issues posed
in the discourse of developmental.
Reclaiming Tse-whit-zen: Contesting Burial Rights in the
Pacific Northwest (Professor Ranco, Professor Nichols)
My thesis examines the contestation of Native American burial rights,
focusing on the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe's reburial conflict with the
Washington State Department of Transportation and the community of Port
Angeles. Contemporary power relations between Natives and the state cannot be
understood in a simplistic oppressor-oppressed paradigm, but must be considered
as a dialogue, both within modern legal structures as well as with the
"traditional" cultural past and the effects of colonial history. My initial
field research focused on understanding the daily influence
Tse-whit-zen (ch-WHEET-son) had on the Lower Elwha Klallam people,
whether through reconnecting with the oldways, providing employment, causing
mental and emotional trauma, or influencing tribal and family politics. This
thesis, however, will focus on unraveling how the Klallam are using Western
systems of justice to achieve their goal of reburial using my fieldwork as an
ethnographic grounding to my arguments. By examining the conflict and lawsuit
through the lens of the colonial past, I hope to determine how litigation of
cultural rights influences the experience of being Klallam today.
A Critical History of the Race-IQ Controversy (Professor Korey,
Professor Welsch)
The thesis surveys the literature on the race-IQ controversy dealing
primarily with the debate in the United States after 1969. Focusing on the
debate in the second half of the twentieth century and beyond, I will analyze
both the content and character of the arguments on both sides of the
issue.
The thesis is a sociology of knowledge, focusing more on the context in which
each paper was written as opposed to analysis of the merits of each individual
work. I will discuss how scientific knowledge is created in the tradition of
Thomas Kuhn, focusing on the social sciences.
I also explore how ideology works its way into scientific discourse, and shapes
the flow of that discourse. Thought on race and intelligence are both
influenced by scientific observations as well as ideology, and the nature of
this interaction changed over time, which in turn changed how the two ideas,
race and intelligence, interacted at any given moment in time.
The thesis is a history of science, chronicling the evolution of scientific
discourse and knowledge on race, and intelligence. The thesis will also analyze
the purpose of scientific discourse, and its function in society.
In this proposal, I deal primarily with the works surrounding Arthur Jensen's
1969 paper, since the majority of the sources I have read come from that time
period. The completed thesis has works up to the present, with a particular
focus on works surrounding The Bell Curve.
Teotihuacan Obsidian at Cosatlan 23 (Professor
Nichols)
During its height in the Early Classic period Teotihuacan was one of the
largest cities in the world. Approximately one third of the residents in the
city were non-agricultural craft specialists, producing both utilitarian and
elite goods. Cosotlan 23 is an apartment compound located in the northwestern
section of the city, which contains unusually dense concentrations of figurine
fragments, pottery, and obsidian that give preliminary implications of
production at the site. It is currently under study by Kristen Sullivan of
Arizona State University as part of her dissertation. In the summer of 2005,1
worked under the direction of Sullivan analyzing the obsidian debitage
collected during her extensive surface collection in the fall of 2004. I
propose to continue my preliminary analysis and contribute to the current
knowledge about obsidian consumption in craft production within the city.
Veiled or Unveiled Honorable Identities: The Effects of Islam,
Social Morality, and Gender Relations on the Identity Creation of College-Aged
Women in Turkey (Professor Kan)
The thesis examines issues of honor and identity creation faced by women
attending university in Ankara, Turkey. These issues of identity creation can
be divided into three interrelated sociocultural phenomena that affect the
creation of women's identity: (1) the degree of personal connection to Islam in
contemporary Turkey, (2) public conduct, and (3) interactions with men. There
is a large range for the degree of connection to Islam, which directly
influences opinions regarding the veil. Some women are very religious, some are
very secular, but the majority are somewhere in between. The years spend at
university serve as a liminal time for people, particularly women, to
experiment with various identities. Since identity is formed within the
socially acceptable boundaries, the Turkish university offers a place to push
the limits and see how much freedom is permitted. Furthermore, social conduct
and interactions between the genders on campus are influenced by but are not
identical to the cultural rules for the same phenomena in the larger Turkish
society.
Using Middle East Technical University as a case study, this thesis examines
several issues: (a) the degree of influence of Islam on the creation of
identity of women receiving higher education; (b) how the identities of the
university women whose commitment to Islam ranges from strong to moderate to
non-existent are expressed through their clothing choices, particularly in
regards to issues surrounding the veil; (c) how the university culture and
students' identities created in the universities compare to the culture of
Turkish society and particularly how social conduct on campus, especially
regarding interactions with men, compares to that outside campus; and (d) the
role of honor in the establishment of the boundaries in identity creation.
The Jews, Christians, Zoroastrians and Manichaeans in the Persian
Empire in Late Antiquity
Touraj Daryaee, California State University, Fullerton
May 12, 2006
It is thought that it is in Late Antiquity that Iranian “national identity”
was constructed by the Sasanian Persians. In this endeavor, the Zoroastrian
church was the main actor which set forth the idea of Eran as a set
territory, and which defined citizenry (Eranagan). This paper will
argue against such a monolithic notion for the whole of the Sasanian period and
will discuss the various views which the state and religious communities held
in regard to the idea of Eran (territory) and Eranagan
(citizenship). I would like to contend that these ideas shifted depending on
the institutions and groups (Jews, Christians, Zoroastrians and Manichaeans)
who lived in Persia from the third to the seventh century CE.
Thus one has to study the issue of ethnicity and boundary of Eran
as defined in the imperial inscriptions of the third and fourth centuries,
private inscriptions of the post sixth century, Zoroastrian Middle Persian
texts, and the material culture to have a grasp of the matter. The need for the
use of such diverse material is that it can elucidate how the concept of
Eran and being er “Iranian” evolved in Persia and how it was
adopted by the Jews and Christians and why it was rejected by the
Manicaheans.
To learn more about Professor Touraj Daryaee, please visit his website at http://faculty.fullerton.edu/tdaryaee/
Contentious Terrain - Muslims, and Meaning on China's
Southwestern Frontier
Kevin Caffrey - PhD Candidate, University of Chicago
The Chinese Muslim Hui of Yunnan province live lives that
resonate with what Sunzi's Art of War called ‚"contested terrain", space that
is beneficial to occupy for both sides in a conflict. These particular people
were alienated from a comfortable multiplicity of imperial "Chineseness" in the
nineteenth century by a colonial moment that ended in rebellion, massacre, and
decimation. Their present day position in the popular imaginary of the area
continues to inherit versions of the fear, mystery, danger, and criminality
that began to mark them in that tumultuous moment. I will talk about these
issues using a very local complex of associations that give meaning to these
Muslims from one particular location near the Burmese border, a place that is
itself indexed by tropes of danger, criminality, and even magic exactly because
of its association with the Hui.
Download
chapter 6 of Kevin's book
Domesticating AIDS: Stigma, Pollution, and Gender Politics in
Contemporary Japan
JoAnne Cullinane, McKennan Postdoctoral Fellow 2004 - 2006, Ph.D. University of
Chicago
Like syphilis, which was referred to as the “French disease” in Italy, the
“Jewish disease” in Germany, and the “Chinese pox” in Japan, AIDS has been
regarded as an alien affliction in every society into which it has made
inroads. Japan, for its part, has witnessed waves of hysteria linking AIDS to
foreign blood, Southeast Asian women, and, more recently, to teenage girls who
are said to exchange sex for money in a practice known as enjō kōsai.
Hence, over the past two decades a virus once associated with external threats
has been domesticated, or rendered familiar, in a nation that had grown
accustomed to thinking of itself as immune from world events. This lecture
addresses that transformation and shows how AIDS emerged as a potent weapon in
gender debates and in discussions that centered on the health of the nation in
late 1990s Japan. Drawing on the concept of the “mindful body” put forward by
Scheper-Hughes and Lock (1987), JoAnne will argue that AIDS in Japan affects
the individual body, the social body, and the body politic alike.
Download JoAnne's paper
Dr. Robert Whitley
Assistant Professor, Dartmouth Medical School
"Public Pressure, Private Protest: Illness Narratives of West Indian Immigrants
in Montreal with Medically Unexplained Symptoms"
March 6, 2006
Some evidence suggests that West Indian immigrants in Canada
are a marginalized and over-burdened group. However, little attention has been
given to examining health status and beliefs. We partly redress this gap by
investigating health beliefs of West Indian immigrants in Montreal with
somatic, emotional or medically unexplained symptoms. The overall aim was to
elicit and explore illness narratives, explanatory models, symptom-attribution
and help-seeking in the community. A sample of 15 West Indian immigrants took
part in semi-structured interviews. We found that participants overwhelmingly
ascribed their symptoms to post-migratory experience. They particularly
highlighted the importance of two related factors: chronic over-work since
migration and irregular patterns of daily living. Many worked long-hours,
including over-time and moonlighting. Participants related their irregular
patterns of daily living to disturbances of bodily functions (e.g. sleeping,
eating) as well as to social functions (e.g. family-life). These themes
reflected elements of ethno-physiological beliefs common in the West Indies, as
well as North American illness models. Attributing medically unexplained
symptoms to overwork and irregularity in personal and social realms may be a
socially acceptable way of critiquing perceived injustices in participants'
work, social and interpersonal situations. This is especially so because the
dominant discourse regarding race and ethnicity in Canada tends to emphasise
positive aspects of multiculturalism- only reluctantly acknowledging conflict
and inequality. Narratives could be interpreted as an oblique criticism of
Canadian society's apparent indifference to participants' ongoing
marginalisation.
Download his
paper
Dr. Whitley's paper is presently in press with the journal "Anthropology ad
Medicine"
Professor Charles Reilly
Professor Charles A. Reilly Research Scholar and
Professor, Institute for Peace and Justice, University of San Diego and former
Director, Peace Corps Guatemala Guatemala: Implementing the
Peace
January 24, 2006
This event was sponsored by the Office of Alumni
Relations, the Martin Luther King Day Committee, and the Department of
Anthropology
Charles Reilly is a political
scientist and Research Scholar and Professor at the Institute for Peace and
Justice at the the University of San Diego. He is the former Director of the
Peace Corps and Guatemala. In 2004 he was a Fulbright Visiting Professor, at
the University of Ireland and he has been a senior consultant on Civil Society,
Inter-American Development Bank. His recent work compares the peace process in
Guatemala and Northern Ireland.
View his presentation
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