To Raise Children, We Must First Raise Parents
An anthropologist compares her early motherhood in London with child care experiences in a hunter-gatherer community of Central Africa. ✽ Bebuna, a woman in her 60s, sits in…
Tag: children
Too much screen time? How digital media impacts children under six
Digital Media Use in Early Childhood by Lelia Green, Leslie Haddon, Sonia Livingstone, Brian O’Neill, Kylie J. Stevenson and Donell Halloway examines how children under six interact with…
Shannon Ward on her book, Amdo Lullaby
Hyemin Lee: Your book, Amdo Lullaby: An Ethnography of Childhood and Language Shift on the Tibetan Plateau, offers an insightful exploration of the anthropological question of how senses…
Mariapaola Gritti takes the page 99 test
I was hoping page 99 of my dissertation would include data documenting face-to-face interactions among children in Manu’a, American Samoa, from my 2015-2017 fieldwork. No luck. It only…
An Ancient Child Who’s Changing Archaeology
A Brazilian archaeologist reexamines the way people treat ancestral Indigenous remains housed in museums—starting with one important encounter. Can museums and archaeology harm the dead? An Indigenou…
Inside Russia’s Campaign to Steal and Indoctrinate Ukrainian Children
An anthropologist investigates an insidious side of Russia’s genocide against Ukrainians meant to shatter families: snatching children and occupying their minds. ✽ Not long after Russia’s full-scale i…
Buried in the Shadows, Ireland’s Unconsecrated Dead
A visual anthropologist reflects on the history of cillíní, unmarked and mostly hidden burial sites in Ireland where loved ones continue to care for the dead. South of…
Can you be a parent and an activist?
I am consumed by a difficult realization I’ve come to lately. The care my children need to be as protected as possible under the conditions of capitalism outstrips…
Learning From Snapshots of Lost Fossils
Not all fossil discoveries happen in the field. In museum archives, researchers found photos of remains from Paleolithic children who had belonged to a group of early Homo…
Infant, Name Once Known
A poet-anthropologist of the Chickasaw Nation honors infant remains historically used in teaching collections at the University of Illinois. “Infant, Name Once Known” is part of the collection…
Contesting Moralities: Roma Identities, State and Kinship – review
In Contesting Moralities: Roma Identities, State and Kinship, Iliana Sarafian challenges established scholarly practices that attempt to define Romani identity, instead exploring how individuals navig…
Weaving Stories: Two Women Speak
Author and poet Sia Figiel and activist and anthropologist Doris Tulifau share their stories of being Samoan women. They also discuss the violence and challenges they’ve faced and…
Trashing an American Icon
Anthropologist Derek Freeman became Margaret Mead’s biggest critic, trying to undo her research in American Samoa and her reputation as a famed anthropologist. Who was Derek Freeman, and…
Flapper of the South Seas
A young anthropologist named Margaret Mead journeyed to American Samoa in 1925 and claimed she found a culture where teenagers were sexually free. Fame and controversy followed. In…
Coming of Age … Today
Does the transition from childhood to adulthood have to be so difficult? This question sent famed anthropologist Margaret Mead to American Samoa in 1925—and ignited decades of controversy.…
The Problems With Coming of Age
A famed anthropologist’s controversial research in American Samoa reveals the biggest questions about growing up and being human. This special SAPIENS podcast season, co-hosted by Doris Tulifau and…
Raising My Children in an Ableist World
In a new book, an anthropologist and father of three, including a daughter with Down syndrome, reflects on the pressures of parenting. Excerpted from An Ordinary Future: Margaret…
Sonia Livingstone on her co-authored book, Parenting for a Digital Future
https://global.oup.com/ushe/product/parenting-for-a-digital-future-9780190874704?cc=us&lang=en& Interview by Ashley McDermott Ashley McDermott: Your work looks at how techn…
What Spider Games Say About Arachnophobia
Many people around the world fear spiders. But in the Philippines, the tradition of spider wrestling often brings people and arachnids in close proximity. ✽ A fear of…
Why Are People Afraid of Multicultural Children’s Books?
A look at the situation in the U.S. shows that the warning about leftist Cancel Culture and Wokism, has in fact prepared a massive wave of bans on…
Post-
An Indigenous poet-anthropologist writes to her daughter of the limits of her motherly protection. “Post-” is part of the collection Indigenizing What It Means to Be Human. Read…
Extraordinary Lessons From a Community-Led Excavation
An archaeologist examines how community members in Cardiff, Wales, collaborated with a research team to make important insights into the Bronze Age. This article was originally published at…
In the Event of Flooding
An Indigenous poet-anthropologist speaks to the survivance of Native communities in the face of colonialism and genocide. “In the Event of Flooding” is part of the collection Indigenizing…
Born of “All That Good”
An Indigenous poet-anthropologist and new mother interrogates the idea that, overall, historic Indigenous boarding schools brought a lot of “good.” “Born of ‘All That Good’” is part …