Process and Pattern in Culture


Book Description

This festschrift commemorates Julian H. Steward. The essays were contributed by former students, colleagues, and other anthropologists whose research or thinking has been influenced by him. There was no preconceived attempt to give the volume any greater sense of unity or to impose upon the contributors any restrictions as to subject matter. On the contrary, each author was urged to write on an anthropological topic of greatest current interest to himself. Many of the essays could be placed just as handily within a division other than the one to which they have arbitrarily been assigned in the book. This kind of interchangeability may reflect, in some measure, the interrelatedness of Steward's contributions to anthropological theory.The broad relevance of all the selections to Steward's work could reflect also the extent to which his interests continue to be reflected in the work of anthropologists influenced by him. It could also reflect a parallelism of theoretical concerns within the profession that stem from the cultural ambience that produced Steward himself. Parallelisms and convergence are aspects of the kind of cultural determinism which has claimed Steward's attention during the many years that he fought a fairly lonely battle to establish the respectability of evolutionism in anthropology. Now that respectability has been achieved--with an almost bandwagon fervor--it is clear that Steward, as much as anyone else in anthropology, was "responsible" for the change.The essays in this collection are at once a vindication of his patience, an evidence of the high status he enjoys among anthropologists, and a testimony to the impact of his unusual creativity on his colleagues.




The South American Camelids


Book Description

One of the most significant differences between the New World's major areas of high culture is that Mesoamerica had no beasts of burden and wool, while the Andes had both. Four members of the camelid family--wild guanacos and vicunas, and domestic llamas and alpacas--were native to the Andes. South American peoples relied on these animals for meat and wool, and as beasts of burden to transport goods all over the Andes. In this book, Duccio Bonavia tackles major questions about these camelids, from their domestication to their distribution at the time of the Spanish conquest. One of Bonavia's hypotheses is that the arrival of the Europeans and their introduced Old World animals forced the Andean camelids away from the Pacific coast, creating the (mistaken) impression that camelids were exclusively high-altitude animals. Bonavia also addresses the diseases of camelids and their population density, suggesting that the original camelid populations suffered from a different type of mange than that introduced by the Europeans. This new mange, he believes, was one of the causes behind the great morbidity of camelids in Colonial times. In terms of domestication, while Bonavia believes that the major centers must have been the puna zone intermediate zones, he adds that the process should not be seen as restricted to a single environmental zone. Bonavia's landmark study of the South American camelids is now available for the first time in English. This new edition features an updated analysis and comprehensive bibliography. In the Spanish edition of this book, Bonavia lamented the fact that the zooarchaeological data from R. S. MacNeish's Ayacucho Project had yet to be published. In response, the Ayacucho's Project's faunal analysts, Elizabeth S. Wing and Kent V. Flannery, have added appendices on the Ayacucho results to this English edition. This book will be of broad interest to archaeologists, zoologists, social anthropologists, ethnohistorians, and a wide range of students.




Evolution and Ecology


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Tipiti


Book Description




Material Worlds


Book Description

Material Worlds examines consumption from an archaeological perspective, broadly exploring the intersection of social relations and objects through the processes of production, distribution, use, reuse, and discard. Interrogating individual objects as well as considering the contexts in which acts of consumption take place, a range of case studies present the intertwined issues of power, inequality, identity, and community as mediated through choice, access, and use of the diversity of mass-produced goods. Key themes of this innovative volume include the relationship between colonial, political and economic structures and the practices of consumption, the use of consumer goods in the construction and negotiation of identity, and the dialectic between strategies of consumption and individual or community choices. Situating studies of consumerism within the field of historical archaeology, this exciting collection reflects on the interrelationship between the material and ideological aspects of culture. With a focus on North America from the seventeenth through the early twentieth centuries, Material Worlds is an important examination of consumption which will appeal to scholars with interests in colonialism, gender and race, as well as those engaged with the material culture of the emergent modern world.




The South America Handbook


Book Description

First Published in 2002. The Regional Handbooks of Economic Development series provides accessible overviews of countries within their larger domestic and international contexts, focusing on the relations among regions as they meet the challenges of the twenty first century. The series allows the non-specialist student to explore a wide range of complex factors-social and political as well as economic-that affect the growth of developing regions in Asia, Europe, and South America. Each Handbook provides an overview chapter discussing the region's economic conditions within an historical and political context, as well as 20 or more chapter-length essays written by recognized experts, which analyze the key issues affecting a region's economy: its population, natural resources, foreign trade, labor problems, and economic inequalities, and other vital factors. In addition, the volumes offer useful support materials, including a series of appendices that include a detailed chronology of events in the region, a glossary of terms, biographical entries on key personalities, an annotated bibliography of further reading, and a comprehensive analytical index.




A Rosetta Stone


Book Description

The fundamental structure of the universe, from the particle and the atom to the biological evolution of organisms such as the eye and ear, exist because of the harmonic relationships of waves. The most significant characteristic of the human species to evolve was advanced communication abilities resulting from the perception of harmonics. This perception led directly to the unique biological morphology of the human vocal apparatus and the correlative neurocranial expansion of the auditory, memory, and language regions of the brain. New research is conclusively demonstrating that the modern human capacity for advanced language was in tact by approximately 200,000 B.C.E. and that the earliest advanced technologies to be created were harmonic sound and language devices. To date, there has never been a thorough examining or explanation of why the harmonic component emerged, nor has a model been discovered or developed to define and elucidate the harmonic structure of language which is the unifying mechanism of all fields. Within this treatise, a new harmonic model of Euclidean space is presented which elucidates the fundamental harmonic identities of numbers and their relationships within a naturally occurring resonant field system. This model is then applied to various harmonic phenomena in contrasting wave based fields to demonstrate unified harmonic structure and function. As a pièce de résistance, it is shown that the harmonic mechanisms which create the triangularity of vowel formant perception and the resultant Euclidean harmonic circularity of vowel space, is synonymous to the ocular cone trichromacy forming color perception and the resultant Euclidean harmonic circularity of color space. Due to the underlying harmonic frequency substrate of both these phenomena, an expanded harmonic correlation is demonstrated with wide ranging repercussions. One such consequence being the ability to linguistically transfer the categorical perception of harmonic structure from one field to another providing a plethora of new harmonic investigative and analytical tools for every wave based field. The core of the information presented herein is demonstrated through the medium of sound and the organizing harmonic elements of music language. Accordingly, the integral components of language formant vowels and consonants, color trichromacy, and dual harmonic frequency/wavelength systems are unified in an applied model which has been tested for the past decade showing fundamental harmonic cohesion and discourse between the underlying phenomena. Though this treatise is a scholarly presentation, it is designed to be accessible to a wide and diverse educated audience due to the sheer scope of facts presented from multiple niche disciplines to which no single scholar could be expected to possess an expert command. It is thus a comprehensive panorama of harmonic structure providing a never-before-seen perspective harmonic correlation between seemingly unrelated fields. As much as this treatise is an extensive exposition of the structure of harmonics, it is also an engaging expose of harmonic evolution within the biology of multiple species and the systems of color, language, and music. It has therefore been defined as a Rosetta Stone which not only provides for the decoding of fundamental evolutionary harmonic correlations between wide ranging organisms, but also provides new tools to investigate, analyze, and evolve the next frontier of harmonic order.




Management of Vicuña


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Culture and Human Values


Book Description

Christian Intervention in Anthropological Perspective Culture and Human Values explores the intricate relationship between culture and the values that shape human behavior and beliefs. Drawing from real-life encounters and ethnographic research, Jacob Loewen delves into the profound influence of culture on individuals and communities, examining how cultural values become the core of people's way of life. Through captivating anecdotes and insightful analysis, the book uncovers the significance of cultural universals in various societies. It highlights the crucial role of values as the hub around which cultures revolve, affecting every aspect of human existence. From the impact of money in missionaries' lives to the centrality of war for ancestral cultures, the Loewen demonstrates how values shape perceptions, actions, and even spirituality. Moreover, the book underscores the importance of cultural awareness for effective cross-cultural communication, particularly in the context of missionary work. It emphasizes the need for missionaries to comprehend and respect the values of the cultures they encounter, as well as the reciprocal learning that takes place in such interactions. By exploring these themes, Culture and Human Values offers valuable insights into the complexities of culture and its profound influence on human behavior, providing a compelling perspective on the intersection of culture, values, and communication.