Showing posts with label anthropology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label anthropology. Show all posts

The Graves of Tarim: Genealogy and Mobility across the Indian Ocean (California World History Library) Review

The Graves of Tarim: Genealogy and Mobility across the Indian Ocean (California World History Library)
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The Graves of Tarim: Genealogy and Mobility across the Indian Ocean (California World History Library) ReviewYou can't get through some books because they are boring. You can't get through others because they are so poorly written. But then, there are a few that take a long time to get through because they are so full of ideas and new currents that constantly join a dense, learned discussion. This is one of the latter. I'm not going to tell you that it's an easy trot through the anthropology and history of Hadramawt and its diaspora. No, if you can't sail through "key site of articulation", "ready apparatus of signs", "two distinct realms of textual circulation", or "dynamics of signification"---plus a lot more---your ship is going to sink. The writing is poetic and lyrical at times, but often hard to pin down. Discussions of geneological texts from a remote Yemeni region are not everybody's cup of tea. So, let's just say that this is a book for scholars, a book that will impress you for sure if you stay the course.
Devout Muslims from the remote region of Hadramawt---today in eastern Yemen---began emigrating abroad some five hundred years ago. At first they served as teachers, judges, religious officials, or holy men, settling in India, East Africa, and Southeast Asia. They maintained ties with their distant homeland, often returning to die there. Their remittances or savings bought date orchards in wadis of Hadramawt, their tombs became places of pilgrimage for their descendants and others. Graves of ancestors and holy men turned into pilgrimage sites, beloved of many, condemned as not Islamic enough by others. As European colonial empires grew in the 18th and 19th centuries, Hadrami Arabs linked up with them economically, becoming ever more prosperous merchants and businessmen. They blended into the societies where their diaspora had settled, but maintained contact over many generations with Hadramawt. As the wider Arab world awoke and currents of pan-Arabism, Islamic revival and nationalism began to run, some segments of the Hadrami community became involved. Geneology played a continuous role in their links to one another, to the rising native elites in such places as Indonesia, Malaysia and Zanzibar through intermarriage. The creoles (Hadrami fathers, local mothers) played important parts in the adoptive societies. Hadramawt's remoteness (and lack of obvious resources) meant that it was not colonized until the late 1930s. It was the last place to fall under European colonial rule. The British ruled it with bombs and bribes, trying to maintain order via treaties with a myriad small rulers. By that time, some 20-30% of the population lived abroad. When the British left, Hadramawt, now absorbed into the Marxist People's Republic of South Yemen, entered at last into the 20th century world of nation states, where everybody had to be a citizen of one or another entity, but not more than one. The creoles faced difficult dilemmas. The new rulers tried to break the bonds of Islam and family built over many centuries. When the two Yemens joined, Marxism got the thumbs down, and the sayyid-tribal complex--bound by Islam--re-emerged. That's the story in a nutshell.

From Malaysia himself, Ho probably came to this subject with unique advantages. It is neither a work totally about Yemen nor a work about the diaspora in Southeast Asia, India, etc. It is a work full of questions about emigration, travel, opportunity, eviction, return, family, religion and graves. For the details, and to know how the author answered many questions, I think you'll have to read this complex, fascinating, and sometimes extremely difficult book.
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Earth Community, Earth Ethics (Ecology & Justice) Review

Earth Community, Earth Ethics (Ecology and Justice)
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Earth Community, Earth Ethics (Ecology & Justice) ReviewLarry Rasmussen has done an excellent job of 'connecting the dots' in his analysis of the current state of Earth community. His analysis is thorough and holistic, as are the solutions he proposes, howbeit tentatively. His passion for Earth community comes through loud and clear, and one can hardly help but be moved by the depth of his compassion. Here we truly have a proposal for an ethic with heart and soul It is not a fast, easy read, however, and at times the text runs a bit dense. Overall, however, it is one of the finest books on Earth ethics--or ethics in general--that I have read.Earth Community, Earth Ethics (Ecology & Justice) Overview

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Race, Identity and Citizenship: A Reader (Blackwell Readers in Sociology) Review

Race, Identity and Citizenship: A Reader (Blackwell Readers in Sociology)
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Race, Identity and Citizenship: A Reader (Blackwell Readers in Sociology) ReviewPractitioner fields inevitably overlap in social science professions, making it impossible to effectively study how goverment and people impact each other without considering the social stratification and classification of inter-related groups. Past mono-discipline efforts understandably released incomplete, contradictory, and ultimately unhelpful studies. The picture generated only represented a selective fraction of what actually existed.
Miron, Torres and Inda eloquently bring historically separate social science disciplines together for social change where other people have previously and currently failed.
Ranging from case studies to quantitative analysis, the collection essays examine why race and ethnicity continue to be a controversial part of America. Bureaucrats and their constituents react negatively (even with open hostilities) because we subconciously fear what is different from our own immediate enviroment. It is also easier to blame these different groups for our real and percieved misfortune (such as the overseas relocation of factory jobs) than to critically examine the specifics of initially benign-sounding policies and our own (quiet) compliance for not applying the critical eye.
Aidia Hurtado's essay "The trickster's play" exposes the racism 'liberal' whites inadvertently engage in when they telling people of color just how damaged they are by racism and attempt to negate the critical different experiences between various ethnicities through 'color-blind' policies, subconciously denying racism's very existence.
Although other works such as This Bridge Called My Back (1982) do a far more comprehensive job of intergrating women of color into their policy prescriptions, the section on gender pointedly reminds readers they are constantly obligated to consider how gender and other subordinate idenities intrsect with each other. In the sociopolitical hierarcy of American society, the low income non-white woman was historically (and currently) branded as the least valuable society member. It is most telling that the same perpetrators are only begining to be held accountable now, but the global community clearly has a long way to go.Race, Identity and Citizenship: A Reader (Blackwell Readers in Sociology) Overview

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Working Globesmart: Twelve People Skills for Doing Business Across Borders Review

Working Globesmart: Twelve People Skills for Doing Business Across Borders
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Working Globesmart: Twelve People Skills for Doing Business Across Borders ReviewThis book clarifies common pitfalls in interacting with foreign counterparts and offers solutions structured around twelve people skills: establishing credibility; giving and receiving feedback; obtaining information; evaluating people; building global teamwork; training and development; selling; negotiating; strategic planning; transferring knowledge; innovating; and managing change. The book is based on inputs from experienced country and regional experts. It includes numerous examples, charts, tables and appendixes, as well as chapter summaries and review questions. A top-notch book, bountiful in substance, it will help you build bridges over cultural divides.Working Globesmart: Twelve People Skills for Doing Business Across Borders Overview

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Moveable Feasts: From Ancient Rome to the 21st Century, the Incredible Journeys of the Food We Eat Review

Moveable Feasts: From Ancient Rome to the 21st Century, the Incredible Journeys of the Food We Eat
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Moveable Feasts: From Ancient Rome to the 21st Century, the Incredible Journeys of the Food We Eat ReviewWith a disarming combination of humor, insight and expertise, Sarah Murray tells a wonderful story -- or rather, a bunch of stories - of how food moves. Studded with fascinating examples, she ranges effortlessly from ancient Rome to modern Bombay to show how the movement of food has shaped history, as well as our own times. To be honest, this is not a question I had considered before; since reading this book, though, I find myself looking at the grocery shelves with new appreciation. Moreover, Murray makes a real contribution to the debate over "food miles," arguing persuasively it makes much more sense to look at the life cycle of food production, rather than just how many miles an item has traveled, when judging its environmental impact.
Highly recommended: Foodies, of course, will love it, but so should anyone interested in history and the environment.Moveable Feasts: From Ancient Rome to the 21st Century, the Incredible Journeys of the Food We Eat Overview

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Rule of Experts: Egypt, Techno-Politics, Modernity Review

Rule of Experts: Egypt, Techno-Politics, Modernity
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Rule of Experts: Egypt, Techno-Politics, Modernity ReviewMitchell's "Colonising Egypt" transformed my experience as a student in Egypt, so I was looking forward to this work from one of the best minds in in Middle East Studies. "Rule of Experts: Egypt, Techno-Politics, Modernity" does not disappoint. Mitchell's work is self-reflective, de-orientalized, thought-provoking scholarship. Mitchell not only connects contemporary political and postmodern theory to his Egyptian primary sources, but he extends theory in new directions and unique interdisiplinary ways. Mitchell empowers the reader to think critically about the negative influences of power and hegemonic discourse on policy and scholarship to create distorted representations and self-fulfilling, self-replicating prophecies. We need more writers like Mitchell to question and challenge the current theory and expertise that has so much currency and momentum in the echo chambers of the Washington Consensus.
The essays cover a wide range of 20th-century topics from malaria to mapmaking, from the manipulated image of the peasant to techno-political nonsense in current development praxis. I have long believed that developmental applications of modern economic theory are very much a "faith-based" process, and Mitchell has put these thoughts in engaging prose. In addition, I was particularly impressed by the chapter on violence, which helped me frame my own thinking on violence, for example, in Syria, Algeria, or Tunisia, places where not so hidden violence functions as an instrument of power and social control. Mitchell writes eloquently on issues that have troubled most of those who work or live or travel in the developing world and who have not found the right language to express their reservations about the descriptive and prescriptive power of current scholarship and techno-political expertise.Rule of Experts: Egypt, Techno-Politics, Modernity Overview

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Essentials of Cultural Anthropology Review

Essentials of Cultural Anthropology
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Essentials of Cultural Anthropology ReviewHaving read several of the brief or essentials cultural anthropology textbooks, I was pleasantly surprised by this one. Yes, it is a compact volume, and less expensive, but it is very comprehensive while being clear and concise. Good coverage of theory and concepts with examples students will relate to their own experiences. Nice features like glossary terms in margins, summary/review tables, and color photos unlike most of the other brief editions. Pleasantly readable and approachable despite.Essentials of Cultural Anthropology Overview

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Human Rights and Gender Violence: Translating International Law into Local Justice (Chicago Series in Law and Society) Review

Human Rights and Gender Violence: Translating International Law into Local Justice (Chicago Series in Law and Society)
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Human Rights and Gender Violence: Translating International Law into Local Justice (Chicago Series in Law and Society) ReviewWe live in an era where both globalization and universalization of international legal discourse have become progressively dominant. On one hand these developments open up new political and socio-economic potentials for the world. On the other hand they stimulate further tensions between the global and the local. In particular, these tensions strongly affect the ability to implement international human rights, which have become strongly institutionalized by now. Sally Merry's book Human rights and Gender Violence: Translating International Law into Local Justice provides a valuable analysis of this theme. In fact, this book does much more that merely identifying these tensions; through a study of the translation of women rights from global into local contexts, Merry examines origins of the existing conflict between the two and presents suggestions for more effective approaches to cultural implications when dealing with the complexity of transnational struggle against human rights abuses.
As expected from a legal anthropologist, Merry combines international law and an ethnographic perspectives in her study of global activism, which characterized by its secular universalistic view, in relation to local realization and "vernacularization", done mainly by NGOs and activist on grass root level. In the beginning of her book she sketches out her (ethnographic) research method, which included attendance of several international conferences, background reading, three years of thorough study of United Nations meetings, extended research in Hawaii, relatively short visits of the Asia-Pacific region in Fiji, India, China, Hong Kong where she had the opportunity to interview local academics and activists. From a purely anthropological perspective Merry's approach could have been stronger if she had stayed for longer periods in different localities simply because her understanding of the subject would have had more time to develop. In addition, the view of one particular group most directly involved in the matter is not sufficiently discussed in this study, namely that of the victims of gender violence. Nevertheless, Merry's nuanced style and the use of geographic diversity add value to her engaging research.
Merry argues that although women's rights have been internationally formulated, the conceptualization of these rights remain problematic. Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination against Women came in 1979. Next to Commission on Human Rights, the UN took specific measures though appointing the Special Reporter on Violence against Women and establishing the Commission on the Status of Women. Nevertheless, it is still difficult to establish gender violence as human rights violations, because it is often perceived as "daily problem", incorporated in system of kinship, religion, welfare and nationalism. Gender violence either occurs in private sphere which makes it shielded from interference from outside or is packed in various concepts that are protected by the society, such as the practice of honor killings in Pakistan (p. 63). Even tough Merry strongly opposes such practices; she stresses the importance of understanding of particular histories, traditions and cultures.
Two main reasons are pointed out. First, generally unrecognized reason that the global human rights discourse established by state representatives and NGOs is narrow because of the uneven power relations that shaped it, and should therefore also be seen as part of a certain culture system, secular transitional modernity. Second, politicians and experts see customs as harmful practices and completely reject them, for they do not have the time to investigate how costumes can help protecting human rights. Merry explores the practice of Bulubulu in her research and uses it as an example to illustrate her point. Bulubulu, central in village life of Fiji, is a practice of reconciliation through apology and gift giving for an offence. It is a fundamentally different approach, with emphasis on reconciliation and avoiding vengeance, rather than punishing and deterring future offenders. The main goal is to restore peace in the community life. This local practice became embedded in the Fiji court system (customary law), but faced complete rejection by the UN committee of CEDAW, because of the relatively new use of Bulubulu in cases of rape (p.144).
Merry stresses the importance of contextualization of human rights strategies in order to be successful. Three forms of transnational cultural flow necessary for appropriation of human rights are distinguished. First, Merry emphasizes something that also Ignatieff argued in his article Human Rights as Politics and Idolatry, Praemium Erasmianum: it is crucial that transnational consensus is built, but it is only possible if consistency is maintained, especially by more influential Western states like the US. Second, transnational program transplantation must be done with use of local values, symbols and meanings through strengthening the national and local culture practices. An Na'im argues in the same direction when talking about human rights appropriation of Sharia in Areas of Expressions and the Universality of Human Rights: Mediation a Contingent Relationship. Last but not least, it is essential to localize transnational knowledge of human rights so that it becomes part of the local consciousness (p.179). Merry argues that international actors and local activist can form a link between the global and the local. Grass root activists can translate and negotiate the rights into frameworks that are relevant to the life situation of local people.
It would have been indeed like this if all grass root human rights activists truly represented the mainstream societies they live in; in reality, their beliefs are often strongly influenced by the global discourse. In addition, Merry tends to underestimate "harmful" practices and the resistance against the international human rights discourses. Traditions and customs are indeed not homogeneous and dynamic; it does not mean however that power holders in existing kinship, religious and cultural entities will easily allow significant change that would threaten their privileged position. While it is especially relevant in women rights and gender violence, Merry is eager to nuance here too strongly. Besides, as one of the case studies presented by Merry shows, women are "slow" to claim their rights (p.181). Reconsidering and contextualizing is undeniably necessary, but we might run into bigger obstacles than expected.
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Networking Futures: The Movements against Corporate Globalization (Experimental Futures) Review

Networking Futures: The Movements against Corporate Globalization (Experimental Futures)
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Networking Futures: The Movements against Corporate Globalization (Experimental Futures) ReviewSince the Internet revolutionized communication technology in the nineties, the concept of the network has become an organizational model to be emulated--a utopian vision even--across vastly different spheres of social life, not the least of which is political activism. The growing importance and prevalence of activist networks, however, has been reflected in only a limited way in the anthropological literature on social movements, and few scholars have approached networks as more than mere abstractions and metaphors at best or, at worst, as static structures. Networking Futures: The Movements Against Corporate Globalization by Jeffrey Juris, on the other hand, provides us with a very necessary and highly successful ethnographic study of the concrete mechanisms, practices, and social relations that constitute the activist networks characteristic of the anti-corporate globalization movements that began with the Zapatista uprising in 1994 and the anti-WTO protests in Seattle in 1999. Since those times, the organizational models and utopian imaginaries of activist networks have profoundly reshaped the social movement landscape across the globe--particularly in Western Europe, Latin America, and the United States--making Juris' well-theorized and richly descriptive study relevant for readers across scholarly disciplines and geographical boundaries.
Juris describes activist networks as "locally rooted, but globally connected", and he attempts to make his own research similarly "multi-scalar". Thus, his research is rooted in long-term ethnographic fieldwork with the Movement for Global Resistance (MRG), a Barcelona based activist network, with which he actively participated in numerous meetings, discussions, events, and direct-action protests. While the most engaging chapters in Networking Futures may be the ones dedicated to how networks are "embodied" and made visible during protests, the work's larger aim and greater accomplishment is to study these networks during their "submerged" phases, illuminating how activist networks such as the MRG are not so much rigid organizations, but fluid processes animated as much by "transnational flows of people, ideas, strategies, and tactics" as by Catalan cultural and political landscape and history.
The central argument of Networking Futures, which Juris repeats like a mantra throughout the book, is that "anti-corporate globalization movements involve a growing confluence among networks as computer-supported infrastructure (technology), networks as organizational structure (form), and networks as political model (norm), mediated by concrete activist practice" (p. 11). He is thus concerned with examining how new technologies, and particularly the Internet, not only provide the arena and means of organization for these movements, but also shape its logic and political goals, such that spreading network technologies, forms, and norms outward becomes a political goal itself. Like anarchists of old, these activists practice a "dual politics", attempting to influence dominant politics, but also to create the embryonic foundations of a new society "in the shell of the old" by engaging in autonomous, decentralized networks.
As a self-ascribed "militant ethnographer", Juris is clearly a sympathetic and enthusiastic participant in the movements he studies; however, it is to his credit that he does not romanticize or fetishize networks, instead paying due attention to the limits of network forms and the contradictions of its norms. The chapter on state repression and performative violence during protests is particularly illuminating in this respect. Equally noteworthy is Juris' sober evaluation in the conclusion of what impact these movements have (and have not) concretely effected upon state or corporate policies. However, what makes this book especially dynamic is that it holds appeal not only across scholarly disciplines, but beyond them as well, since the author makes a concerted effort to make it relevant and useful, not only to scholars, but to activists... Juris makes a significant contribution to the field of social movement studies and should hold a broad appeal to readers in various disciplines, as well as general non-academic readers, concerned with politics and political culture.
-- -- -- Bruno Renero-Hannan
This review was originally published in the journal COMPARATIVE STUDIES IN SOCIETY AND HISTORY, Vol. 52, Issue 01, January 2010, pp 210-211.
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Money Has No Smell: The Africanization of New York City Review

Money Has No Smell: The Africanization of New York City
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Money Has No Smell: The Africanization of New York City ReviewAn old Latin saying, Pecunia non olet, translates as "Money has no odor". Originally related to the urine tax levied by Roman emperors upon the collection of urine in public latrines, it means that the value of money is not tainted by its origins. West African street peddlers in New York City use this ancient adage to justify why they sell baseball caps ornamented with foul language, or African statues and masks that these pious Moslems associate with idolatry and refer to simply as "wood". They also feel no qualms about selling bootlegged videos, unlicensed merchandise, and fake fashion goods, but they make it clear to their clients that they are not selling the originals. They believe in honesty in transactions, and avoid everything that reeks of "funny business".
For the tourists and African Americans who patronize their stalls, their replication of an African market in Harlem has a "smell": indeed, the buyers are in for the exoticism, and they want to experience a piece of Africa in New York City. Growing out from illegal stalls and having gone through several relocations, the African street market has become one of the city's tourist attractions. Some African American clients are on a quest for origins: they are looking after their African roots, and West African merchants have turned that longing for African origins into a commercial operation. They sell a commodified version of Afrocentrism, a specific ideological orientation that exerts a profound influence on African American sociocultural life. Associated with the figure of Malcolm X, Afrocentrism has been developed into a body of doctrine by scholars such as Molefi Asante who are tracing its roots to the ancient civilization of Egypt. It has led to the invention of modern rituals and traditions such as the festival of Kwanzaa, a seven-day African American holiday celebrated between Christmas and the New Year. Of course, for West African merchants in New York, the meaning of Kwanzaa has little cultural resonance; it is not so much a sacred celebration as a simulation of Africa that is good for business.
The story of "kente" cloth illustrates how commodities are created and transformed by transnational networks that use the Afrocentric ideology as a source of profit. Kente is the name of a colorful, intricate, handwoven silk cloth traditionally worn by Asante nobles in Ghana on ceremonial occasions. The antique clothes are colored with vegetable dyes of deep blue, yellow, green, and red hues and are stitched in subtle and elegant patterns. Silk and rayon kente strips--handwoven but admittedly inferior to the original cloths--gradually became popular in the United States. Many icons of African American cultural life began to wear these kente strips as scarves--colorful material badges of African identity. Sometime in the early 1990s, enterprising Koreans entrepreneurs saw an opportunity. Working from photographs of handwoven Ghanaian silk kente, they designed a cotton print cloth version--for a fraction of the original's cost. Small textile factories in New Jersey began to mass produce them, and they were then transformed into "kente" cloth caps, sports jackets with "kente" cloth lapels, as well as dresses, skirts, and trousers.
The story doesn't end here: the success of New Jersey "kente" shocked the African textile industry into action. Ghanaian textile factories reproduced the cloth design, undercutting the costs, and shipped it to New York City as well as to other West African markets, where the cloths were transformed in low-cost textile mills. The "Ghanaian" reproduction of kente, whatever its origin, surpassed the New Jersey version in quality at a cheaper price. Asian entrepreneurs in lower Manhattan also bought bolts of fabric from African wholesalers and transformed it into caps and cheap clothing in downtown sweatshops manned by Asian immigrants. And soon African "kente" was back on the streets of Harlem, peddled by West African cloth merchants and street vendors, and sold mostly to African Americans in search of authenticity. As the book notes, "this confluence of symbolic contradiction is a small reminder of how the flow of money, goods, and people across increasingly fragmented spaces is transforming social landscapes, making them less bounded, more confusing."
Paul Stoller, the author of this ethnographic study, is on a different quest. Before conducting fieldwork through participant observation in street markets in New York City, his research experience had been in the rural western region of the Republic of Niger, where he studied symbolic interactions and religious practices in ethnically diverse villages. His familiarity with the Nigerien cultural context, and knowledge of the Songhay language as well as of French, gained him acceptance among the Francophone African merchants, otherwise suspicious of outside interference that may draw attention to their undocumented status. His informants were apparently happy to have him hang around, discuss their lives, and accompany them in various business transactions or administrative formalities. One goes so far as to suggest to him to change career and become a diplomat: "You know, you should come to Côte d'Ivoire or better yet, to Niger, and give out visas. With someone who understands our ways as well as you do, it would be very good for business."

The Africanization of New York City refers to the ways West African immigrants recreate part of their communal life in their new environment. As the author shows, the street markets are organized like many West African markets, where the space is often apportioned and regulated through informal mechanisms. Members of the same ethnic group or place of origin usually occupy contiguous space and sell the same kind of merchandise. In Manhattan, the aristocracy of street vendors is formed by the Senegalese, often members of the Mourid religious brotherhood, who were the first to migrate and who established a lock on informal vending space. Kinship, ethnicity, and nationality also directly affect the density of contacts and degree of trust and cooperation, which is bolstered by Islamic morality. Practices of long-distance trade in West Africa is also reproduced in the United States, where merchants from the same kinship network or ethnic group often pool resources and travel to what they call the "American bush", peddling their wares in African American festivals or Third World commercial fairs.
The author is also interested in describing the global forces that have compelled these merchants to leave West Africa and develop their trade in the streets of New York. Most West African traders come to the United States as single men, leaving behind their wives, children, parents, and complex extended families. Most of them are undocumented immigrants; this means they may avoid going to physicians, postpone English instruction at night schools, keep their proceeds in cash rather than bank accounts, and fail to report the theft of inventory. As the author writes, "they work, eat, and sleep with only the slightest exposure to American social life. They count their days in America, waiting to have made enough money to return home with honor." Having completed this detailed ethnography, the reader may agree with the author that "There is something heroic about this group of West African traders."Money Has No Smell: The Africanization of New York City Overview

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Territories of Difference: Place, Movements, Life, Redes (a John Hope Franklin Center Book) Review

Territories of Difference: Place, Movements, Life, <I>Redes</I> (a John Hope Franklin Center Book)
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Territories of Difference: Place, Movements, Life, Redes (a John Hope Franklin Center Book) ReviewThis is a complex book and takes on the intersection of development conservation history, social movements and political narrative in one of the most difficult places to work, Colombia. It is one of those books that really rewards a careful reading and re-reading. But most importantly it illuminates a huge dynamic of development that is rooted in social movements that is having extraordinary impact in Latin America, and integrates it with globalization and the politics of nature.
Its very clearly written but the topic is demanding. Students can really see what political ecology is about in this amazing volume.
If you want to understand how the tropical future will work, this is the book to read.
Territories of Difference: Place, Movements, Life, Redes (a John Hope Franklin Center Book) Overview

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Humanity: An Introduction to Cultural Anthropology Review

Humanity: An Introduction to Cultural Anthropology
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Humanity: An Introduction to Cultural Anthropology Reviewthis book was in great condition when received but took longer to arrive than any of the three books i purchased at the same time which is somewhat inconvenient but when finally arriving i was not disappointed with the productHumanity: An Introduction to Cultural Anthropology Overview

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Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor Review

Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor
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Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor ReviewBeyond the lens of a media trained on the dramatic scenes of hurricanes, wars, and terror attacks, the real violence at work, according to Rob Nixon's new book, Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor, is one that works insidiously over time and outside of view on the poorest and most vulnerable citizens of the planet. Instead of just chronicling the despicable practices of energy conglomerates, big oil, armament manufacturers and the coalition of the willing--the IMF, World Bank, and neoliberal governments like our own, Nixon's book does something much more interesting. He focuses on the literary and imaginative responses of writer-activists around the world as they have joined forces with indigenous peoples and the poor to save their lands and ways of life. Nixon, who grew up in South Africa under apartheid and who has spent much of his own literary and scholarly work on environmental justice issues, is a keen observer of how writer-activists have learned to use a whole range of literary forms (novels, plays, essays, blogs, testimonial protest, and literary journalism) to counter the powerful forces at work in the name of globalization, economic development, progress, and democracy. With lucidity and careful contextualization, Nixon presents the work of several key writers and describes how their passion, outrage, and intellectual and artistic influences find a voice in their causes. We learn of the heroic work of Ken Saro-Wiwa exposing the horrific poisoning of the lands and fishing culture of the Ogoni people of Nigeria by Shell Oil. We follow the work and life of Nobel Peace Prize-winning Wangari Maathai as she helps to organize farmers and women to plant trees to save the depleted soils in Kenya. And, In India, Nixon examines the powerful protest essays and journalism of Arundhati Roy's in her support of indigenous Indians trying to save their lands against transnational mining and the mega-dam industry. But throughout the book, Nixon gives us a whole range of writers from the global south and north who have found "imaginative strategies," as he calls them, to shed light on various slow forms of cultural and environmental degradation from e-waste dumping, depleted uranium from US bombings in Iraq and Afghanistan, and even the seemingly benign billion dollar global tourism industry. From the viewpoint of the writer-activist, Nixon reminds us that writers since the monumental works of Rachel Carson and Nadine Gordimer have always played an indispensible role in speaking truth to the powerful forces of industry and in inspiring local activism in the protection of the environment and those who depend on its health.
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Cultures and Organizations: Software of the Mind Review

Cultures and Organizations: Software of the Mind
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Cultures and Organizations: Software of the Mind ReviewHofstede is, of course, the pioneer of culture studies in business and organizations. This book is a simpler and more accessible version of the more comprehensive - but also more difficult, 'Culture's Consequences'.
He begins with an excellent overview of culture and its levels and explains the concept of cultural `dimensions' - aspects of culture that can differentiate and measure differences among different cultural groups. The book then proceeds to present the four dimensions of culture that he identified as a result of a massive survey he conducted on IBM employees in 72 countries in 1968 and again in 1972. Additional data was later collected from other countries and populations, outside IBM, and used to verify and enhance the original results.
However, in this book, Hofstede discusses his four original dimensions of culture: Power Distance; Uncertainty Avoidance; Individualism & Collectivism; and finally Masculinity & Femininity. The fifth dimension which was later added based on results from the Far East and Asia - Long- versus Short-Term Orientation - is not discussed in this book. Despite that, it remains a very valuable and highly readable introduction to the topic from the man who pioneered the field and popularized it among business people, multinationals and business researchers alike.
Hofstede also uses these dimensions of culture to 'classify' organizations to different types according to where they fall on the Power Distance vs. Uncertainty Avoidance grid. The discussion is highly informative and touches on Mintzberg's theories as well typical models of organization in different cultures. In Part Four, he discusses how intercultural encounters are affected by these dimensions and how awareness and acceptance of these differences can yield more effective results.Cultures and Organizations: Software of the Mind Overview

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Direct Action: An Ethnography Review

Direct Action: An Ethnography
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Direct Action: An Ethnography ReviewDon't let the word "ethnography" intimidate you. While this is certainly a serious scholastic work, it does not at all read like an anthropology textbook. In fact, at times it reads like a really good novel, full of dramatic street actions, colorful characters, and passionate conversations. In the first half of the book, Graeber provides a vivid history of the intense political organizing that culminated in the mass mobilization against the 2001 Summit of the Americas in Quebec City. Along the way, he provides a rich description of the various groups behind the protests like the Direct Action Network, the NYC Ya Basta! collective, CLAC, SalAMI, the Pagan Cluster, and the Black Bloc, among others. While the first half of the book will for sure keep you on the edge of your seat, the second portion is no less fascinating. Here, Graeber gives a detailed study of anarchist culture in North America, from consensus decision-making and spokescouncils to infoshops, Indymedia, giant puppets, DIY punk, and vegan diets. Besides recounting large events like the World Bank/IMF protests in DC and the FTAA protests in Miami, Graeber also describes many smaller actions like Critical Mass bike rides and the walkout of employees of the Museum of Modern Art in midtown Manhatten. So, if you want to better understand what the anti-capitalist movement is all about, I strongly urge you to read this insightful book. It will make you yearn for a better world.Direct Action: An Ethnography Overview

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Friction: An Ethnography of Global Connection Review

Friction: An Ethnography of Global Connection
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Friction: An Ethnography of Global Connection ReviewI picked this up from the city library after a professor showed it to me, admitting she hadn't read it; what a good decision that was! I bought a copy a few weeks later. At this point, I've probably read 'Friction' three times, and once or twice a year I'll pull it off the shelf to graze through Tsing's accomplished prose and absolutely jam-packed observations.
'Friction' deals with conflict in the rainforest of Indonesia, but that is a superficial description of a book that reads like a hero-less political thriller set in a multitudinous, global carnival of atrocity, adaptation, and survival. Tsing includes a large cast here: indigenous, rainforest communities, black market loggers, hikers, special forces units, environmentalists, multinationals, NGOs, political parties, and so on. Remarkably, none of these groups are left out as the book comes together. Rather, the reader is treated to a smooth description of the connections that are threaded between all of them, however insignificant they may have first appeared.
I am not sure that Tsing's concept of friction (the cultural co-formation occurring in global economy) is really original or functional enough to merit its role as title. It's an old concept that has worn different clothes (eg, 'creative destruction'). However, this is just a quibble, as Tsing also forwards a range of theoretical propositions that succeed in elaborating both her research subjects and a tentative sense of hope. Trees are social networks, 'universals' are promiscuous jet-setters, and utopias are valid rallying cries in apocalyptic landscapes of environmental devastation.
Tsing should be, and has been, praised for her restrained prose, which allows events to convey their moral impact without subjecting the reader to a sermon. Her writing is fluid, rhythmic, athletic and most of all, economical. I'm often surprised how small the book seems for the amount of writing it holds.
Finally, the presentation is refreshingly light. A few intriguing images are scattered through the book, traditional ecological knowledge is given some space, and poetry, extensive citations, excerpts from advertisements all work to expand the range of 'Fricton' while freeing up the weight of the text.
This is not your standard 'shock' and 'outrage' expose of corporate immorality. Instead, it is a detailed and novel look at the spectrum of actors involved in the formation of socioeconomic reality. 'Friction' would be a great choice for anyone looking for a complex analysis of the ongoing, global reticulation of capital, culture, environment, and technology. The book is accessible enough for popular consumption and detailed enough for academic and professional specialists. For those interested in the anthropology, ecology, economics, geography, or sociology of frontiers and margins, start here.Friction: An Ethnography of Global Connection Overview

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The Rise of the Network Society (The Information Age: Economy, Society and Culture, Volume 1) (Vol 1) Review

The Rise of the Network Society (The Information Age: Economy, Society and Culture, Volume 1) (Vol 1)
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The Rise of the Network Society (The Information Age: Economy, Society and Culture, Volume 1) (Vol 1) ReviewGiven Castells' huge range of understanding and the sheer ambition of his work, it seems a bit unfair to really criticize this book. Few writers would try to tackle the huge ideas that Castells covers here - vast theories about the state and direction of humanity in relation to the rising information society. On the other hand, theory-of-everything books like this, as frequently attempted by polymaths such as Fritjof Capra, have their own unavoidable problems which deserve to be criticized. When a theorist tries to combine knowledge of everything into a huge integrated and unified theory, the writing becomes monstrously diffuse and unfocused. That is the exact problem with this book.
Castells obviously has an understanding of all the disparate theoretical areas that would be encompassed by such a huge endeavor. As the book progresses, Castells is not afraid to move from areas like astrophysics to rural sociology to corporate architecture to programming language to everything else you could think of, often in successive paragraphs. But when describing everything, Castells eventually reaches conclusions on nothing. Bringing together disparate realms of knowledge is one thing, but reaching insights that make sense is much more difficult.
That all makes this book extremely tiresome for the reader. In that exasperating theory-of-everything fashion, Castells can't stop piling on new terminology like real virtuality, technopoles, or milieux of information (terms created by himself or others) that merely illustrate the smashing together of ideas, rather than synthesis. And whenever it's time for an awe-inspiring insight, Castells can only come up with supposedly deep (usually in italics for significance) pontifications like "space is crystallized time" or "a place is a locale whose form...[is] self-contained within the boundaries of physical contiguity." These are indications of Castells' writing style - never-ending collections of disconnected pieces of data, topped off by windy pronouncements. After so many intensive build-ups, Castells can come up with little for the reader to really chew on.
And get this man an editor, please. Extremely long paragraphs, some more than two entire pages long, illustrate a real lack of control in the writing department. Castells also has the habit of endlessly qualifying his ideas by explaining what he's NOT going to talk about and why he decided to cover what he IS talking about, to the extent that he almost forgets to make his points at all (see the early portions of chapter 4 for a good example of this). And to think that this 500+ page monster is merely the first book in a trilogy on this subject. Castells deserves credit as a polymath with huge interests and ideas. But he is sorely lacking in focus, and effective writing skills. [~doomsdayer520~]The Rise of the Network Society (The Information Age: Economy, Society and Culture, Volume 1) (Vol 1) Overview

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Perspectives on Las Americas: A Reader in Culture, History, and Representation (Global Perspectives) Review

Perspectives on Las Americas: A Reader in Culture, History, and Representation (Global Perspectives)
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Perspectives on Las Americas: A Reader in Culture, History, and Representation (Global Perspectives) ReviewI bought this book for class several months back from Bookholders at a really low price and the book arrived at my house in perfect condition, like new. I was amazed at how fast it got here because I really needed it for my Anthropology class. I would recommend everyone interested in Latin American Anthropology to take a look at it. It is a compilation of articles and studies edited by Matthew C. Guttman. This book was good but the seller was great. Way to go bookholders.Perspectives on Las Americas: A Reader in Culture, History, and Representation (Global Perspectives) Overview

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Pathologies of Power: Health, Human Rights, and the New War on the Poor, With a New Preface by the Author (California Series in Public Anthropology) Review

Pathologies of Power: Health, Human Rights, and the New War on the Poor, With a New Preface by the Author (California Series in Public Anthropology)
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Pathologies of Power: Health, Human Rights, and the New War on the Poor, With a New Preface by the Author (California Series in Public Anthropology) ReviewPaul Farmer, perhaps the most famous 'Third World doctor' living today, has written an eloquent and moving plea for a reconsideration of modern approaches toward healthcare in the developing nations in this book, "Pathologies of Power". Based on his personal experiences of care in Haiti, but also his professional visits to Russia, Africa, Central America, Mexico, Cuba and many other places besides, Paul Farmer demonstrates that the problematics of healthcare and those of poverty and inequality are insolubly linked in these nations. Whoever says "heal the sick" must also say "end poverty", for the one is not possible without the other; and whoever says "prevent disease" must also say "destroy socio-economic inequality", for the one is not possible without the other. That is the message of this book.
A large part of the work consists of reflections by Farmer on his experiences in Haiti and elsewhere and on the way in which the current worldwide economic structures engender a genuine and systematic violence against the rights of the poor. Strongly inspired by liberation theology (though not necessarily religious), Farmer eloquently and effectively contrasts the heavy importance attached to individual political and legal rights with the way in which the violations of rights done by structural inequalities and injustices is wholly ignored in the same circles that would complain about the former. Rights issues are the domain of jurists, development issues the domain of (liberal) economists; but the way in which the poor and weak are constantly crushed by the systematic repression that is poverty and inequality, at least as real and at least as much a violation as any torture, that seems to be the domain of nobody at all. As Paul Farmer clearly shows, even in the lately so blossoming domain of medical and bioethics the issue of socio-economic structures is completely swept under the carpet. As he says, this really is the "elephant in the room".
The same also goes for the oft-invoked importance of efficiency. Callous and counterproductive Western, often American, inspired healthcare policies in the developing nations (among which we must now sadly share Russia as well) generally fail at providing effective treatment against simple preventable disease such as TBC, because those medications that would actually help are considered "not cost-effective". This is in fact just a polite way of saying "we don't care about these people", but then phrased in a manner that will lead to less of an uproar in the newspapers. Farmer however is not fooled so easily, and sees this for what it is - a structural repression of the developing nations by the developed ones, in the name of "efficiency", i.e. efficiency in achieving the aims of the Western states.
This book is a very powerful work, and a strong indictment of the prevailing attitude towards healthcare and development issues and the little attention paid to their interrelation. It also demonstrates convincingly how the current worldwide economic system is bad for everybody's health. And what could be a more important thing than that?Pathologies of Power: Health, Human Rights, and the New War on the Poor, With a New Preface by the Author (California Series in Public Anthropology) Overview

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Counterculture Through the Ages: From Abraham to Acid House Review

Counterculture Through the Ages: From Abraham to Acid House
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Counterculture Through the Ages: From Abraham to Acid House Review
I found this book in an airport, and bought it for three reasons: 1) because Bruce Sterling plugged it; 2) because my 15-year old is well on his way to being part of the emerging counter-culture; and 3) because I do believe that "power to the people" is now imminent--not if, but when.
It starts slow, quickly improves by page 50, and as I put down the book I could not help but think, "tour de force." This is both a work of scholarship and an advanced commentary that puts counter-culture movements across history into a most positive context.
Across the ages, the common currency of any counter-culture is the will to live free of constraints, limiting the impositions of authority. Indeed, it is very hard not to put this book down with an altered appreciation for hippies, war protesters and civil rights activists, for the book makes it clear that they are direct intellectual, cultural, and emotional descendants of both Socrates and the Founding Fathers, especially Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson.
From Socrates to Taoism, Zen, Sufis, Troubadours, the Enlightenment, the Americans, Bohemian Paris, and into the 1950's through the 1970's, the author's broad brush review of the history of counter-culture in all its forms is helpful to anyone interested in how the next twenty years might play out.
The bottom line is clear: we need the counter-culture, and it is time for this century's culture hackers--of whom Stewart Brand may be the first--along with the author--to rise from their slumber.
Some side notes:
1) An underlying theme, not fully brought out, is that anything in excess or without balance can be harmful. Absolute dictatorship by religions is as bad as absolute secular dictatorship. Science without humanity, humanity without science.
2) The Jewish religion is favorably treated in this book as perhaps the most counter-cultural and individualistic of the religions. I found this intriguing and was quite interested in some of the specific examples.
3) I disagree with the author's attack on Roger Shattuck's "Forbidden Knowledge: From Prometheus to Pornography," and would go so far as to say that the two books should be read together, along with "Voltaire's Bastards," "Consilience," and a few of the other books on my information society list.
The author concludes somewhat somberly, not at all sure that there is much good ahead. He very rationally notes that before we begin the next big counter-cultural movement we should probably focus on fundamentals first: do we have enough water, energy, food, medicine?
I agree with that, and I agree with John Gage's prediction in 2000, that DoKoMo phones in the hands of pre-teens, and Sony Playstations at $300 with access to the Internet, are irrevocably changing the balance of power. Jonathan Schell is on target in "Unconquerable World: Power, Non-Violence, and the Will of the People," and both Tom Atlee ("The Tao of Democracy") and Howard Rheingold ("Smart Mobs") as well as James Surowiecki ("The Wisdom of the Crowds") all show us clearly that information is going to out the corrupt and restore balance to our lives. It is not a matter of if, but when. Collective intelligence--public intelligence--is here to stay.Counterculture Through the Ages: From Abraham to Acid House Overview

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