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A personal look at anthropology

Kenai Peninsula Online (Alaska)

Generations of anthropologists have appeared in Alaska Native villages and attempted, with varying degrees of tact, naivete or insight, to explain the villagers’ lives. Margaret B. Blackman who teaches anthropology at the State University of New York College at Brockport parts in “Upside Down: Seasons among the Nunamiut,” from typical scholarly writing to create a book of essays that read more like personal memoir than academic treatise.

” … I tired of academic writing,” she says in her introduction. ” … I became increasingly irritated with the uncanny ability of so many anthropologists to render, in stilted prose, the most interesting cultures hopelessly pedantic and unappealing. I wanted to write differently about Anaktuvuk Pass.” The result is a beautifully written exploration of an anthropologist’s life as well as a portrait of the remote Nunamiut village in the Brooks Range. >>continue

Kenai Peninsula Online (Alaska)

Generations of anthropologists have appeared in Alaska Native villages and attempted, with varying degrees of tact, naivete or insight, to explain the villagers' lives. Margaret B. Blackman who teaches anthropology at the State University of New York…

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Hmong: An Endangered People

University of California, Center for Southeast Asian Studies

There are more Hmong people today than Tibetans, yet the campaign to “Free Tibet” is widely popular in the U.S. and is internationally recognized, while the plight of Hmong people is relatively unknown. With this challenge, Dr. Eric Crystal introduced his lecture for the Center for Southeast Asian Studies on the UCLA campus. Eric Crystal is an anthropologist who has researched highland Southeast Asian cultures for over three decades.

The Hmong have had a long and distinctive history in China. Over the centuries they migrated south so that today they are dispersed throughout the highlands of southern China and northern Southeast Asia, including in Laos and Vietnam >>continue (Link updated 23.8.2022)

University of California, Center for Southeast Asian Studies

There are more Hmong people today than Tibetans, yet the campaign to "Free Tibet" is widely popular in the U.S. and is internationally recognized, while the plight of Hmong people is relatively unknown.…

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Saving native languages

University of Berkeley News

Chochenyo, the language of the Muwekma Ohlone people, has been silent since the 1930s, but a handful of tribal members working with mentors from the University of California, Berkeley’s linguistics department are bringing it back to life >>continue

University of Berkeley News

Chochenyo, the language of the Muwekma Ohlone people, has been silent since the 1930s, but a handful of tribal members working with mentors from the University of California, Berkeley's linguistics department are bringing it back to life…

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Book Review: Uqalurait – Oral history of Nunavut requires some refinement

Nunatsiaq News

At 473 pages, the book is unlikely to appeal to the audience its authors say they’re aiming for: children, young parents, and teachers of Nunavut. It is more likely to attract academics, who should be its secondary audience. No one would refute the idea that Nunavut needs to hang onto the history that its elders can only safeguard temporarily. It’s to be hoped that in this case, the achievement will inspire someone else to produce a book that people want to read late into the night, and maybe pass on to someone else.
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Nunatsiaq News

At 473 pages, the book is unlikely to appeal to the audience its authors say they’re aiming for: children, young parents, and teachers of Nunavut. It is more likely to attract academics, who should be its secondary audience. No…

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Lowly weeds may hold promise for curing host of common health woes

Innovations Report

“If I had one place to go to find medicinal plants, it wouldn’t be the forest,” said John Richard Stepp, a University of Florida anthropologist. “There are probably hundreds of weeds growing right outside people’s doors they could use.” He found the area’s Mayan residents use weeds for all sorts of day-to-day illnesses, such as common colds, upset stomachs, skin rashes, and aches and sprains >>continue

Innovations Report

"If I had one place to go to find medicinal plants, it wouldn’t be the forest," said John Richard Stepp, a University of Florida anthropologist. "There are probably hundreds of weeds growing right outside people’s doors they could use."…

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