Applying Anthropology

Overview

Applying Anthropology: An Introductory Reader is a collection of articles that provides compelling examples of applied research in all four fields of anthropology. In this age of globalization and increased cultural intolerance, the basic messages of public anthropology are more important than ever. The ninth edition offers 11 new readings and a new chart at the beginning of the text to help instructors and students locate key themes and topics.

Table of contents

Contents

*= new reading

To the Student
To the Instructor

Introduction: Understanding Humans and Human Problems

PART I Biological Anthropology
1 Teaching Theories: The Evolution-Creation Controversy
Robert Root-Bernstein and Donald L. McEachron (The American Biology Teacher, 1982)

*2 Re-reading Root-Bernstein and McEachron in Cobb County, Georgia: A Year Past and Present
Benjamin Z. Freed (2008)

*3 The Family Tree Has Become a Bush with Many Branches
John Nobe Wilford (New York Times 2006)


4 What Are Friends For?
Barbara Smuts (Natural History, 1987)

5 Mothers and Others
Sarah Blaffer Hrdy (Natural History, 2001)

6 Great Mysteries of Human Evolution
Carl Zimmer (Discover, 2003)

7 Ancient Bodies, Modern Customs, and Our Health
Elizabeth D. Whitaker (1998)

8 Slumber’s Unexplored Landscape
Bruce Bower (Science News, 1999)

9 Ancient Genes and Modern Health
S. Boyd Eaton and Melvin Konner (Anthroquest, 1985)

10 The Tall and the Short of It
Barry Bogin (Discover, 1998)

11 Identifying Victims After a Disaster
Dick Gould (Anthropology News, 2005)

PART II Archaeology
12 Battle of the Bones
Robson Bonnichsen and Alan L. Schneider (The Sciences, 2000)

13 The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race
Jared Diamond (Discover, 1987)

*14 Uncovering America’s Pyramid Builders
Karen Wright (Discover 2004)

15 New Women of the Ice Age
Heather Pringle (Discover, 1998)

16 Disease and Death at Dr. Dickson’s Mounds
Alan H. Goodman and George J. Armelagos (Natural History, 1985)

17 The Secrets of Ancient Tiwanaku Are Benefiting Today’s Bolivia
Baird Straughan (Smithsonian, 1991)

18 “Clean Your Plate. There Are People Starving in Africa!” The Application of Archaeology and Ethnography to America’s Food Loss Issues
Timothy W. Jones (2005)

19 Dawn of a New Stone Age in Eye Surgery
Payson D. Sheets (1993)

*20 The Challenge of Race to American Historical Archaeology
Charles Orser (American Anthropologist1998)

PART III Linguistics
*21 From Hoefonum to Heavens
Y. Battercharjee (Science 2004)

*22 Village of the Deaf
Margalit Fox (Discover 2007)

23 “To Give up on Words”: Silence in Western Apache Culture
Keith H. Basso (Southwestern Journal of Anthropology, 1970)

24 A Cultural Approach to Male-Female Miscommunication
Daniel N. Maltz and Ruth A. Borker (Language and Social Identity, 1982)

PART IV Cultural Anthropology
CULTURE AND FIELDWORK
25 Body Ritual Among the Nacirema
Horace Miner (American Anthropologist, 1956)

26 Race Without Color
Jared Diamond (Discover, 1994)

27 Shakespeare in the Bush
Laura Bohannan (Natural History, 1966)

28 Eating Christmas in the Kalahari
Richard Borshay Lee (Natural History, 1969)

FAMILY & KINSHIP
29 How Many Fathers Are Best for a Child?
Meredith F. Small (Discover, 2003)

30 When Brothers Share a Wife
Melvyn C. Goldstein (Natural History, 1987)

31 Our Babies, Ourselves
Meredith F. Small (Natural History, 1997)

GENDER AND SEXUALITY
*32 Strange Country This: An Introduction to North American Gender Diversity
Will Roscoe (Changing Ones 2000)

33 Tricking and Tripping: Fieldwork on Prostitution in the Era of AIDS
Claire E. Sterk (2000)

34 Law, Custom, and Crimes Against Women: The Problem of Dowry Death in India
John van Willigen and V. C. Channa (Human Organization, 1991)

HEALTH, MEDICINE, AND CULTURE
35 Culture and the Evolution of Obesity
Peter J. Brown (Human Nature, 1991)

*36 Pocahontas Goes to the Clinic: Popular Culture as Lingua Franca in a Cultural Borderland
Cheryl Mattingly (American Anthropologist 2006)

37 Culture, Poverty, and HIV Transmission: The Case of Rural Haiti
Paul Farmer (Infections and Inequalities, 1999)

38 Circumcision, Pluralism, and Dilemmas of Cultural Relativism
Corinne A. Kratz (2002)

WORK AND BUSINESS
*39 Conflict and Confluence in Advertising Meetings
Robert Morais (Human Organization 2007)

40 Coming of Age in Palo Alto
Kiate Hafner (New York Times, 1999)

41 Just Another Job? The Commodification of Domestic Labor
Bridget Anderson (2002)

CONFLICT, LAW, AND CULTURE
42 The Kpelle Moot
James L. Gibbs, Jr. (Africa, 1963)

43 Contemporary Warfare in the New Guinea Highlands
Aaron Podolefsky (Ethnology, 1984)

*44 Army Enlists Anthropology in War Zones
David Rohde (New York Times, 2007)

GLOBALIZATION AND CULTURE CHANGE
45 Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving? Anthropological Reflection on Cultural Relativism and Its Others
Lila Abu-Lughod (American Anthropologist, 2002)

46 Cell Phones, Sharing, and Social Status in an African Society
Daniel Jordan Smith (2005)

47 The Price of Progress
John H. Bodley (Victims of Progress, 1999)

*48 Moral Fibers of Farmer Cooperatives: Creating Poverty and Wealth in Malian Cotton Fields
Scott M. Lacy (2008)