Making anthropology public

Public Anthropology entails diverse practices. One is 'writing' for the public by making our work more accessible and accountable. A less conventional way of getting anthropological research findings and interpretations to broader publics is through active collaboration with journalists and the media. To make anthropology public is to invite criticism and to face 'erasures' of ownership of our findings once they are shared with journalists. Even so, it is satisfying to see one's work appear on the front pages of the Sunday Times even if uncited. Finally, in the tradition of CW Mills' The Sociological Imagination, the goal of public anthropology is to make public issues, not simply to respond to them. Those who wan to be public anthropologist – just do it! But don't expect to be rewarded for it. Instead, consider it a precious right and a privilege.     

What's nature got to do with it? A situated historical perspective on socio-natural commodities

Nature(s) have been commodified since the early days of capitalism, but through processes and socio-natural relationships mediated by their times, histories and localities. While the conditions under which nature's commodities are being trademarked today may be new, their potential for commodification is not. Commodifications of nature should not come as a surprise to environmental social scientists and activists. In this article, I argue that commodification of ‘nature's products, places and processes’ produces new sorts of socio-natures. Situated histories of rubber are particularly relevant because, like carbon, ecosystem services and other recently commodified natures, rubber sits comfortably on the line between a fictitious commodity and a commodity produced explicitly for market: the latex alone has almost no use value, and to give it any exchange value, it requires processing. Yet analytically, it is still considered a ‘natural commodity’, different from ‘synthetic rubber’ and other tradable tree latexes in qualities and socio-natural characteristics. However, it is the social relations constituting rubber's production and trade in various rainforest and agro-forestry environments that have given it a positive or negative connotation, rather than its natural properties or the ecological contexts within which it has been produced. By situating rubber in three of its globally important temporal and spatial contexts, I show how it has been subjected to fairy-tale-like stories that masked and naturalized its commodity lives of the moment. Understanding how history is told or remains untold is thus an essential part of the politics of knowledge production, but also of human experience and mobilization for change. It should be part of any political ecology analysis.     

Latino immigrants and the renegotiation of place and belonging in small town America

This article compares the politics of place and belonging within two non-metropolitan communities—Woodburn, Oregon, and Leadville, Colorado—that have witnessed a significant increase in Latino immigration during the last fifteen to twenty years. Today both communities are approximately 50 per cent Latino, a demographic change that has reworked understandings of place identity and social belonging in each. Through a comparison of the two towns we seek to chart the unique regional political economic dynamics driving these changes, examine their spatial imprint, and interrogate how local context shapes the extent to which new arrivals are able to make effective claims to a sense of place and belonging despite hierarchies of race, class and ‘illegality.’ Assessing the differences between these two immigrant destinations provides insights into how sociospatial relations are crucial to analyzing immigrant–receiving society interaction, and contributes to scholarship on the uneven geography of immigrant incorporation in the contemporary USA.     

Mediating messiness: expanding ideas of flexibility,reflexivity, and embodiment in fieldwork

This article aims to help researchers think about some big-picture challenges that occur in the early stages of fieldwork. In particular, we address the transition from a clear, concise research proposal to the often complicated, messy initiation of a project. Drawing on autobiographical accounts of our own PhD research projects, we focus on dilemmas that may arise for researchers guided by feminist epistemology and methodology. First, we discuss parameters regarding acceptable changes to original research plans and questions. Noting that the carefully planned proposal may dramatically change as fieldwork begins, we draw on feminist literatures to expand and concretize the notion of flexibility in the research process. Second, we puzzle out the relationship between theory, epistemology, and method as the researcher delves into her fieldwork. As logistical challenges may take priority, theoretical and epistemological concerns may temporarily wane. Third, we consider the many ways in which the researcher's personal and field life bleed into each other to shape the conduct of research. We emphasize the importance of considering – prior to research as well as during – what the concepts of reflexivity and embodiment mean in fieldwork, especially for the researcher in terms of personal needs and logistical realities. Finally, while we suggest that there are certain unique pressures that shape the early stages of the field research period for PhD students, we conclude the article by focusing on ways in which lessons learned during our own experiences might be broadly useful for any researchers in the beginning stages of fieldwork.     

Temporal changes in diet: a stable isotope analysis of late Iron Age and Roman Dorset,Britain

This study investigates the relationship between diet and cultural change in late Iron Age and Romano-British populations from Dorset, England (1st century BC to the early 5th century AD). Dorset was the only region in Britain to exhibit continuity in inhumation burial rites through these periods and a wide array of environmental, archaeological and material culture evidence is available there. A sample of N = 77 human adult and N = 17 faunal rib samples were utilized for carbon and nitrogen stable isotope analysis to test the hypothesis that Romanization of the diet would result in greater dietary variation.     

Lipoic acid formulations for the removal of arsenic and mercury from museum artifact materials

Museums currently face a tremendous task of identification, mitigation, and remediation of pesticides from artifacts in order to protect museum workers and the general public. Additionally artifacts are being repatriated by Native American tribes for use in cultural ceremonies which may subject the practitioner to health risks. Arsenic and mercury salts are among the most persistent poisons used and so a critical challenge is removing these hazardous metals without damaging the material composition or decorations of the objects. At this time, there are no feasible procedures that can meet both of these objectives. Reported here is the development of a procedure involving concentrated aqueous reduced lipoic acid solutions for the removal of arsenic and mercury pesticides from substrate materials commonly encountered in museums.     

A sacral anomaly from the Quaker Cemetery,Kingston‐upon‐Thames,England

A rare defect of the sacrum was observed in the skeleton of an adult female from the Quaker Cemetery (1663–1814 CE) in Kingston‐upon‐Thames, England. This is an isolated finding in the skeletal collection and no other elements in this individual were similarly affected. After eliminating post‐depositional damage and skeletal asymmetry, a differential diagnosis resulted in the consideration of two conditions: hemivertebra and sacral agenesis, both of which are rare developmental defects that originate during foetal growth. Although the defect is interesting from an embryological, genetic and palaeopathological perspective, it would have resulted in few clinical symptoms for the individual. This case adds to the limited knowledge of the morphological variability of the sacrum, and will aid in future diagnoses of these rare pathological conditions. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Using Enthesis Robusticity to Infer Activity in the Past: A Review

In bioarchaeological studies, entheseal change is commonly used to infer patterns of activity in past populations. This category of skeletal modification includes both pathological changes (enthesopathies) and changes in size, shape and surface complexity (robusticity). Despite the recent impetus to reassess the use of enthesopathies as markers of activity, robusticity has received little critical attention. In this review, we reassess key assumptions that underpin the use of robusticity in activity studies, drawing on anatomical, physiological, biomechanical and sports medicine literature sources. We find that, whilst there is some evidence to support the assumption that variation in enthesis robusticity reflects different activity patterns, little is known about the process through which this variation is produced. Presently, the stimuli (dynamics of muscle use or muscle size) for entheseal adaptation are ill-defined, a situation that limits our interpretive abilities. Consideration of bone functional adaptation principles and of the relationship of entheses to soft tissue also highlights how other factors, such as age, sex and genetic background, may influence enthesis robusticity and obscure activity-related adaptation. Understanding how these factors influence enthesis robusticity helps define how robusticity studies should be controlled, but further research is required to clarify how these factors interact with activity in robusticity development and the precise relationship between activity and robusticity. Ultimately, this review emphasises the complexity of entheseal structures and their morphological development. Any interpretation of activity from enthesis robusticity should be approached with caution, but in some circumstances, the endeavour may be ill-advised.