~ a group blog on a variety of topics related to anthropology, sociology, and ordinary people ~
Distant Doctors: A Surgical Theater in Romania
– By Cristina A. Pop –
Someone has a fondness for purple decor, I decide, as I look around the examination room at a gigantic poster of blooming irises, a mauve plastic cover atop the gynecological table, and a vase of artificial lilac cuttings on the windowsill. No need to look further: sitting at a desk covered in patient paperwork, the doctor sports a lavender gown.…
Ritual Shrine Offerings Among the Exotic Nacirema Tribe
While it may seem that anthropologists have documented the most exotic rituals across the globe, the strangest rituals are still yet to be documented by scientists in the exotic tribe of the Nacirema. The strange beginnings of the exotic Nacirema tribe have been documented by Tocqueville (1835), and intimate body rituals have been documented by Miner (1956), but no scientist has brought to light the strangest worship ritual of any tribe on the planet.…
Since returning to Kigoma, Tanzania on the shores of Lake Tanganyika in central Africa for my Fulbright research, I have been looking for two of my Congolese friends. I was told that they crossed the Lake, and returned to two of the cities in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo to live– to be together with their family and relatives.
People should not be reduced only to suffering, and narratives only to exodus, which I recognized in my anthropology classes at California State University, Chico. …
‘Mental health’ has been shown to be social and environmental, though we’ve heard of Prozac, and even music therapy led by professionals. Well-being may also be connected to collective, organized sound among ordinary people. I’d like to share a recent study in biomedicine, and draw these scientific conclusions into the anthropological realm. First, because I’d like to bring biomedicine into anthropological discussions, so that the medical system fathered by Hippocrates can meet other medical systems, particularly those of the immense continent of Africa.…