Post 14: Globalized Communities

The China Youth Development Fund is a non-profit social organization that was funded in 1989. They are partners with the International Youth Foundation, Motorola, Coca-Cola and the New Path Foundation. Motorola and Coca-Cola both fund Project Hope, which is a project started by the CYDF. The projects goal is to increase Chinese youth's access to eduction. Chinese youth in rural areas of China are unable to get an education because of their financial situation. According to the organization's brochure, they have provided 2.47 million children access to education. They have also built schools, trained teachers and donated school supplies and books to schools and libraries.
This organization seeks support for Project Hope. The money is used for children's education (one year, or many), training teachers, buying supplies and building schools. The organization is devoted to educational development. Many organizations may provide a school and books but no teachers or leaders to keep development going; but the CYDF focuses on sustainable development. They focus solely of Chinese youth. Companies like Coca-Cola and Motorola, who have factories in China, have donated millions of dollars to the CYDF. I wonder if these donations are truly altruistic behaviour. Could it be that these companies are donating money so that in the future they can have workers with some education like reading and writing?

Link to the CYDF website.
Pictures here.

Post 13: Review of art

I chose the 'Medicine Man Gallery' from the list on DMOZ. This gallery focuses on Native American Indian baskets, trays and ollas. The gallery shows baskets from different cultures such as the Pima and the Hopi. Baskets are one of the most valued forms of Native art according to this website. As the different groups, such as the Apache, become less nomadic, the need for baskets and ollas decreased. The decrease in production makes the Apache ollas very rare, a very well made Apache ollas can sell for over $100,000 today. Collectors look for pieces that "have great symmetry, size, and feature polychrome and multi figures". Pieces are represented as authentic or traditional by the materials they are made out of the patternization and area they originate from. My impression is that the cultural expression is more important to the collector, than the individuals creative expression. Only more recently has the individual artist been important. Basket weaving originally began out of practicality. The women made baskets to collect food an water. From this tradition, the art of basket weaving arose. Therefore, the objects in this Medicine Man collection are both art and ethnographic objects.
My overall impression of the objects is that they are very intricate, and take a lot of skill to create.The intended audience of the gallery seems to be collectors and people who are uneducated about basket weaving. The website offers free evaluations of peoples baskets. The art fits all of the categories of indigenous art, fine art, tourist art, folk art, handicrafts and fine arts depending on how well its made, when it was made and who made it. For example, baskets could be seen as tourist art when they are sold at airports in Arizona.
Here is a video with some more info about basket weaving.
The picture is of a native american indian basket, Ca. 1800 found here.

Post 12: Communication

Being someone who is hopelessly unilingual, this subject intrigues me. Communication is the conveying of a meaningful message from one person to the other, in any form. This topic focuses on non-alpabetic systems of writing that can be read- for example, hieroglyphics from Egypt (see photo). Other types of communication that do not use and alphabet are: logographic (uses signs to represent a morpheme- Ex. Chinese), logophonetic (signs denoting syllables-Ex. Japanese) and syllabic (many signs each having a phonetic value-Ex. Cree).Common features of these language system is that each symbol represents some sound instead of a letter. A difference is that the type of sound mean by each symbol is different, some denote a syllable while others denote a phoneme.Writing was invented independently in at least three places, Mesopotamia, China, and Mesoamerica. While evolutionists like Tylor may think that a non-alphabetic language is inferior to an alphabetic language, modern anthropologists know that having a writing system "is not a marker of civilization". An interesting point made by the author of this website is that even english is somewhat logographic because we do not read a word by looking at each letter individually. We read by seeing the word as a whole like a picture.
Another interesting point he makes is that we may not be able to fully understand the full meaning of language of ancient times. Although Shakespeare's time was not that long ago his poems don't rhyme the way we think rhymes work. But in that time period they rhymed perfectly. So we might think we understand ancient language, but understanding ancient language fully may be impossible.

Picture found here.

Post 11: Religion

MbaKuhwa is a Tiv women in her thirties who died after only a few weeks of being sick. MbaKuhwa is not a witch. The Tiv determine this by doing a post-mortem examination. During the exam they will examine the heart and look for 'tsav' which in english translation approximately means “witchcraft potential”. MbaKuhwa did not have tsav therefore she was not deemed a witch. The etic view of this scenario would be that MbaKuhwa died of a disease such as an infection. Since her death was not caused by witchcraft the family must determine who's fault it is that MbaKuhwa died. This is a ritual in which family members throw blame back and fourth. The ritual of throwing blame back and forth does not cause one person to be punished for this death, it is more of a symbolic process.
What I found interesting from this article is how the anthropologist interacts with the Tiv people. The author asks one of the Tiv people if he can watch the post mortem examination. The Tiv person then asks him if his culture does a post mortem exam, the author replies that they do, so the Tiv allow him to watch. It seems the Tiv were very welcoming of the author.
You can read more about the funeral here.

Post 10: Feminist Anthropology

In order to be as subjective as possible when doing anthropological research is is important to 'defamiliarize' yourself from the cultural norms you have grown accustom to. Since it is impossible to wipe our memories clean, like we do a computer, George Marcus and Michael Fischer have identified two techniques that allow a more subjective 'cultural critique': defamiliarization by epistemological critique and defamiliarization by cross-cultural juxtaposition.
Saba Gul Khattak, writes about the Afghan women living in refugee camps in Pakistan in an article titled, "Living on the Edges: Afghan Women and Refugee Camp Management in Pakistan". She is using the defamiliarization by cross-cultural juxtaposition technique, focusing on women's role in the refugee camps and how they are given less privileges than the men. She writes, "a high incidence of violence against women was tolerated both within and outside the camps, as were public acts of vigilantism, if women were seen to transgress norms set by the men in the camps." This statement shows that she is comparing her norms (etic view) on violence against women and gender roles, to the norms of the women she is studying. The author calls for more freedom for the women living in refugee camps so that they are not abused or need to turn to working as sex trade workers to support themselves. Women were not allowed to leave the camps which greatly inhibiting their ability to support themselves. The author also argues that their should be more health care and counselling for the women who are traumatized.
Quynh-Giao N. Vu writes from a completely different perspective, being a refugee herself. She experienced living as a refugee and adapted that as her norm therefore she used defamiliarization by epistemological critique when she later moves to the US and can compare the two experiences. The author is calling for more attention to refugees.
These two articles were very different. Quynh-Giao N. Vu writes from personal experience, where as Saba Gul Khattak writes as an outsider.

You can read these articles in the spring 2007 issue here.

Post 9: Social Groups and Social Stratification

The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo is a social group consisting of Argentinian women who's children disappeared during the 'Dirty War' from 1976-1983. The Dirty War was a war between the state of Argentina and left-winged militia who included students, journalists and revolutionaries. The association formed when mothers met each other while trying to search for their missing children. The Argentinian government admits that about 9,000 people are still missing, but the Mothers Association have calculated it to be over 30,000. Outrageously, many of the founders of the Mother's Association have also disappeared and DNA tests have confirmed their deaths. The mothers meet every thursday at the Plaza de Mayo, wearing white cloth on their heads with their children's names embroidered on them.
The Mother's have not given up on their children's memory. They have founded a university and cultural centre in honour of their children. They have also been able to raise money to provide other children education and are spokes women for human rights in Argentina.
I think what provides this group solidarity is the weekly gathering to remember their children, this makes them a primary group. Also, they have been able to rise from the tragedy and do good for others.
You can learn more about this association with the book "Revolutionizing Motherhood:The mothers of the Plaza de Mayo".

Picture here.

Post 8: Perspectives on Polygamy

I personally do not think that polygamy should be legal in Canada. Seeing as how polygamy is a cultural norm for some people, I find it hard to criticize those who want to live that lifestyle. My biggest issue with polygamy is that it suppresses women. In most polygamist societies the wife's (wives' in this case) role is to fulfil her husbands wishes, and have and raise children. I'm certainly not alone in my feelings considering that "only 20% of 2,093 Canadians surveyed were “willing to accept polygamy”(link).
As we learned in class, kinship is a topic which was of major interest to cultural anthropologists in the past. We can tell a lot about a culture from their kinship systems. For example, in a polygyny (many wives) marriage we can assume that the male has more power than females, and this assumption is generally true. Also, following the kinship diagrams of polygamist families and what they consider incest would be very interesting for anthropologists.
My fear with polygamy, which is naive since I have no experience with polygamy, is that the females in the relationship have no voice. An example is the Elizabeth Smart case. Elizabeth a 14 year old girl was abducted by a polygamist. She was raped and threatened that if she tried to escape or contact her family he would kill her and her family. I know this is a very extreme case, but I worry that females in those relationships live in fear of their husbands and therefore can't make their own decisions.
Polyandry is when one female has many husbands. This is extremely rare, and certainly not an issue in Canada.
Here you can see a time line of polygamy.

Photo found here.