Anthropology Books

First Published in 1999. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

In discussing the moral and practical dilemmas posed by the malnourished children in Mount Kilimanjaro, the authors explore the shame associated with child hunger in relation to social organization, colonial history and global economy.

In rich ethnographic detail, Robin Nagle chronicles the life of a poor Brazilian community in its relationship to the Catholic church and to the larger politics of Brazil. Centered in Recife, on the northeast coast, Nagle's work investigates how...

In Courtesans and Tantric Consorts, Serinity Young takes the reader on a journey through more than 2000 years of Buddhist history, revealing the colourful mosaic of beliefs that inform Buddhist views about gender and sexuality.

Modern beauty contests were invented by P.T. Barnum in the United States, but in the 20th century pageants and contests have spread across the entire world from Nepal to Tierra Del Fuego. Why are women (and sometimes men in drag) parading on stage such a...

This collection of essays analyzes relations of social inequality that appear to be logical extensions of a "natural order" and in the process demonstrates that a revitalized feminist anthropology of the 1990s has much to offer the field of feminist...

Visualizing Theory is a lavishly illustrated collection of provocative essays, occasional pieces, and dialogues that first appeared in Visual Anthropology Review between 1990 and 1994. It contains contributions from anthropologists, from cultural,...

Developing a multi-leveled historical inquiry of the Native Tolowa of the US, James Collins explores the linguistic and political dynamics of place-claiming and expropriation as well as the relation between otherness and subjugation.

In the wake of tensions between modern and postmodern sensibilities, what larger directions now emerge in cultural anthropology? In this major work, Bruce Knauft takes stock of important recent initiatives in cultural and critical theory. By combining...

Based on field-work in Taiwan, this book examines the cult of Tudi Gong both as a religio-social phenomenon and as an appropriate medium for exploring and analysing the social changes that have been occurring in contemporary Taiwan.

This book is about the way that professionals in archaeology and in other sectors of heritage interact with a range of stakeholder groups, communities and the wider public. Whilst these issues have been researched and discussed over many years and in...

Focussing on the methodology of social anthropology this book covers the following: · The aims of social anthropology · Observation and description · Psychology in observation · The material of observation · Institutions · Groupings · Explanation ·...

Anthropology of Religion: The Basics is an accessible and engaging introductory text organized around key issues that all anthropologists of religion face. This book uses a wide range of historical and ethnographic examples to address not only what is...

This book is an interdisciplinary empirical investigation of how people interact with public screens in their daily lives. In more and more surprising locations, screens of various kinds appear within the sightlines of passers-by in contemporary cities...

In an attempt to cope with the profusion of tools and techniques for qualitative methods, texts for students have tended to respond in the following two ways: "how to" or "why to." In contrast, this book takes on both tasks to give students a more...

Globalisation - the global movement, and control, of products, capital, technologies, persons and images - increasingly takes place through the work of organisations, perhaps the most powerful of which are multinational corporations. Based in an...

Providing a wealth of empirical research on the everyday practise of Islam in post-Soviet Central Asia, this book gives a detailed account of how Islam is understood and practised among ordinary Muslims in the region, focusing in particular on...

First published in 1984, This work is a cross-cultural study of the moral and social meaning of food. It is a collection of articles by Douglas and her colleagues covering the food system of the Oglala Sioux, the food habits of families in rural North...

First published in 1973, Rules and Meanings is an anthology of works that form part of Mary Douglas' struggle to devise an anthropological modernism conducive to her opposition to reputedly modernizing trends in contemporary society. The collection...

The Anthropology of Donald Trumpis an edited volume of original anthropological essays, composed by some of the leading figures in the discipline. It applies their concepts, perspectives, and methods to a sustained and diverse understanding of Trump's...

Getting Through Security offers an unprecedented look behind the scenes of global security structures. The authors unveil the "secret colleges" of counterterrorism, a world haunted by the knowledge that intelligence will fail, and Leviathan will not...

How does an extended stay in Japan influence Indian migrants' sense of their identity as they adapt to a country very different from their own? The number of Indians in Japan is increasing. The links between Japan and India go back a long way in history,...

Through an ethnohistorical chronicling of the emotionally-laden treatment of selected suicide media-events, this book offers a neo-Durkheimean account of suicide, addressing its social-moral threat and the ensuing need to gloss over its unsettling...

This volume presents a comparative exploration of Dalit autobiographical writing from India and of Latin American testimonio as subaltern voices from two regions of the Global South. Offering frames for linking global subalternity today, the chapters...

Integrating interdisciplinary and cross-cultural analysis, this volume advances our understanding of sexual violence in intimacy through the development of more nuanced and evidence-based conceptual frameworks.Sexual violence in intimacy is a global...

The domestication of plants and animals was one of the greatest steps forward taken by mankind. Although it was first achieved long ago, we still need to know what led to it and how, and even when, it took place. Only when we have this understanding will...

Despite wide acceptance that the attributes of living creatures have appeared through a cumulative evolutionary process guided chiefly by natural selection, many human activities have seemed analytically inaccessible through such an approach. Prominent...

A Space for Race engages in a critical examination of some of the major discourses related to original/settler/immigrant and, particularly, racialized belonging. In the course of this examination, the book explores the various themes of racism,...

Doing Ethnography in the Wake of the Displacement of Transnational Sex Workers in Yokohama reflects on the politics, poetics, and ethics of remembering the lives of transnational migrant sex workers in postcolonial Japan. Drawing on ethnographic...

This book offers an overview of the key debates in the burgeoning anthropological literature on resource extraction. Resources play a crucial role in the contemporary economy and society, are required in the production of a vast range of consumer...

This book examines socio-economic relationships and cultural changes in contemporary rural China, focusing on the experience of a typical Chinese village the working-age population of which has been hollowed out by outbound labor migration.The volume...

This innovative text reinvigorates argumentation studies by exploring the experience of argument across cultures, introducing an anthropological perspective into the domains of rhetoric, communication, and philosophy. The Anthropology of Argument fills...

This book is an introduction to theory in archaeology - but with a difference. Archaeological Situations avoids talking about theory as if it was something you apply but rather as something embedded in archaeological practice from the start.Rather than...

For several decades now, there have been calls to decolonize research on the Indigenous Sámi people, and to make it accountable to the Sámi society. While this has contributed to the rise of a vibrant Sámi research community in the Nordic countries, less...

This handbook presents in a comprehensive, concise and accessible overview, the emerging field of international political sociology. It summarizes and synthesizes existing knowledge in the field while presenting central themes and methodologies that have...

The Anthropology of Entrepreneurship provides a comprehensive overview of the unique contribution from anthropology to the field of entrepreneurship studies. Insights from anthropology illuminate the wider socio-cultural implications of...

This book explores issues of national identity, history, and language in light of the 2018 Prespa Agreement. Designed to resolve a protracted and bitter dispute, the agreement signed by the Macedonian and Greek foreign ministers on the banks of the...

This volume takes a more comprehensive view of past familial dynamics than has been previously attempted. By applying interdisciplinary perspectives to periods ranging from the Prehistoric to the Modern, it informs a wider understanding of the term...

This volume reports on the encounters between hikers and wildlife on the Appalachian Trail. Based on narratives provided by trail hikers, it explores the ways in which humans relate to the animals with whom they temporarily share a home. With attention...

Ancestral Presence tells a history that has more than one history in it while also telling the story of the relation between worlds.For the Fuyuge people of the Papuan highlands, the past is not 'history' in a conventional sense. For them, the world and...

Every day, the human awakes to a new world, a new dawn and a new cascade of nonverbal communication. It may be the pleasant scent of a rose, the soft touch of a loved one, the sight of sun rays on a bedroom floor or the excited chatter of a child...

Christianity and Sexuality in the Early Modern World surveys the ways in which people from the time of Luther and Columbus to that of Thomas Jefferson used Christian ideas and institutions to regulate and shape sexual norms and conduct, and examines the...

Since the 1990s, biometric border control has attained key importance throughout Europe. Employing digital images of, for example, fingerprints, DNA, bones, faces or irises, biometric technologies use bodies to identify, categorize and regulate...

Originally published in 1986, this urban political ethnography focusses on Mushin, a large suburb of metropolitan Lagos, Nigeria. It explores the mechanisms which bridge the various social categories to bring about political interaction. The book traces...

Originally published in 1988, this book documents genealogical developments which, together with changes in agricultural production, religious ethic, politics, gender relations, patterns of solidarity and trade were local adjustments to the economic...

Originally published in 1986, this book draws upon a range of authors to reflect wide interest in systematising traditional medicine, and to include material on significant instances of regulation or organisation. It was the first book to study the...

Originally published in 1987, this book traces the broad outlines of urban food policy, drawing attention to the limited knowledge of regional social history. Urban food supply systems in Africa have developed very fast, in the midst of societies in...