Travel – Page 2 – Ethnography.com

Ethnography, Stigma, and Protecting a Potentially Spoiled Identity

Posted on February 20, 2015February 18, 2015 by Tony Waters

Originally published here at e.com in April 2007. It’s one of my favorites and still makes me laugh out loud, I hope you enjoy it too. -Julie

This blog is about why ethnographer Erving Goffman’s observation of stigma are important not just to ex-cons, but also to professors like me on foreign exchange programs. Goffman, as many sociologists and anthropologists know, observed the maneuvers of the marginalized and stigmatized in society, and then wrote about how they thought about their disability.…

Sweet Salvation

Posted on February 12, 2015February 12, 2015 by Marianne Paiva

Sweet Salvation was originally published at www.norcalblogs.com.

December 2006, Cabo San Lucas, Mexico

There are three facts that exist on the southern tip of Baja Mexico: 1) this is a desert, 2) until very recently, even though the entire area is surrounded by ocean, there was very little drinking water here, and 3) it is desperately cut off from the rest of the world.

We arrive at Los Cabos International airport early in the afternoon.…

Why Does Anthropology Worry about Jared Diamond when they have Nigel Barley?

Posted on January 25, 2013January 25, 2013 by Tony Waters

The Anthropology blogosphere (including Ethnography.com, SavageMinds.org, anthropologyreport.com and even National Public Radio) has recently lit up with critiques of Jared Diamond’s new book The World Until Yesterday. Jared Diamonditis seems to be a regular affliction of anthropology, re-emerging every time that the esteemed Professor of Geography (and Physiology) publishes a new tome of big picture history. The manner that Diamond does this is something that anthros really don’t seem to like. …

Love, Duty, and Marriage in a Classic Thai Novel

Posted on October 7, 2011October 7, 2011 by Tony Waters

In summer 2011, I had the pleasure of co-teaching a Sociology/English class for American students in Thailand. One of the real pleasures was using novels to illustrate sociological principles. It was kind of like profession (sociology) meets hobby (reading novels). I hope that the students liked it—I certainly did, and this blog is about what was my favorite Thai novel of the summer, Behind the Painting. It proved to be ideal for discussing a wide range of subjects stretching across both sociology and literature, particularly the meaning of duty and love in structuring Thai and American society.…

Which Thumb is on Top? Questions about Culture from a Mlabri Village in Thailand

Posted on July 11, 2011July 11, 2011 by Tony Waters

Explaining why people do things, even when it doesn’t seem reasonable to an American undergraduate is what I do for a living. I’ve explained why people don’t agree with their political views, the persistence of “irrational habits,” why most people don’t want to move to America, why poverty persists in a world of abundance, and a whole bunch of things that the many undergraduates do not want to believe. And after I’m done they undergraduates still don’t generally understand how people could have such persistent beliefs and practices which to them are just not logical.…

Changing Thailand, Not Changing Thailand: Of Water Buffalo, Work Elephants, and Cultural Persistence

Posted on June 25, 2011June 25, 2011 by Tony Waters

Karen Connelly was a Rotary Exchange student in Phrae Province, northern Thailand, in 1986-1987 as a 16 and 17 year old. She published an enchanting memoir about her experiences in Phrae Province Dream of a Thosuand Lives: A Sojourn in Thailand in 1993, a book that won the coveted Governor General’s prize for Canadian Literature. I can indeed understand well why the book won the prize. Her descriptions of Phrae bring alive the world of northern Thailand in the 1980s. …

The Case of the Stung Ducks: A Study of Law from Sukumaland in Tanzania

Posted on February 16, 2010 by Tony Waters

This is a story about the nature of law, what is like to feel like an outsider in court. It is about laws of liability which are rational, reasonable, and legtimate by local standards. However, as I think that the following example shows, such assumptions about liability and law are always embedded in the unspoken culture that is the epistemology which gives cultural life meaning.

The encounter discussed below took place in Tanzania in 1986 when I was working for the Lutheran World Federation’s refugee development programs. …

How to Get Deported for Christmas

Posted on February 12, 2010February 15, 2010 by Tony Waters

File this one under…I don’t know what. My story begins with the desire to get cheap airplane tickets to visit our family in Germany this winter. Simple: Leave at an uncomfortable hour, fly Christmas Eve, save $200 per ticket, and still arrive at Grandma’s in time for Christmas breakfast. Anyway, we arrived at the Sacramento airport, produced tickets, passports, and so forth, and off we were to Chicago. In Chicago, out came the boarding pass, our passports were scanned again, and last flight was off to Frankfurt am Main. …

Learning Foreign Languages

Posted on February 8, 2010February 8, 2010 by Tony Waters

I was reminded of the importance of foreign language learning twice in the last week or so. This morning I read a commentary in the New York Times about how poorly Americans do at foreign languages. Several of the authors remind us that Americans have long done poorly at foreign language learning, and that demands for foreign language learning are declining in the United States, despite attempts by the Chinese government (and others) to get Americans into language classes.…