Soanin Kilangit is determined to unite the people and attract international tourism through the revival of culture on Baluan Island in the South Pacific. He organizes the largest cultural festival ever held on the island, but some traditional leaders argue that Baluan never had culture and that culture comes from the white man and is now destroying their old tradition. Others, however, take the festival as a welcome opportunity to revolt against '70...

Using photographs, old home movies and direct interviews Amalie R. Rothschild explores the mother-daughter ties in 3 generations of her own family and in the process explores the classic female problem faced by her artist mother: the conflict between work and children--the necessary compromises, the incumbent anxieties. The structure is intentionally loose and open-ended, like a good conversation, emphasizing the need to ask the right questions rather...

"The Bolvian Aymara series (comprising six films) is one of the most thorough-going documentations of Andean peasant life yet made or available. One can think of a number of topics not overtly dealt with but the knowledgeable observer can quickly find other themes interwoven with the main topic. Each film follows the lives of the peasants of the highland communities of Ayata and Virochocha, Bolivia, in a direct, cinema veritZ fashion. The AUFS team...

"This is the story of the incredible journey of David Good, the son of an American anthropologist father, and indigenous Yanomami mother who calls the Amazon rainforest her home. Overlapping the story of what David's mother's early years were like being raised in the rainforest, the book follows David from childhood to adulthood as he searches for identity, love, acceptance, and the one thing truly missing from his life, his mother. Growing up in...

Winner, 2009 John O'Connor Film Award of the American Historical Association. Winner, Best Documentary, Hollywood Black Film Festival. Is there a politics of knowledge? Who controls what knowledge is produced and how it will be used? Is there "objective" scholarship and, if so, how does it become politicized? These questions are examined through this groundbreaking film on the life and career of Melville J. Herskovits (1895-1963), the pioneering American...

This book brings together several favourite tales from Native American tribes across the United States. From heartwarming coming of age tales to warning tales of supernatural power, the stories told in this volume bring to life the culture of America's first peoples. Recounted from oral traditions by a variety of anthropologists, the customs and ways of life of the diverse peoples blur the boundaries between myths and reality and remind us of a time...

Investigating a massacre that took place in Guatemala in 1982, forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan discovers that those events are linked to the disappearance of four girls from Guatemala City, as well as the murder of a human rights investigator.

The final decades of the twentieth century brought unprecedented changes for American Indians, especially in the areas of human rights and tribal sovereignty. In 1990, after a long struggle between Indian rights groups and the scientific establishment, the Native American Graves Repatriation and Protection Act was passed. For American Indians, this was perhaps the most important piece of civil and human rights legislation of this century. Skeletons...

"Profiled are 26 American women from the 18th through 21st centuries, who have made-or are still making--history as artists, writers, teachers, lawyers, or athletes. The women come from a variety of economic and ethnic backgrounds and many had to overcome extreme hardships. One woman represents each alphabetical letter beginning with Angela Davis, an activist, teacher, and writer, and concludes with Zora Neale Hurston, an anthropologist and writer."--Publisher....

Psychological anthropologist Luhrmann offers an extended case study examining how believers come to have faith in an active, present God despite secular pressures in contemporary America. Drawing on extensive interviews and personal experience among Vineyard Movement members, Luhrmann focuses on the use of prayer among charismatic evangelical Christians. Her work combines personal narratives and excerpts from bestselling evangelical how-to guides...