Are nuances like curry leaves?
The title of this post – and its contents – was inspired by an anecdote I wrote about in an earlier post in my field blog. Before I…
(Video) Games as Motivation for Japanese High School Students
By Andrew Ross Sushi served on conveyor belts. Robot restaurants and robot theater. Toilets that automatically open themselves upon room entry. For visitors of Tokyo (and to an…
The Myth of the Virgin Rainforest
The little village of Pa Lungan sits in a grassy clearing, high in the hills of Malaysian Borneo, in a region called the Kelabit Highlands. The people here—a…
Special Issues! Biomedicalization in Brazil; Life after Biopolitics by Anna Zogas
April brings many special issues! We’ve already highlighted themed issues on insurance and digitized health, and here are two more themed issues to know about: this month’s História, Ciênc…
When It’s Time to Vote, Don’t Boycott Academics – Cut the Purse-strings by Jennifer S. Hirsch
Editor’s note: We received this letter, signed by the authors listed above and by nine anonymous authors, as a reply to our earlier Debate Forum. After far too…
how to make TV now (the “whole world” approach)
Natalie Chaidez is the show runner for Hunters (Mondays, 10:00 eastern, SyFy). Recently Sean Hutchinson asked her what she was aiming for. Our idea of aliens is cliched, she replied. She wanted to &#…
The Bone Lab Goes To School
“You’re the lady that taught us about the bones last year,” one of the students exclaimed as I made my way through the door of Bedford Village Public…
Learning to Make People Laugh: A Semiotic Anthropology of Stand-up Comedy
The Open-Mic Anthropologist The first time I performed stand-up comedy was in December 2015, at an open-mic club called On the Rocks. Gripped by nerves, I worried I…
Overproduction as mass existentialism
Earlier this year, I observed that there are two kinds of scholarly overproduction, “herd” overproduction and “star” overproduction. I’d like to come back to that line of…
Proposing a Harry Potter and Anthropology Course
In Part Three of an ongoing series on teaching anthropology and popular culture, Leah McCurdy (University of Texas, San Antonio) provides some suggestions for creating an anthropology course…
Letter to the Editor and Response: The Symbolic Violence of Choice
The Symbolic Violence of Fallacious Reasoning To the Editor: Re “The Symbolic Violence of Choice” (In Focus, March 2) On its face, Starrett’s essay resembles any anthropologically grounded…
Why I have voted in support of BDS: Ghassan Hage
Anthropologists for the Boycott of Israeli Academic Institutions is pleased to present Ghassan Hage‘s eloquent essay on the urgency of voting for boycott in a desperate situation of…
David Grazian, “American Zoo: A Sociological Safari” (Princeton UP, 2015)
Urban zoos are both popular and imperiled. They are sites of contestation, but what are those contests about? In his new book, American Zoo: A Sociological Safari(Princeton, 2015),…
Deborah Cramer: The narrow ledge – a tiny bird, an ancient crab, an epic journey
Fascinating new book out from Deborah Cramer, description from Yale follows with a talk from Deborah Cramer below: Each year, red knots, sandpipers weighing no more than a…
Reforming Saudi Arabia?
Mystique of Monarchy Post-War Watch – April 19, 2016 https://postwarwatch.com/2016/04/19/mystique-of-monarchy/ MADAWI AL-RASHEED — Limited social and political reforms in Saudi Arabia only prolong t…
Visit from the Czech Republic, University of Hradec Kralové
Mgr. Jana Karlová, Ph.D. from the Czech Republic will be on a research stay at the Department of Social Anthropology and to our project from April 17th to…
Visit from the Czech Republic, University of Hradec Kralové
Mgr. Jana Karlová, Ph.D. from the Czech Republic will be on a research stay at the Department of Social Anthropology and to our project from April 17th to…
Visit from the Czech Republic, University of Hradec Kralové
Mgr. Jana Karlová, Ph.D. from the Czech Republic will be on a research stay at the Department of Social Anthropology and to our project from April 17th to…
Are We to Blame for the Colorado Theater Shooter?
Around midnight on July 20, 2012, James Holmes entered a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, for a showing of the Batman movie The Dark Knight Rises and took…
Visit from the Czech Republic, University of Hradec Kralové
Mgr. Jana Karlová, Ph.D. from the Czech Republic will be on a research stay at the Department of Social Anthropology and to our project from April 17th to…
Visit from the Czech Republic, University of Hradec Kralové
Mgr. Jana Karlová, Ph.D. from the Czech Republic will be on a research stay at the Department of Social Anthropology and to our project from April 17th to…
Philadelphia Street Style: Lukeja, Walnut St
I first photographed Lukeja back in February of 2013. I didn’t recognize her when I saw her walking around Center City the other day. But she remembered me,…