Suomen antropologinen seura

Westermarck Memorial Lecture, Dec 9, 2009

Antti Leppänen — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 12:26:03 +0000

Westermarck-muistoluento 9.12.2009/ Westermarck Memorial Lecture Dec 9, 2009

Professori Marilyn Strathern (Cambridgen yliopisto) pitää 25. Edvard Westermarck –muistoluennon keskiviikkona 9.12.09 Helsingissä. Luennon otsikkona on ”Comparing Concerns: Some issues in organ and other donations”, ks. abstrakti viestin lopussa. Professori Strathern on kansainvälisesti arvostettu englantilainen antropologi ja Helsingin yliopiston kunniatohtori vuodelta 2006. Professori Strathernin monitieteellinen lähestymistapa sekä laajat tutkimusintressit tekevät hänestä kiinnostavan myös muille kuin antropologeille, erityisesti mainittakoon sukupuolijärjestelmän tutkimus, oikeustiede ja sosiologia.

Suomen Antropologinen Seura on järjestänyt Edvard Westermarck -muistoluennon vuodesta 1983 vuorovuosina Westermarck-seuran kanssa. Westermarck-muistoluennot ovat olleet merkittäviä akateemisia tilaisuuksia, jotka ovat keränneet yhteen useiden eri alojen tutkijoita ja opiskelijoita. Tänä vuonna Suomen Antropologinen Seura järjestää muistoluennon yhteistyössä Helsingin yliopiston Sosiaali- ja kulttuuriantropologian laitoksen kanssa.

Aika ja paikka: ke 9.12.2009 klo 18.00 Yliopistomuseo Arppeanumin auditoriossa (Snellmaninkatu 3, Helsinki 00014, 2. kerros). Tasan klo 18.00 alkavaan tilaisuuteen on vapaa pääsy.

Professor Marilyn Strathern (Cambridge University) will give the 25th annual Westermarck Memorial Lecture on Wednesday, December 9, 2009 in Helsinki. Her lecture is titled “Comparing Concerns: Some issues in organ and other donations” (abstract at the end of this message). Professor Strathern is a renowned English social anthropologist who has received an honorary doctorate from the University of Helsinki in 2006. Due to her interdisciplinary approach and varied research interests she also appeals to audiences outside anthropology, such as sociology and gender studies.

The Finnish Anthropological Society together with the Westermarck Society of Finnish Sociologists has organized the Westermarck Memorial Lectures since 1983. These lectures are held annually, alternating between the two learned societies. The Finnish Anthropological Society is organizing this year’s lecture in collaboration with the Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Helsinki.

Time: Wednesday December 9 at 6 pm.
Location: Arppeanum (Helsinki University Museum), auditorium, (Snellmaninkatu 3, Helsinki 00014, 2nd floor). The event is free of charge and starts at 6 pm sharp.

Abstract:

Comparing concerns: Some issues in organ and other donations

In an information society, where overload has become a problem, might anthropology’s comparative method find a new lease of life? This Lecture sets out to test the hunch that it might. A field ever more densely populated with information is that of organ and tissue donation, and the debates to which current practices give rise. Donation is only one of several modes of procurement, organs only one kind of body part that can be donated, and people offer comparisons just as commentators do. Perhaps here is an answer to the question of how to make a reasonable account out of a fraught and infinitely expandable nexus of public concerns. Is it possible to conserve the complexity of the issues while not letting the sheer quantity of information run away with itself? Would following through the comparisons do the trick?

“Bureaucracy Kills So Many Things”. Interview with M. Swantz

anna a — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:40:50 +0000

FORUM: Health, Healing And Kinship in Africa

anna a — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:35:17 +0000

Reea Hinkkanen - Women’s Infertility at the Crossroads of Modernity and Tradition Maia Green - The Impact of Institutions: Participatory action and forms of healing Perpetual Crentsil - Caring for Aids Orphans in Ghana

BOOK REVIEWS

anna a — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:25:35 +0000

Steven Vertovec. Transnationalism (Laura Hirvi)

Daniel L. Everett. Don’t sleep, there are snakes: life and language in the Amazonian jungle (Tuomas Pylkkö)

Henrika Donner. Domestic Goddesses; Maternity, Globalization and Middle-class Identity in Contemporary India (Sirpa Tenhunen)

Annelise Riles (ed.). Documents: Artifacts of Modern Knowledge (Rene Uruena)

Editorial note

anna a — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 15:04:27 +0000

The first contribution in this autumn issue of Suomen Antropologi is the work of Diana Espirito Santo (Instituto de Ciencias Sociais, University of Lisbon). Entitled ‘Making Dreams: Spirits, vision and the ontological effects of dream knowledge in Cuban espiritismo’, the article explores the status of dream knowledge among practitioners of Afro-Cuban religious cults in Havana, especially the spirit mediums (espiristas). Santo notes that in Cuba, both in religious and secular fields, local cosmology is crystallized in dreams and rendered visible, providing a valued source of information and prophecy which is often discussed in detail with friends and family. Meanwhile, amongst the espiristas, dreams allow access to an extra domain of knowledge in which “the potentialities of the real” are revealed to the spiritually developed, and may be conceptualized as special states of “receptivity”. Her ethnographic project is directed at understanding the implications and effects of this receptivity. Simultaneously, however, Santo is trying to conceptualize how knowing may have deeper effects than merely cognitive ones, and how the communicative act in a post-dreaming context is also a transformative act, not just an expressive one. This is not a ground-breaking idea in itself, but she moves beyond conventional constructivism to explore ideas presented in A. Henare, M. Holbraad and S. Wastell’s recently edited volume—Thinking Through Things (2007)—in order to propose that the anthropology of Cuban dreams may require a relational approach that “allows dreams, spirits, people and words to fully be subjects of their relations, rather than just objects on the one hand and subjects on the other”. This, she suggests, shifts the task of anthropology from a fundamentally epistemological one to an ontological project that requires the recognition of what is real for different groups of people, rather than what they think exists—“which is a matter of ‘belief ’ and thus representation”.

In a potentially similar vein but with a rather different focus is the second article in this issue: ‘Narrating Religious Realities: Conversion and testimonies in Chilean Pentecostalism’ by Martin Lindhardt (Institute of Ethnology, University of Copenhagen). In his article, Lindhardt examines narrative strategies of born-again converts to Pentecostal religions in Chile but, unlike most of the literature on the subject, he is interested in not why people convert but how. This has led to the centrality in his study of the role played by narrative practice in the constitution and—importantly—the maintenance of Pentecostal identities and shared realities. He postulates that Pentecostal narrative practice provides converts with “symbolic structure and a temporal schema for present and future action”, thereby empowering them with tools to interpret their lives over time. Furthermore, he suggests that the narrating and re-narrating of the conversion experience should also be seen as a specific kind of social interaction in which religious realities are created and shared by narrator and listener alike. He pursues this argument by examining various rhetoric and non-linguistic strategies whereby those who are listening to testimonies are invited to inhabit the world of the story and live out its plots themselves.

Of the two research reports presented here, one visits the warrior tombs of Sindh in Pakistan and the second is the result of recent fieldwork in Maluku in Indonesia. Both conform to the policy of Suomen Antropologi of presenting reports on the work-in-progress of scholars at any academic level in anthropology and associated disciplines, and offering readers the chance of vicariously enjoying the huge variety of projects on which contemporary anthropologists are engaged. We warmly welcome submissions of this nature which, while they receive editorial advice and feedback from peers working in similar fields, do not undergo the rigour of review procedure accorded research articles, and are guaranteed swift appearance if they present work of quality.

In the first report—‘Tombs of Fallen Heroes’—Zulfiqar Ali Kalhoro (Staff Anthropologist at the Pakistan Institute of Development Economics and Ph.D. Scholar at the Taxila Institute of Asian Civilizations, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad) provides a description and discussion of the figurative and other depictions found on tombstones in the graveyards at Oongar and Saidpur Takkar located in the province of Sindh in Southern Pakistan. He also discuss the role of the tribes associated with these graveyards in the tribal history of Sindh and the battles in which they displayed the heroism which gave rise to the images of weaponry in the reliefs which decorate their tombs.

In the following report, Timo Kaartinen (Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Helsinki) discusses the regional urban diaspora of Bandanese-speakers from two villages in the Kei Islands to the broader island society of Maluku. ‘Urban Diaspora and the Question of Community’ explores the extent to which the dispersing community’s ethnic relations are informed by its previous history of travel, migration and displacement and affected by the Bandanese niche in enterprises connected with fishing and trade—the backbone of the provincial economy. Kaartinen extends his empirical discussion of the specific economic, political and kinship relations of the diaspora with local land-owning groups in the new locales by suggesting that the emerging status quo gives new meaning to the classifications of immigrant and autochthonous people.

Our interview in this issue is a conversation between Maia Green (Global Poverty Research Group and Department of Social Anthropology, University of Manchester) and Marja-Liisa Swantz, a celebrated Finnish anthropologist whose career and work in Africa spans over half a century. Professor Green was in Helsinki in June as opponent to Reea Hinkanen’s dissertation on women’s infertility in West Central Tanzania (see the Forum in this issue), and was eager to meet with this pioneer in the field of the participatory research approach in Tanzania, an approach which is now an integral part of development planning initiatives there and elsewhere. Space has meant that much of the conversation—which roamed through Professor Emerita Swantz’s extraordinary life and achievements—has been truncated in order to focus on the principal theme under discussion, but Swantz is currently working on a volume of essays which will review her life’s work and provide considerable, previously unpublished material whereby the omissions may be rectified.

Finally, mention must be made of the annual anthropology convention in Finland 7th–8th May 2009, titled ‘Continuity through Change: Anthropological perspectives in the contemporary world’, which was a cooperative effort between the Finnish Anthropological Society and the Department of Social Research at the University of Tampere, in which the latter were unarguably the movers and shakers. Keynote speakers were Signe Howell (University of Oslo), Ulla Vuorela (University of Tampere) and Stef Jansen (University of Manchester), all of whom approached, in various ways, phenomena that come under the rubric of contemporary globalization: Howell discussed social process through the lens of her multi-temporal fieldwork among the Chewong in Malaysia; Vuorela postulated the anthropologist of any era as a transnational subject; and Jansen’s lecture was based on ethnographic research in a post-Yugoslav Sarajevo suburb where he has investigated the materialization of ‘the state’ through local grids of provision and organization. Over seventy participants took part in nine workshops which reflected the themes of continuity and change at global and disciplinary levels and discussion was animated, informal and very productive. The organizers in Tampere did a wonderful job and we in Helsinki look forward to returning the hospitality in May 2010, when the Convention’s theme will be “Ideas of Value: Inquiries in Anthropology.” Calls for workshops and presentations are on their way.

MARIE-LOUISE KARTTUNEN
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Making Dreams: Spirits, vision and the ontological effects of dream knowledge

anna a — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:59:54 +0000

In this paper the significance of dreaming and dream communication in Cuba is explored, principally from the point of view of mediums in the Afro-Cuban religious practice of espiritismo in Havana. I suggest that dreams are both continuous with, and epitomize, the experience of mediumship and prophecy, where ‘vision’ is a fundamental trope, and are thus important sources of insight and extended spiritual perspective. In a cosmos where knowledge is both indicative and generative of a spiritual flow, and where its retention on the part of mediums has physical consequences, salient images and information received through dreams act as catalysts for the development of spirit mediumship, signaling the inherent porosity of the body as well as the potential mobility of an individual’s spirit. I also propose that dream knowledge be conceptualized ontologically; specifically, as possessing the agency to produce certain effects once it is formulated into language. This perspective undercuts purely representationalist views of language, as well as placing the communicative act in an essential cosmological light.

Tombstones of Fallen Heroes

anna a — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:50:56 +0000

This paper is based on fieldwork which I carried out in Sindh, Pakistan, from December 2007 to February 2008. The main objective of the study was to document and delineate two graveyards and their contents which are located in two different districts of Sindh, one in Thatta and the other in Tando Muhammad Khan. After discussing the origin of the term ‘chaukhandi’ as applied to a type of tombs present in the area I present the two graveyards, discussing the meanings of motifs that decorate the tombstones in both places. I also discuss the role of the tribes associated with these graveyards in the tribal history of Sindh and the battles in which they displayed their heroism.

Urban Diaspora and the Question of Community

anna a — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:47:25 +0000

The Bandanese are a community with a distinct language and tradition which point to their origin in Banda, an early base of Dutch colonization in Indonesia. Presently focused in two villages in the Kei Islands, the community has been transforming into a regional, urban diaspora since the 1960s. Field research from March until August 2009 focused on the question of how this community distributes itself regionally and to what extent its ethnic relations are informed by its previous history of travel, migration and displacement. The study reveals that urbanized Bandanese occupy political and economic niches marked by a privileged access to fishing and trade, the backbones of the provincial economy. At the same time, their shared ancestry with local land-owning groups legitimizes their presence in new locations. Differential access to maritime wealth and land give new meaning to the classification of immigrant and autochthonous people, ubiquitous in each island society of Maluku, in which the Bandanese are placed in a mediating position.

BOOK REVIEWS

marie-louise — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 10:58:32 +0000

Gender, Christianity and Change in Vanuatu: An Analysis of Social Movements in North Ambryn - Annelin Eriksen (Karen Armstrong)

Doing Anthropology in Consumer Research - Patricia L. Sunderland and Rita M. Denny (Minna Ruckenstein)

In God’s Image: The Metaculture of Fijian Christianity -Matt Tomlinson( Matti Eräsaari)

Editorial Note

marie-louise — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 10:42:58 +0000

This summer issue of Suomen Antropologi commences, appropriately, with an article entitled “Tourism as a ‘Moment of Being’” by Hazel Andrews (Liverpool John Moores University), which discusses the nature of tourist experience in the British summer destinations of Magaluf and Palmanova within a theoretical framework drawn from wider anthropological discourse on the subject. Thus, via her examination of the effervescent form of ‘Britishness’ generated by resort practices, Andrews explores the perspectives of anthropologists who have contributed to discussions regarding the nature of experience more generally—Michael Jackson, Victor Turner, Edward Bruner inter alia—to illuminate how the practice of charter tourism might be understood as an opportunity for increased reflexivity and heightened awareness of individual and collective identity among participant holiday-makers. Following this is a contribution by Toomas Gross (University of Helsinki)—“Is Protestant Growth Inevitable? Assessing Religious Change in Twenty-First Century Mexico”—which draws on fieldwork the author has conducted in southern Mexico since the late 1990s. Mapping and analysing changes in the religious composition of one particular Zapotec community in Oaxaca over the ten-year period, the article demonstrates that local-level religious dynamics are considerably less predictable than aggregate statistics indicating continued Protestant expansion would suggest. A fairly swift rise in Protestantism in the area during the nineties appeared to have stabilised by Gross’s latest period of fieldwork in 2008—a result, he suggests, of a combination of factors including the internal dynamics of the various Protestant congregations, national legislation such as a law on freedom of religious association in 1992, as well as changes and revitalisation in approaches and practices of the Catholic Church at local levels. From Protestantism (including Pentecostal strains) in Mexico to the world-view that is characteristic of a great many of the Pentecostal Churches currently flourishing in Africa: guided by Professor Paul Gifford (School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London) we are offered a glimpse into “The Primal Pentecostal Imagination: Variants, Origins and Importance”—a paper he presented at a public seminar in Helsinki in February 2009 entitled “Spirits and African Christianity”. In his presentation Gifford explores the ‘primal’ or ‘enchanted’ world view of African Pentecostalism which sees spiritual forces such as demons, spells or witchcraft as operative in physical events; he suggests that this orientation links local preoccupations to certain Western thinking and is the greatest single reason for the success of Pentecostal Christianity in Africa. He gives the last word to Ghana’s Abraham Akrong who sees charismatic Christianity as “nothing but the repackaging of traditional witchcraft mentality in Christian categories”. Continuing with the oral format, Suomen Antropologi is pleased to offer two articles which were first presented at a seminar held at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) in Trondheim in October 2008 entitled “Experimenting the Visual in Art and Anthropology: The Ethics of Research and Collaborations”. It is always rewarding to forge links with researchers working in neighbouring countries and we hope to welcomeas many as possible of you to the annual Finnish “Anthropology Days” successfully held this year in Tampere in May—next year in Helsinki (report follows in the subsequent issue). The Trondheim papers are introduced by one of the organisers, Giedre Jarulaitiene, who notes that the seminar gathered together professionals working with art and anthropology, who purposely or unintentionally combine the objectives and methods connecting the two fields; central themes at the seminar were the various orientations of subject to object in visual representation, ethics, aesthetics and methodologies. One of the resulting articles, “Complementarity between Art and Anthropology: Experiences among Kolam Makers in South India”, is written by anthropologist and artist Anna Laine (University of Gothenburg) who conducted fieldwork in Tamilnadu in 2005 and 2006. In it she explores both the performative process of kolam-making and its material result—the ornate daily designs the women of southern India draw at their doorways. In the course of this examination she discusses the visual as a source of knowledge, the ethical questions raised by collaboration with her informants and their reflections on the photographic representations which are a large part of her research methodology. The second work—“A Nice Dandelion: Visual Experiences at a Shopping Centre in Trondheim”— by Ruth Woods (NTNU), explores the role that art plays in public places via extensive observation of ‘interactions’ between shoppers and the ‘Dandelion’, a nine-meter tall, naturalistic sculpture painted with bright green and yellow car paint installed on a traffic island outside the City Syd Shopping Centre on the outskirts of Trondheim. Woods suggests that the towering reproduction of the ubiquitous weed provides visitors to the shopping centre with an aesthetic standard with which to consider and measure other elements in the area. We conclude with our regular forum which, in this issue, presents viewpoints raised at the annual symposium of the Finnish Oral History Network in December 2008 which focused on the role of ethics in oral history research and dissemination. Themes of the parallel sessions included the silencing of memories in intergenerational research contexts, building confidentiality and trust and other ethical issues which are of perennial concern to all ethnographers. Discussants to this forum are Ekaterina Melnikova (European University at St. Petersburg), Leena Rossi (University of Turku) and Ulla Savolainen (University of Helsinki). MARIE-LOUISE KARTTUNEN EDITOR-IN-CHIEF