Based on field research in eastern Finland not far from the Russian border, this book is an account of the main features of rural society in the area. It pays detailed attention to the adaptability of farming families in a rapidly changing world. Subjects treated include marriage and the family, work and mechanization, succession to farms, and the paradoxical combination of fierce individualism and cooperation. Two major themes of the book are the relation between law and custom, which is not always what it seems on the surface, and the complex interlocking of farm, family, and the wider...

Belonging in the two Berlins is an ethnographic investigation into the meaning of German selfhood during the Cold War. Taking the practices of everyday life in the divided Berlin as his point of departure, Borneman shows how ideas of kin, state, and nation were constructed through processes of mirror-imaging and misrecognition. Using linguistics and narrative analysis, he compares the autobiographies of two generations of Berlins residents with the official version of the lifecourse prescribed by the two German states. He examines the relation of the dual political structure to everyday life,...

The Khoisan are a cluster of southern African peoples, including the famous Bushmen or San "hunters," the Khoekhoe "herders" (in the past called "Hottentots"), and the Damara, also a herding people. Most Khoisan live in the Kalihari desert and surrounding areas of Botswana and Namibia. Despite differences in their ways of life, the various groups have much in common, and this book explores these similarities and the influence of environment on their culture and social organization. This is the first book on the Khoisan as a whole to be published since the 1930s.

South coast New Guinea has long been a focus of ethnographic attention, with its varied cultures, its reputation for flamboyant sexual practices, and its traditions of headhunting. Dr. Knauft examines previous ethnographic material to reanalyze the region's seven major language-culture areas, covering a range of topics including sexuality, social inequality, the status of women, religion, politics and violence. Ethnographically rich and theoretically sophisticated, this book will be essential reading for all those interested in Melanesia, and should be read by anyone concerned with the...

The Vezo are fishing people of western Madagascar. The identity of the Vezo is not fixed by descent; rather, it is established by what they do. They are people of the sea, distinguished from the farmers around them by their economic specialism. Ethnicity is usually thought to be a consequence of inborn qualities acquired by descent, and Astuti explores the consequences of ascribing ethnic identity with reference to economic activity. Her analysis reveals that only in the cult of the dead does descent become critical, and her argument in this innovative analysis of Vezo kinship is that the...

Children in the Taiwanese fishing community of Angang have their attention drawn, consciously and unconsciously, to various forms of identification through their participation in schooling, family life and popular religion. They read texts about virtuous mothers, share meaningful foods with other villagers, visit the altars of divining children and participate in dangerous god-strengthening rituals. In particular they learn about the family-based cycle of reciprocity, and the tension between this and commitment to the nation. Charles Stafford's study of childhood in this community (with...

Among the Tuareg people in the Air Mountain region of Niger, women are sometimes possessed by spirits called 'the people of solitude'. The evening curing rituals of the possessed, featuring drumming and song, take place before an audience of young men and women, who joke and flirt as the ritual unfolds. In her analysis of this tolerated but unofficial cult, Susan Rasmussen analyses symbolism and aesthetic values, provides case studies of possessed women, and reviews what local people think about the meaning of possession.

This path-breaking study of Egyptian popular culture provides fresh and vital insights into the long struggle of modern Egypt to define its identity. Walter Armbrust examines Egyptian television, recorded music, the press, and the cinema, revealing the delicate balance between conservative nationalist imagery and a modernist ethic. However, this balance has been put in question both by producers and consumers of the media, reflecting a sense that the way modern Egypt is represented does not reflect the real experience of Egyptians.

Ladislav Holy brings to this timely study of national identity the skills of a seasoned researcher, a cosmopolitan perspective, and the insights of an insider. Drawing on historical and literary sources as well as ethnography, he analyzes Czech discourses on national identity. Arguing that there were specifically "Czech" aspects to the Communist regime and to the "velvet revolution," he explores how notions of Czech identity were involved in the debates surrounding the fall of Communism, and the emergence of a new social system.

In 1992, an explosion of "stock fever" hit Shanghai. Ellen Hertz's anthropological study sets the stock market and its players in the context of Shanghai society, and probes the dominant role played by the state, which has yielded a stock market very different from those of the West. She explains the way in which investors and officials construct a "moral storyline" to make sense of this great structural innovation, identifying a struggle among the big investors, the little investors and the state to control the market.