indigenous people / minorities

Global identity politics and The Emergence of a Mongol Race in Nepal

Published on February 19, 2006 by lorenz Posted in anthropology in the news, Asia, indigenous people / minorities, journal articles / papers, Us and Them

Although race has typically been mobilized to justify and uphold social inequality, recently in Nepal race was used in a political movement to oppose those in power, Susan Hangen writes in her article The Emergence of a Mongol Race in Nepal in Anthropology News February.

During the 1990s, some ethnic groups in Nepal—including Gurungs, Magars, Rais, Limbus and Sherpas, began asserting that they all belong to a Mongol race. Previously, each of these groups was primarily identified as belonging to a jati, a term that means both a caste and ethnic group. Their adoption of this racial identity was inspired by the platform of a small political party called the Mongol National Organization (MNO), which sought to unite and mobilize these social and ethnically diverse people, in part to make major political changes that would increase their social, economic and political power.

(…)

The MNO also believed that adopting a racial identity would help them to bring international attention to their political cause. Race appealed to the MNO as a global language of identity.

(…)

Like the concept of indigenous peoples, race may increasingly serve as a framework through which minorities make political claims, to the extent that it is acknowledged and validated through international institutions like the UN. Thus international efforts to expunge racism may reinforce the salience of race as an identity.

>> read the whole story

“Racialization is part of the current moment of globalization” – as anthropologist Nina Glick Schiller commented.

Primitive Racism: Reuters about “the world’s most primitive tribes”

Published on February 7, 2006 by lorenz Posted in Andaman & Nicobar societies, anthropology in the news, indigenous people / minorities, Us and Them

(via ethno::log) Looking for another example of everyday racism? Read reuters story about “the worlds most primitive people”:

Members of one of the world’s most primitive and isolated tribes have killed two fishermen who strayed on to their island in India’s Andaman and Nicobar archipelago, a senior government official said on Monday.

(…)

A group of about 20 Sentinelese tribes people were surrounding them, Negi said. “They (the tribals) were naked and carrying bows and arrows,” he told Reuters by telephone.

The Indian government has banned anyone from going near Sentinel Island where about 250 tribe members live a hunter-gathering lifestyle little changed since the Stone Age.

UPDATE: Story no longer online. >> Read the same story in The Times where the India correspondent even dares to write “Described by anthropologists as a lost tribe of Stone Age aborigines, the Sentinelese…”

Our obsession with the notion of the primitive society

“Stone Age Tribes”, tsunami and racist evolutionism

Ten Little Niggers: Tsunami, tribal circus and racism

(via ethno::log) Looking for another example of everyday racism? Read reuters story about "the worlds most primitive people":

Members of one of the world's most primitive and isolated tribes have killed two fishermen who strayed on to their island in India's…

Book review: Claiming the Stones, Naming the Bones: Cultural Property and the Negotiation of Identity

Published on February 7, 2006 by lorenz Posted in anthropology in the news, books, culture traditions, indigenous people / minorities, Us and Them

It’s “a strong volume and potentially an excellent teaching text for those interested in exploring case studies in cultural heritage and representation”, anthropologist Jamie Brandon concludes in his review of the book Claiming the Stones, Naming the Bones: Cultural Property and the Negotiation of National and Ethic Identity by Barkan, Elazar and Ronald Bush .

He writes that the book attempts to cross-cut multiple disciplines (including archaeology, physical anthropology, literature, cultural studies, ethnomusicology and museum studies) and offer perspectives regarding disputes over the definition and ownership of cultural properties.

This part of the review caught my eye

In the United States, Ross tells us, “to belong to a particular race is to possess copyright in that race; the right to turn a profit—or not—on the reputation credited to that race; the right to image the race in particular ways; the right to hold property, invest in, and profit from one’s racial “stock” (p. 260). Ross charts the struggle over these rights through efforts of African-Americans to challenge and control popular images of blackness.

>> read the whole review on the blog “Farther Along”

Indigenousness and the Politics of Spirituality: “Cultural ownership may lead directly to essentialization and racism”

It's "a strong volume and potentially an excellent teaching text for those interested in exploring case studies in cultural heritage and representation", anthropologist Jamie Brandon concludes in his review of the book Claiming the Stones, Naming the Bones: Cultural Property…

Native Rights Issues: Anthropologists under attack

Published on December 12, 2005 by lorenz Posted in aboriginees, anthropology (general), anthropology in the news, indigenous people / minorities

In Australia, anthropologists have been criticized for “conducting themselves as advocates for Aborigines instead of impartial experts”, the Australian writes. Because anthropologists frequently had long-term relationships with particular groups of Aborigines, their ability to give objective evidence was sometimes open to attack, Graeme Neate, president of the National Native Title Tribunal says.

Similar findings can be found in a report that was produced for the tribunal last year. It found there was “a certain form of entrenched amateurism” among anthropologists outside universities. “Some expert witnesses have been held to be manifestly advocates for the claimants”.

>> read the whole story (link updated)

UPDATE:

1. Comment by Tad McIlwraith:

It seems unreasonable to expect anthropologists not to feel empathy for the people they work with and, often, have lived with … but does that eliminate the possibility of objectivity? What about academics with long-term associations with the government? I suspect that the courts are not likely to reduce the value or credibility of their testimonies. Are we simply back to the problem of the power-relations inherent in land and title cases that rely on ’settler’ courts?

>> read Tads whole post: The Problem of Anthropologists as Advocates

2. Jamie writes:

Perhaps it was anthropological or scientific research that led the anthropologist to feel that advocacy was necessary in the first place!

>> continue

3. Kambiz Kamrani thinks:

Studying cultures and peoples cannot be done without the give and take of personalities, behaviors, beliefs; in my opinion… and that maybe one of the reasons why anthropology has not become the “universal intellectual discipline” that it has potential to be.

>> read the whole post

In Australia, anthropologists have been criticized for "conducting themselves as advocates for Aborigines instead of impartial experts", the Australian writes. Because anthropologists frequently had long-term relationships with particular groups of Aborigines, their ability to give objective evidence was sometimes…

AAA: “Expanding willingness among anthropologists to listen to Native peoples”

Published on December 8, 2005 by lorenz Posted in anthropology (general), anthropology in the news, indigenous people / minorities, Native American

For decades, a stereotypical and frequently inaccurate mindset dominated the way anthropologists and museum curators treated Native Americans in research and exhibits. But several attendees on this year’s American Anthropological Association conference noted an expanding willingness in the field to pay attention to the voices of Native peoples in the development of new museum exhibitions and in the evolution of older ones, according Inside Higher Education.

Bruce Bernstein, the National Museum of the American Indian’s assistant director for cultural resources said: “I think that people are largely enlightened now,” said Bernstein. He recalled that while presenting similar ideas on American Indian voices within museums at an American Anthropological Association conference in the early 1990s, “the crowd was not pleased.”

He adds:

“If, as anthropologists, we’re really looking to work with people — to understand them better — then repatriation [of objects] is really the best thing that ever happened for museums. It puts them in one-to-one contact with the very people that they want to be in contact with and generate information about.”

Has the dialogue sometimes gone too far, Native Indians taken over the control? Elizabeth M. Brumfiel, president of the association, says why Indians still need anthropologists:

“There’s been a lot of dialogue by Native Americans, asking ‘Why do we need anthropologists to speak for us? We can speak for ourselves,’. I think that’s a legitimate question, but I think there’s an answer to it. Nobody — including anthropologists — see themselves objectively. People benefit from dialoguing with an outsiders point of view. If anthropologists are outsiders, that’s also good for Native people to be in dialogue with them. It’s also good for anthropologists.”

>> read the whole story