A Fieldpoem for World Poetry Day
How we practice and write ethnography matters. Poetry is one way to understand what it feels like to be human at a particular time and place. The difference…
How we practice and write ethnography matters. Poetry is one way to understand what it feels like to be human at a particular time and place. The difference…
How memes articulate tech trouble and signal “all the things.” History repeats itself, “the first time as tragedy, the second as farce”—especially in Silicon Valley. In April 2018,…
What might a Basque wine tell us about current wine trends and broader human issues? My coworkers at the wine bar knew I had an interest in the…
How pop music videos perform a simultaneously Lahu and modern identity. As the music video begins, we see a young man waiting anxiously, peering through a gate. A…
Are we developing emotional machines with all-too-human capacities for care? An interactive scene from Gatebox Inc.’s promotional video. Gatebox Inc. There is a moment in Spike Jonze’s film…
Among Acholis, ideals of home and a good life are resilient even if everyday realities increasingly diverge from such aspirations. There is a tendency to think about love…
What we talk about when we talk about Tinder. I have never been good at dating. I simply refused to acknowledge the subtleties and rituals of courtship, to…
For community organizers in New Orleans, action to oppose the carceral state first requires the building of community. We were in the middle of one of Voice of…
AN invites you to go wild (or domestic) and submit proposals for our May/June “Animalia” issue. Whether your story is about bonobos or whales or bees, we want…
As the year winds down, Anthropology News rounds up our most popular articles of 2018. From critical reflections on the discipline and experiences of it, to grappling with…
How a global internet phenomenon is foreshadowing the effects of virtual reality and changing the way strangers connect online. Sitting in a home office filled with stuffed…
An anthropologist reflects on conducting research as an “insider” to the veteran population. Kreisten Downs For me, Veterans Day produces contrasting and sometimes painful emotions. Yet for others,…
Reflections on a career tackling some of the critical workplace challenges of our time. I could not have imagined when I entered the PhD program in anthropology at…
Does technology mean something different when it leaves the Valley and goes to the Beach? In the summer of 2016, during preliminary fieldwork in California, I met with…
Long-term residents’ experiences of technological disruption and resilience are an untold yet essential part of the Silicon Valley story. In May 2018, I spoke with Tom, an elderly…
In a climate of pervasive narratives of wealth creation and success, how can anthropology hold corporate and tech sectors to account? In March 2014, Business Insider published the…
How Silicon Valley’s wealth produces uneven impacts throughout the region. Silicon Valley is a geographic region, shorthand for all things tech, the global hub of the technology industry,…
Silicon Valley’s workers must maneuver their way through this place of diversity and discrimination, capitalist aims, and countercultural aspirations. You can spot the extremes on the street in…
Although it rarely results in accusations, violence, or exclusion, witchcraft has implications for relations of power and authority in Mexican Catholicism. In late September 2017, in the quiet…
We may never know the intricate details of early human diets—and sometimes, different lines of evidence can seem contradictory. Happy National Fossil Day! Fossils are among the most…
People living with chronic illness and medication also manage their health in experimental and often quite ordinary ways. Blood tests, echocardiograms, waist measurements, and body weigh-ins comprise…
Fossil and archaeological evidence suggests that our ancient relatives found innovative ways to make and share meaning. A recent exhibit at the Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas,…
The idea that a single population was the ancestor of all living humans is neat and convenient, but it is not consistent with the data. The origin of…
There is more to our evolutionary history than a single origin in Africa. In the past year, at least four fossil finds have been billed as overturning the…