Группа авторов
Список книг автора Группа авторовIndigenous Peoples, Civil Society, and the Neo-liberal State in Latin America
In recent years the concept and study of “civil society” has received a lot of attention from political scientists, economists, and sociologists, but less so from anthropologists. A ground-breaking ethnographic approach to civil society as it is formed in indigenous communities in Latin America, this volume explores the multiple potentialities of civil society’s growth and critically assesses the potential for sustained change. Much recent literature has focused on the remarkable gains made by civil society and the chapters in this volume reinforce this trend while also showing the complexity of civil society – that civil society can itself sometimes be uncivil. In doing so, these insightful contributions speak not only to Latin American area studies but also to the changing shape of global systems of political economy in general.
Contemporary Religiosities
The last decade has seen an unexpected return of the religious, and with it the creation of new kinds of social forms alongside new fusions of political and religious realms that high modernity kept distinct. For a fuller understanding of what this means for society in the context of globalization, it is necessary to rethink the relationship between the religious and the secular; the contributors – all leading scholars in anthropology – do just that, some even arguing that secularization itself now takes a religious form. Combining theoretical reflection with vivid ethnographic explorations, this essential collection is designed to advance a critical understanding of social and personal religious experience in today's world.
An Anthropology of War
As we move deeper into the twenty-first century, power, lethal force, and injustice continue to explode violently into war, and the prospects for lasting peace look even bleaker. The horrors of modern warfare – the death, dehumanization, and destruction of social and material infrastructures – have done little to bring an end to armed conflict. In this volume, leading chroniclers of war provide thoughtful and powerful essays that reflect on their ethnographic work at the frontlines. The contributors recount not only what they have seen and heard in war zones but also what is being read, studied, analyzed and remembered in such diverse locations as Colombia and Guatemala, Israel and Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Haiti. In detailed reports from the field, they reflect on the important issue of “accountability” and offer explanations to discern causes, patterns, and practices of war. Through this unique lens, the contributors provide the insight and analysis needed for a deeper understanding of one of the greatest issues of our times. Contributors: Avram Bornstein, Paul E. Farmer, R. Brian Ferguson, Lesley Gill, Beatriz Manz, Carolyn Nordstrom, Stephen Reyna, Jose N. Vasquez
The Challenge of Epistemology
Epistemology poses particular problems for anthropologists whose task it is to understand manifold ways of being human. Through their work, anthropologists often encounter people whose ideas concerning the nature and foundations of knowledge are at odds with their own. Going right to the heart of anthropological theory and method, this volume discusses issues that have vexed practicing anthropologists for a long time. The authors are by no means in agreement with one another as to where the answers might lie. Some are primarily concerned with the clarity and theoretical utility of analytical categories across disciplines; others are more inclined to push ethnographic analysis to its limits in an effort to demonstrate what kind of sense it can make. All are aware of the much-wanted differences that good ethnography can make in explaining the human sciences and philosophy. The contributors show a continued commitment to ethnography as a profoundly radical intellectual endeavor that goes to the very roots of inquiry into what it is to be human, and, to anthropology as a comparative project that should be central to any attempt to understand who we are.
Images of Power and the Power of Images
Real places and events are constructed and used to symbolize abstract formulations of power and authority in politics, corporate practice, the arts, religion, and community. By analyzing the aesthetics of public space in contexts both mundane and remarkable, the contributors examine the social relationship between public and private activities that impart meaning to groups of people beyond their individual or local circumstances. From a range of perspectives—anthropological, sociological, and socio-cultural—the contributors discuss road-making in Peru, mass housing in Britain, an unsettling traveling exhibition, and an art fair in London; we explore the meaning of walls in Jerusalem, a Zen garden in Japan, and religious themes in Europe and India. Literally and figuratively, these situations influence the ways in which ordinary people interpret their everyday worlds. By deconstructing the taken for- granted definitions of social value (democracy, equality, individualism, fortune), the authors reveal the ideological role of imagery and imagination in a globalized political context.
China in Oceania
It is important to see China’s activities in the Pacific Islands, not just in terms of a specific set of interests, but in the context of Beijing’s recent efforts to develop a comprehensive and global foreign policy. China’s policy towards Oceania is part of a much larger outreach to the developing world, a major work in progress that involves similar initiatives in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East. This groundbreaking study of China’s “soft power” initiatives in these countries offers, for the first time, the diverse perspectives of scholars and diplomats from Oceania, North American, China, and Japan. It explores such issues as regional competition for diplomatic and economic ties between Taiwan and China, the role of overseas Chinese in developing these relationships, and various analyses of the benefits and drawbacks of China’s growing presence in Oceania. In addition, the reader obtains a rare review of the Japanese response to China’s role in Oceania, presented by Japan’s leading scholar of the Pacific region.
The State and the Arts
Judith Kapferer and her collaborators present an insightful volume that interrogates relations between the state and the arts in diverse national and cultural settings. The authors critique the taken-for-granted assumption about the place of the arts in liberal or social democratic states and the role of the arts in supporting or opposing the ideological work of government and non-government institutions. This innovative volume explores the challenges posed by the state to the arts and by the arts to the state, focusing on several transformations of the interrelations between state and commercial arts policies in the current era. These ongoing challenges include the control of repressive tolerance, complicity with and resistance to state power, and the commoditization of the arts, including their accommodation to market and state apparatuses. While endeavouring to avoid the currently dominant pragmatic and didactic priorities of officialdom, the contributors tackle social and cultural policy and practice in the arts as well as connections between national states and dissenting art from a range of genres.
Young Men in Uncertain Times
Anthropology is particularly well suited to explore the contemporary predicament in the coming of age of young men. Its grounded and comparative empiricism provides the opportunity to move beyond statistics, moral panics, or gender stereotypes in order to explore specific aspects of life course transitions, as well as the similar or divergent barriers or opportunities that young men in different parts of the world face. Yet, effective contextualization and comparison cannot be achieved by looking at male youths in isolation. This volume undertakes to contextualize male youths’ circumstances and to learn about their lives, perspectives, and actions, and in turn illuminates the larger structures and processes that mediate the experiences entailed in becoming young men. The situation of male youths provides an important vantage point from which to consider broader social transformations and continuities. By paying careful attention to these contexts, we achieve a better understanding of the current influences encountered and acted upon by young people.
Protest Beyond Borders
The protest movements that followed the Second World War have recently become the object of study for various disciplines; however, the exchange of ideas between research fields, and comparative research in general, is lacking. An international and interdisciplinary dialogue is vital to not only describe the similarities and differences between the single national movements but also to evaluate how they contributed to the formation and evolution of a transnational civil society in Europe. This volume undertakes this challenge as well as questions some major assumptions of post-1945 protest and social mobilization both in Western and Eastern Europe. Historians, political scientists, sociologists and media studies scholars come together and offer insights into social movement research beyond conventional repertoires of protest and strictly defined periods, borders and paradigms, offering new perspectives on past and present processes of social change of the contemporary world.
Searching for a Cultural Diplomacy
Recent studies on the meaning of cultural diplomacy in the twentieth century often focus on the United States and the Cold War, based on the premise that cultural diplomacy was a key instrument of foreign policy in the nation’s effort to contain the Soviet Union. As a result, the term “cultural diplomacy” has become one-dimensional, linked to political manipulation and subordination and relegated to the margin of diplomatic interactions. This volume explores the significance of cultural diplomacy in regions other than the United States or “western” countries, that is, regions that have been neglected by scholars so far—Eastern Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. By examining cultural diplomacy in these regions, the contributors show that the function of information and exchange programs differs considerably from area to area depending on historical circumstances and, even more importantly, on the cultural mindsets of the individuals involved.