Dept. of ethnologica, kerleone, January 28, 2003 at 11:20:55 AM CET

A Japanese in Germany

For some practical readings on intercultural communication, which is taught at our insitute, you may have fun reading this diary of a japanese girl which visited germany. It's written in german. It's really interesting what she wonders about: bikes, the huge germans and hectic shopping on saturday because of the "Ladenschlussgesetz". Via Schockwellenreiter

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Dept. of ethnologica, kerlone, January 23, 2003 at 1:14:23 PM CET

Important debate: Genes and Culture

In Current Anthropology from Februar is a important debate about how far genetic determinism reaches. Cultural Anthropologists are complaining since some years about a overestimating of genetic determinism. Now they get help from the Department of Biological Sciences, Stanford University. Paul Ehrlich and Marcus Feldman write in their paper: "A central theme of the flood of literature in recent years in "evolutionary psychology" and "behavioral genetics" is that much or even most human behavior has been programmed into the human genome by natural selection. We show that this conclusion is without basis." The Stanford authors argued that very visible evolutionary psychologists, such as MIT's Pinker, do not acknowledge "the importance of interactions and of cultural evolution" but promote the idea of a genetically fixed human nature. You should at least read this very good abstract of the debate from stanford university. In Current Anthropology you will find also some critical answers to the paper from scientists.

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Dept. of ethnologica, kerlone, January 23, 2003 at 11:00:41 AM CET

Again "Fabrication of Aboriginal History"

We already reported about a new book from an australian historian which tried to disprove the thesis of the genocide of aborigines by the white man. Now Cathie Clement, Vice President of the Australian Council of Professional Historians Associations pointed us to a collection of links to debates and discussings of this book in australia. She explains: "The book is part of a range of writing that seeks to counter left-wing influence on people's thinking about the history of Indigenous Australians." Thanks for that!

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Dept. of ethnologica, kerlone, January 22, 2003 at 10:40:28 AM CET

Indigenous Languages decreasing in Canada

"The 2001 national survey suggests that just 24 per cent of North American Indians, Inuit and Metis can still converse in their ancestral tongue. That's a drop from 29 per cent measured five years ago. " Read more at Associated Press.

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Dept. of ethnologica, kerlone, January 19, 2003 at 3:40:13 PM CET

Rather Gathering than Hunting

A anthropological study from the university of Utah in Salt Lake City now want's to correct the image of the ancient homo erectus. He was not as much a hunter and carnivore as we think today. Hunting, he argues, was much more a social event. Alimentation was in fact much more solved by gathering, and thus by the woman. Read more at New Scientist and Telepolis (german).

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Dept. of ethnologica, kerlone, January 14, 2003 at 6:58:47 PM CET

Anthropologists and their Jobs

At the University of Cologne is a interesting study (in german, but completely online) from Michael Bollig und Christoph Brumann about how the chances are finding a job in anthropology and what former students actually are working. It's not new (from 1997), and well known, I guess, but anyhow interesting. And don't forget the event about this topic in Munich in two days (we already reported!).

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Dept. of ethnologica, kerlone, January 14, 2003 at 12:31:39 PM CET

The Making of a Disease: Female Sexual Dysfunction

Yesterday we were discussing in a course about cultural influences: Are cultures importing foreign cultures by theirself, or is it more that the western cultures (and mainly the industry) is pressing new ways of living to other cultures, to find a new market (McDonaldization). Now I found very interesting example, in which the industry, in this case the pharma-industry, is accused of constructing a whole disease, and this time not even in foreign waters. The British Medical Journal published an article by the Washington-based journalist Ray Moynihan that accused the drug industry of creating a new disease – female sexual dysfunction – so that it could profit from drugs to treat it, writes The Independent. Today also the german Süddeutsche was reporting in a huge article. This was what I said: Influence by the industry is not a thing only "stupid natives" are affected by. We, same stupid, are also affected from that influence. And we also managed to live with that.

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Dept. of ethnologica, kerlone, January 9, 2003 at 4:43:29 PM CET

Anyone with Mali-Mali or Ghost Sickness?

The university of California put a short index online listing all important Culture-Bound Syndromes. Deeper information is available for Culture-Bound Syndomes in China.

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Dept. of ethnologica, zephyrin, January 9, 2003 at 3:52:08 PM CET

DAVO-Newsletter

The latest newsletter sent to me by DAVO (see older story) features the following items of interest:

1. Wissenschaftliche/r Mitarbeiter/in Religionswiss. Univ. Erfurt (job opportunity)
2. DAVO-Kongress 2003, Hamburg, 20.-22. November 2003 (event)
3. DAVO-Kongress 2004 / 29. Deutscher Orientalistentag, Halle, 20.-24. September 2004 (event)
4. BRISMES Annual Conference: "Education as a Force for Change?" Exeter,12-15 July 2003 (event)
5. Congrès AFEMAM 2003: "La construction des savoirs sur les mondes musulmans" Paris, 2-4 juillet 2003(event)
6. Séminaire Doctoral du GDR International EMMA: "Economies de la Méditerranée et du Monde Arabe" Paris, 20-21 mars 2003 (event)
7. Tenth Annual Conference of the Economic Research Forum (ERF), Cairo, 16-18 December 2003 (event)
8. Research Officer, German Development Institute, Bonn, Germany (job opportunity) Read the details here ...

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Dept. of ethnologica, kerlone, January 7, 2003 at 12:10:36 PM CET

The War in Columbia

The Berliner Zeitung today reports about the long lasting war in columbia: In Kolumbien bekämpfen sich linke Guerillas, rechte Paramilitärs und Regierungstruppen. Finanziert wird der Konflikt auch mit Geldern aus den USA. Read more ... Via Cable Cat in Telepolis Forum

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Dept. of ethnologica, kerlone, January 7, 2003 at 12:07:52 PM CET

Top 10 List of the Year's Most Underreported Humanitarian Stories

The international medical aid organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) last week issued its list of the Top 10 Most Underreported Humanitarian Stories of 2002. To this topic you may also r read this article at Telepolis (german).

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Dept. of ethnologica, kerlone, January 7, 2003 at 11:41:10 AM CET

'I Didn't Know I Was Black'

The Social Construction of Race: The Washington Post writes about latino immigrants, which came to the USA and discovered, that here they are black. In Argentina, Chile, Peru and Bolivia, there are racial tensions, but mostly between indigenous Indians and white descendants of Europeans.

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