Perspectives in Anthropology

Internet-based magazine

Pandemics: Agents of Global Change – Part 2

The Economic and Commercial Impact of Pandemics: By now, the COVID-19 influenza outbreak has reached practically all parts of the globe. In the context of discussing the pandemic, it serves no purpose to focus on the fact that scientists, medical professionals, public health experts and a handful of concerned economic institutions and businessmen have been […]

Gun Violence in American Schools

There is something terribly wrong going on in American schools today. A silent epidemic is spreading throughout the country like a cancer. What does it say about a society when children and adolescents can get their hands on military grade weapons, somehow get them into their schools and gun down dozens of fellow classmates […]

Brazil’s Dichotomous Treatment of Corruption – PT 2

After the end of the Brazilian military dictatorship, the Liberal Front Party (LFP), Democratic Social Party (PMDB) and Brazilian Social Democratic Party (PSDB) dominated the government of Brazil. For more than 20 years, right wing and centrists autocrats controlled the government and struggled with enormous foreign debt, rampant hyperinflation, and the difficulties of transitioning to […]

What Anthropologists Really Do-by Keith Hart

The Summary The new anthropologist is a self-appointed people’s representative in the double sense of writing them up and acting as their advocate. And anthropology is a sort of democratic politics, informed by long-term, empty-headed exposure to strangers wherever they live and shaped by the main public issues of the day. This populism is hostile […]

Religion and Economy – Part Two-by Keith Hart

We need to understand better how we build the infrastructures of collective existence, money among them. How do meanings come to be shared and memory to transcend the minutiae of personal experience? Property must endure in order to be property and that depends on memory. Money thus expands the capacity of individuals to stabilize their […]

Capitalism, revolution and racism in the US and the world-by Keith Hart

In the aftermath of Trump’s victory, we would do well to recall Hegel’s maxim that difference-in-sameness moves history. Max Weber used a similar argument to moderate the polarised Methodenstreit (Battle over Methods) between Berlin and Vienna about economics in the late 19th century. We would not be interested in the Greeks if they were the […]

Brexit: Where once was an empire-by Keith Hart

Separation from Europe has opened up the real possibility that the United Kingdom will break up. Scotland is already bent on secession and the two Irelands may resolve the problem of belonging to different commercial regimes by reunification. The London media portray such an outcome as unthinkable. My aim here is to recall the violent […]

World’s Most Vital Resource

It is not necessary to explain the process by which algae through millions of years of geological time and chemical reactions become fossil fuels such as oil, natural gas and coal. It is important to explain, however, why these fossil fuels have become the most vital resources in the world today. Our modern-day lives depend […]

Birth of the Pharmaceutical

In his highly original work, Birth of the Clinic, Foucault focuses his attention on the human experience and the rational for its continued homogenous reality. He discusses in great detail concepts about ideological space, the transformation of language and the politicization of medicine. He attempts to illustrate and illuminate the development of methods of medical […]

Changing Global Economies

For decades, investors in advanced economies (AEs) have shaped the evolution of global markets. Research shows that advanced economy investors tend to hold diversified portfolios that include significant investments in equities. Over the past decade, these pools of wealth have been growing at a much slower rate than emerging economies (EMs). With their rapid growth, […]

Global Warming: trends and consequences

Recently, health officials from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control issued a travel alert for Central, South America and the Caribbean, some 14 countries and territories exposed to the mosquito-borne Zika Virus. The alert targets pregnant women and follows reports that thousands of babies in Brazil were born last year with microcephaly, a brain disorder […]

Expatriates: Dilemmas and Misconceptions

Those who have chosen to become permanent expatriates at some time or another experience a very disturbing and confusing dilemma. What makes this dilemma so disturbing is it works at the psychological and emotional level and has the tendency to creep up unperceived and undetected. Some researchers define this phenomenon simply as culture shock. But, […]

Mandate of the Intellectual

Recently, a PhD educated, cultural researcher for a Canadian magazine contacted me about Perspectives’ focus on “open-access publishing, public accessibility and seeking a broad readership while maintaining a high academic standard.” This was the way he described it. He went on to state that he found that an intriguing balance. It appears he wanted information […]

Tristes Tropiques: Revisited

When I first encountered Lévi-Strauss in graduate school, I thought the title of his monumental work sounded strange. At that time, I spoke absolutely no Portuguese but knew enough Spanish to understand that tristes meant sad. However, I could not for the life of me penetrate the “meaning” associated with the title of this passionate, […]

Universality of Truth

Now this is an article that is going to upset a lot of people but at the same time it will cause a lot of people to reflect on something that we so easily take for granted. As anthropologists, we are charged with trying to understand and explain what humans do and essentially why. […]

Self-imposed Discrimination in Brazil

When I arrived in Brazil seven years ago as an American anthropologist seeking to discover if Brazil would be a good place to do research for a book, I had no idea about the degree of class discrimination that existed and the depths of its penetration into the cultural fabric of Brazilian society. Clearly, I […]

Long-term Ethnographic Immersion

In the years I have been doing ethnographic research, I have found that some ethnographers have a tendency to avoid researching issues that involve deep immersion. Clearly, there is a difference between what is termed participant-observer and observer-participant; however, I have also found that to take up positions in the midst of other’s lives in […]

Lecture series

Perspectives in Anthropology welcomes you to explore our new Lecture Series where you can discover a wide range of topics, each with a unique perspective and interpretation. We hope that these lectures will reflect the values of good anthropological research and inspire your own critical thinking and imagination. If you can’t view the lectures here […]

Transforming Refugees

The point of this article is not to argue that bio-medicine has become a mechanism for establishing political or cultural identity for refugees entering the United States. Neither does it claim that modern bio-medicine influences define the character and needs of immigrants. Rather, it seeks to establish that each verifies the other and it seeks […]

Traditional Family Values in Urbanized Societies

This article presents a brief discussion about the importance of traditional cultural and family values in urbanized, industrialized societies. In order to illustrate succinct dynamics among social factors and practices Brazilian family models are presented. It also describes dynamics concerning values, beliefs, and elements of parent-child relationships.

Unemployment & Poverty in Brazil

Although there is considerable literature on conditions of unemployment and poverty in many modernized countries, there is a penuriously small amount on how these issues are addressed in developing countries. In Brazil, a good portion of the available literature is gathered by agencies such as the Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatistica (IBGE), Brazilian Institute […]

The Art of Capoeira

There are many holidays celebrated in the city of Salvador, Bahia, Brazil. And on almost every occasion, you can see practitioners of Capoeira displaying their art somewhere during the festival. In Brazil, Capoeira is a very strong part of the history and culture of the people. Although it was once outlawed as a form of […]

Documentary Series

Some of you may be interested in knowing that Perspectives in Anthropology will be featuring a series of online anthropology documentaries. Many of these documentaries are available for viewing online for free from a variety of different websites. Not only will we feature some of the films we think are interesting but we will also […]

Urbanization in Brazil

Originally posted on Christina H Kim:
This is a course description for my class at the New School for Fall 2014. Wanda Model for Dandong China. The course explores the emergence and processes of urbanization in Asia through ethnographies. The course will examine urban development of specific Asian cities by focusing on urban problems and…

Revolta dos Búzios – 1798

This review is organized as a history of the diverse elements of scholarship by which the field of African Diaspora studies has been developed. It presents research findings of selected studies emerging from distinct interests and traditions of African Diasporic communities. The history examined here emphasizes the scholarship of diasporic researchers that, until recently, had […]