The Rope of Moka

The Rope of Moka
Author: Andrew Strathern
Publisher: CUP Archive
Total Pages: 280
Release: 1971-07-02
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780521079877

In the Mount Hagen area of central New Guinea, warfare has been replaced since the arrival of the Europeans by a vigorous development of moka, a competitive ceremonial exchange of wealth objects. The exchanges of pigs, shells and other valuables are interpreted as acting as a bond between groups, and as a means whereby individuals, notably the big-men, can maximize their status. Professor Strathern analyses the ways in which competition between big-men actually takes place, and the effects of this competition on the overall political system.

Identity and Control

Identity and Control
Author: Harrison C. White
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 452
Release: 2012-11-21
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1400845904

In this completely revised edition of one of the foundational texts of network sociology, Harrison White refines and enlarges his groundbreaking theory of how social structure and culture emerge from the chaos and uncertainty of social life. Incorporating new contributions from a group of young sociologists and many fascinating and novel case studies, Identity and Control is the only major book of social theory that links social structure with the lived experience of individuals, providing a rich perspective on the kinds of social formations that develop in the process. Going beyond traditional sociological dichotomies such as agency/structure, individual/society, or micro/macro, Identity and Control presents a toolbox of concepts that will be useful to a wide range of social scientists, as well as those working in public policy, management, or associational life and, beyond, to any reader who is interested in understanding the dynamics of social life.

The Question of the Gift

The Question of the Gift
Author: Mark Osteen
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 324
Release: 2013-09-13
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1136481435

The Question of the Gift is the first collection of new interdisciplinary essays on the gift. Bringing together scholars from a variety of fields, including anthropology, literary criticism, economics, philosophy and classics, it provides new paradigms and poses new questions concerning the theory and practice of gift exchange. In addressing these questions, contributors not only challenge the conventions of their fields, but also combine ideas and methods from both the social sciences and humanities to forge innovative ways of confronting this universal phenomenon.

The Gender of the Gift

The Gender of the Gift
Author: Marilyn Strathern
Publisher: Univ of California Press
Total Pages: 439
Release: 1988
Genre: History
ISBN: 0520072022

Marilyn Strathern argues that gender relations in Melanesia have been a particular casualty of unexamined assumptions held by Western anthropologists and feminist scholars alike. The book treats with equal seriousness, and with equal good humour, the insights of Western social science, feminist politics, and ethnographic reporting, in order to rethink the representation of Melanesian social and cultural life.

Dream Travelers

Dream Travelers
Author: R. Lohmann
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 255
Release: 2003-11-13
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1403982473

In dreams, part of the self seems to wander off to undertake both mundane tasks and marvellous adventures. Anthropologists have found that many peoples take this experience of dreaming at face value, assuming that their spirits literally leave the body to travel, meet other spirits, and acquire valuable knowledge - with dramatic consequence for relationships, social organization, and religions. Dream Travellers is about Melanesian, Aboriginal Australian, and Indonesian peoples who hold this assumption. Several leading anthropologists contribute theoretically and ethnographically rich chapters, showing that attention to these peoples' dream lives deeply enhances our understanding of their cultures and waking lives as well.

Nameless Relations

Nameless Relations
Author: Monica Konrad
Publisher: Berghahn Books
Total Pages: 310
Release: 2005
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 9781845450403

Based on the author's fieldwork at assisted conception clinics in England in the mid-1990s, this is the first ethnographic study of the new procreative practices of anonymous ova and embryo donation. Giving voice to both groups of women participating in the demanding donation experience - the donors on the one side and the ever-hopeful IVF recipients on the other - Konrad shows how one dimension of the new reproductive technologies involves an unfamiliar relatedness between nameless and untraceable procreative strangers. Offsetting informants' local narratives against traditional Western folk models of the 'sexed' reproductive body, the book challenges some of the basic assumptions underlying conventional biomedical discourse of altruistic donation that clinicians and others promote as "gifts of life." It brings together a wide variety of literatures from social anthropology, social theory, cultural studies of science and technology, and feminist bioethics to discuss the relationship between recent developments in biotechnology and changing conceptions of personal origins, genealogy, kinship, biological ownership and notions of bodily integrity.

Americans in Tuscany

Americans in Tuscany
Author: Catherine Trundle
Publisher: Berghahn Books
Total Pages: 230
Release: 2014-07-01
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1782383700

Since the time of the Grand Tour, the Italian region of Tuscany has sustained a highly visible American and Anglo migrant community. Today American women continue to migrate there, many in order to marry Italian men. Confronted with experiences of social exclusion, unfamiliar family relations, and new cultural terrain, many women struggle to build local lives. In the first ethnographic monograph of Americans in Italy, Catherine Trundle argues that charity and philanthropy are the central means by which many American women negotiate a sense of migrant belonging in Italy. This book traces women’s daily acts of charity as they gave food to the poor, fundraised among the wealthy, monitored untrustworthy recipients, assessed the needy, and reflected on the emotional work that charity required. In exploring the often-ignored role of charitable action in migrant community formation, Trundle contributes to anthropological theories of gift giving, compassion, and reflexivity.

Landmarks

Landmarks
Author: Andrew Strathern
Publisher: Kent State University Press
Total Pages: 212
Release: 1993
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9780873384797

Landmarks addresses a wide range of questions relevant to the recent history of anthropology and its importance to contemporary issues. These questions include the significance of anthropology for Third World studies; the debate on whether anthropology is a scientific or a humanistic subject; anthropology as a means of reflecting on ourselves as well as others; and the criticisms of anthropological work that have emerged out of postmodernism. Drawing on his research findings in Papua New guinea since 1964 and his more recent work on the cross-cultural study of medicine, the author examines the extent to which we can achieve understanding between different cultures and the relative merits of approaches that stress indigenous categories or those of the observer. He concludes that the discipline now requires reconstruction rather than deconstruction, and advances the call for holistic models of human behavior which re-conceptualize the relationship between body and mind.

Engaging with Capitalism

Engaging with Capitalism
Author: Fiona McCormack
Publisher: Emerald Group Publishing
Total Pages: 368
Release: 2013-05-14
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 178190541X

The volume addresses how capitalism has been very effective in generating wealth and technological innovation, but has also been associated with social inequity and environmental damage. Its inherent flaws have been highlighted by the escalation of ecological problems arising from growth-oriented capitalism and various economic crises.