Category: General Anthropology

I first heard of Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor during an interview on Fresh Air, it is a great conversation (Listen to the interview, not just the text, it is more in depth than the TED talk you see here). Thanks to my friend Mariflora for bringing the TED link to my attention. How often do we get the emic on such a matter? Well worth watching and forming your own ideas from.…

I am a registered independent, I always have been. I have voted all over the political map because I don’t think I should have to vote for a party but the person. With the health care debates its hard NOT to see the republican party as the greed supporting evil empire. There have been death threats of people attending meetings, republican operations to disrupt meetings. Look, my late father.. a die hard conservative republican family practice doctor… spend some time as the medical director of an HMO.…

CNN has reported that Trina Thompson, age 27, is suing her alma mater, Monroe College (New York), for not being sufficiently helpful in supporting her efforts to find a job since her graduation this past April.  Headlines describing the suit sum it up as follows: “Alumna Sues College Because She Can’t Find a Job.”

Recently, for personal reasons, I have become very interested in what social sciences might have to say about the personal quality we call patience. …

I like pitchmen, well the good ones and Billy Mays was that.  He was one of the best known pitchmen of the last decade.

You have to understand, for nearly I decade I performed in the streets, festivals and fairs in the U.S. and Canada, and encountered the pitchmen, talkers, hawkers and shills of all manner.  Billy was the logical evolution.  Were the things he pitched sometimes crap? Of course.  Caveat Emptor has been the motto of all performers, not just the pitchman, since people started to barter. …

As many of you know from earlier posts,  I am the mother of a 15 year old.  Although I have certainly been aware of the need for constant email, phone, and camera usage everywhere she and her friends congregate, it came to me this spring that although she embraces this practice enthusiastically, it seems to place an unnatural burden on her I am only too glad I did not have in my teenage years.…

The American Anthropological Association is expanding its resources, services, and professional networks to anthropologists practicing outside academia. A key step toward achieving this goal is to conduct a survey aimed at understanding the careers of MA anthropologists.

Each year there are at least 1,000 anthropology Masters degrees granted in North America . Based on anecdotal information, we know that many MAs pursue careers at the types of companies associated with AnthroDesign(editors note, this is a yahoo newsgroup).…