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DOI: 10.1111/aman.12540 his death in 1987; imbued with intelligence, energy, and
integrity, he instilled these virtues in many of
Aderemi Suleiman Ajala his disciples as the philosophy of his power
University of Ibadan, Nigeria and Max Planck Institute for Social cult. To Adebanwi, Awol o. wo.` established modern
Anthropology, Halle, Germany Yoruba!
The challenge of sustaining this cult after his death is
Wale Adebanwis book about O . baf e. mi Awol o. wo.` (1909 a critical issue that forms the second part of Adebanwis
1987), Nigerian politician and nationalist, focuses on the book. How the politics of succession (personal and corpo-
ways in which African elites appropriate politics beyond rate) manifested itself in the post-Awo era and the struggles
their lifetime. Because Awol o. wo.` died almost 30 years ago of Afeniferes continuous hold on Yoruba politics are of par-
and many books have already been written about him, one ticular interest. The Awol o. wo.` cult was beset by the exclu-
wonders what could yet be unknown, and because anthro- siveness of some political elites of conservative background,
pological texts are expected to be rich in etic and emic the death in succession of potential Afenifere leaders, and the
perspectives, the quantity and quality of both employed in polarization of Afenifere. According to Adebanwi, Afenifere
this book are questionable. This may cause dissatisfaction weakened, but the Awol o. wo.` cult was never destroyed.
with the book, but Adebanwi has reinvented the spirit of Because key cult leaders were imperiled by absence of
Awol o. wo.` by using a new paradigm that analyzes him as democratic opportunities for self-actualization of cultural
an elite who created agency to reset the political order in and political goals of the Yoruba nation in Nigeria (p. 137),
Yoruba society. Rather than providing more narratives of the agency was disillusioned but still attached to the cult.
Awol o. wo.` s biography, Adebanwi uses elitism and agency to Nonetheless, there was a reconciliation and reenactment
explore political profiles in Nigerian colonial and postcolo- of the agency when Bola Ige assumed Awol o. wo.` s mantle
nial politics. Long-term fieldwork and engaging methodol- of intelligence, energy, and integrity as Awol o. wo.` reincar-
ogy result in an amazingly dense description of Awol o. wo.` as nate. The emergence of a democratic governance inspired
an agent of political modernity in Yoruba society. Thus this new momentum for elites and agency in Yoruba politics.
book will spark interest. New elites emerged with new structures: the political par-
Structured in two parts with an introduction, the book ties Alliance for Democracy and Action Congress of Nigeria,
has seven chapters that smoothly transit from the least to patterned after Awol o. wo.` s Action Group and Unity Party of
the most complex ideas about Awol o. wo.` s background, his Nigeria. The tentative success of this reinvention of agency
politics, and his legacy. Describing his methodology and in the 21st century sees Yoruba politics and nation still at-
the books structure, Adebanwi successfully entices readers tached to the Awol o. wo.` cult but deeply polarized by the
with juicy anthropological discourse as his introduction mag- structures and elites driving it.
nanimously interacts with rich arrays of literature. The first Through the text Adebanwi demonstrates how theories
part of the book beautifully deconstructs Awol o. wo.` s biogra- (elitism and agency) and concepts (corporate agency, the cult
phy and theorizes about how traditions, social values, birth of power, and the reinvention of tradition) played out in the
and early years, energetic ambition, and integrity influenced (re)making of the Yoruba nation and politics. Illustrations
his social aspirations. How this was possible for Awol o. wo.` , and coherent presentation of data characterize the book as a
whom he compares to Oduduwaa Yoruba personage of masterpiece of anthropology of person and text. Adebanwis
progeny and nationalismis central to Adebanwis pre- methodology is quite fascinating and demonstrates a perfect
sentation. He lucidly describes how Awol o. wo.` established mixture of observations, interviews, and inferences from
and managed pan-Yoruba structures such as the political as- archival materials.
sociation Afenifere and political parties Action Group and Nonetheless, use of the terms (post)colonial and
Unity Party of Nigeria. Awol o. wo.` sustained this agency until postcolonial is problematic because the author fails to
AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST, Vol. 118, No. 2, pp. 411465, ISSN 0002-7294, online ISSN 1548-1433.
C 2016 by the American Anthropological
explicate their meanings. Ignoring the effect of non- author cites John Higley and Michael Burton 2001, but in
Western-educated elites on the construction of elite and the references he cites a 2006 publication. On p. 38, re-
agency in Yoruba politics is also worrisome. Yoruba pol- ferring to figure 3, he claims that Awol o. wo.` is shown in
itics features non-Western-educated elites playing critical his last decade on earth. But the picture is from March 26,
roles in political patronage as Awol o. wo.` used them mostly 1950. Figure 3 also fails to correlate with the fact presented
as the last link to the political masses. These elites constitute on page 37.
agency in their own right. While self-studying is defensi- Despite these minor shortcomings, Adebanwis book is
ble, the authors closeness to certain structures he studies a good and classic work that problematizes elitism and agency
and the fact that he was a director of one of these (p. 26) in 20th-century Yoruba politics. It successfully illuminates
are worrisome considering the ethics of anthropological re- Yoruba influences on 21st-century Nigerian politics. Thus I
search. The book contains a few errors. On page 9, the can recommend it.
conversant with, rather than strictly opposed to, transna- tive. State and parastatal actors are not the only producers of
tional discourses on the rights and NGO-ization of local transnational strategies, technologies, theories, or expertise:
and global civil society. Deployments of securitization may activists, protestors, and social movements are too. In fact,
fail due to the ingenuity and tenacity of protestors, rev- Amar is at his most compelling when writing about these
olutionaries, or prisonersbut when they do they are sites of resistance, reversal, and innovationfrom prison re-
analyzed, reformed, recalibrated, and redeployed else- volts in Rio to the anti-authoritarian and anti-police national
where along the archipelago. Intensification across transna- uprising in Egypt. Amars ethnographic flair is on display in
tional circuits of capital and expertise connects actors and the latter half of the book as he grounds his theoretical and
institutions such as occupying armies, municipal police empirical insights in and from the (often broken and bruised)
forces, privately run incarceration sites, and campus security bodies on the front lines of the human security state.
forces. The Security Archipelago is a necessary read for anthro-
Lest this vision of a securitized and parahuman- pologists interested in the Middle East, South America,
ized transnational terrain seem overwhelming or totalizing, transnational anthropology, urban studies, securitization
Amar insists throughout his book that resistance across the studies, studies of the state, and, finally, feminist and queer
archipelago is consistent, innovative, and sometimes effec- theory.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12565 by the progressive Zero Hunger state officials. Rather than
being based on exclusionary and disempowering clientelism
Kees Koonings (the premise of the officials), local politics is built on what
Utrecht University and CEDLA/University of Amsterdam Ansell calls intimate hierarchies.
I do not doubt that this is an appropriate term to de-
Aaron Ansell has written a perceptive ethnography about the scribe the nature of political transactions in the villages of
encounters of rural communities in the sertao of northeast the municipality of Passarinho, but I am not convinced
Brazil with the reformist social engineering strategies of the that these hierarchies are in essence egalitarian, as Ansell
Brazilian state during the first few years of President Lulas claims. For this claim, he first presents a conceptual critique
Workers Partyled government, which came to power in of the idea that patronage reflects unequal and exclusionary
January 2003. This book offers fascinating insights into how political practices. He suggests that the political interaction
top-down policies of social reform are appropriated and of intimate hierarchies is egalitarian because both parties to
redefined by local stakeholders, especially local politicians, the exchange (politicians versus villagers) trade equivalent
civic leaders, activists, and state technocrats. needs: political and electoral support versus resources,
Ansell does not claim to assess the results of the so- including money. In doing so, both parties acknowledge
cial policies laid out in the backlands of the state of Piau mutual vulnerability: lack of political and electoral support
under the flag of President Lulas Zero Hunger program. versus lack of resources. In passing, Ansell dismisses Brazilian
However, he succeeds in conveying the ambivalence of its anthropologist Roberto DaMattas seminal work on the un-
impact: failure of the intended germination of cooperative, equal foundations of personal relations in Brazilian society
hunger-eradicating productive activities and success with as not fitting the contemporary dynamics of patronage
respect to the improvement of the material conditions of (p. 10).
some individual families, the empowerment of women pro- I think this is not only theoretically untenable (and re-
tagonists in local quilombola (Afro-Brazilian) identity politics, flects a misreading of DaMattas argument) but also not re-
or the (temporary) neutralization of local political faction- ally demonstrated in the ethnographic analysis. For instance,
alism in the selection of beneficiaries of the Food Card and when Ansell describes a campaigning day of Henrique, a
Bolsa Famlia conditional cash grants. relatively wealthy rancher and shopowner and a candidate
Rather, the initial claim of the book is a different one: to in the 2004 mayoral election, the egalitarian nature of his
unveil the failure of the Brazilian state and its representatives encounters with villagers is merely deduced from observed
to break down the hierarchical patronage of local politics body language on the street, while the actual encounter with
that supposedly stands in the way of the full realization of one family took place behind closed doors and was not com-
citizenship by the peasantry. Ansell argues that the reason for mented upon by other villagers (pp. 7275). The apparent
this failure is the misrepresentation of local political culture joviality of Henrique may well reflect the cloaking of power
414 American Anthropologist Vol. 118, No. 2 June 2016
differentials in a display of cordiality meant to mediate asym- tions. The first has to do with ethnographic interpretation.
metrical relations in a setting of face-to-face encounters. At some points, Ansell engages in too thick description in
Fortunately, the question of whether intimate hierar- lengthy conceptualized vignettes when a posterior shared
chies are egalitarian is not key to the real contribution made reflection with protagonists might have lent more depth to
by the study. In my view, this lies in Ansells insights into the the interpretation of events. An example is the imputation of
mechanisms of state making in the margins, which he shows nostalgia in observed encounters between officials and locals
to be a complex process of claim making and negotiating based on terminology cited from Michael Herzfeld rather
through the lens of conflicting and overlapping subjectivities. than on follow-up interviews with the participating villagers
Ansell dissects the Zero Hunger program officials identifi- (p. 115).
cation with a romanticized past of rural solidarity that guides Second, Ansell explicitly reports his active interference
their interventions in the villages. He then defines three in local affairs, sometimes at the behest of informants or local
strategies used to implement the Zero Hunger program. friends, sometimes apparently of his own accord. In itself,
Each of these strategies reflects specific constructs of polit- this explicitness is no problem but is, rather, commendable
ical culture. Antipoverty programs in the sertao generate because it is part and parcel of ethnography as an engaged
change through the conversations between state defenders and highly personal research methodology. However, I do
of progressive public citizenship and the personalist ethos of feel that Ansell could have offered more reflection on the
villagers and local power brokers. consequences for his position in the field and how this inter-
As far as methodological, epistemic, and ethical chal- ference might have informed his interpretation of intimate
lenges are concerned, I want to make two closing observa- hierarchies.
rich and unique analysis of the politics of water access, dining, feasting, and reciprocity would have served to
water-related detriments to health, and the creative ceramic build networks and establish or cement relationships as well
practices employed to navigate these conditions. as police racialized divisions within Creole society.
Chapter 4 draws on inventories, ceramic vessel forms, Chapter 6 provides an insightful analysis of health-
and use wear to examine the role and agency of over- and hygiene-related ceramic practices as inferred from the
looked yet highly valued enslaved women cooks. These presence and ubiquity of hygiene-related ceramic artifacts. In
powerless cooks, working in separate, minimally outfitted this analysis, Arcangeli notes a greater emphasis on cleanli-
kitchens, are argued to have become powerful contributors ness and presentation of the body and self in Guadeloupe
and creative intermediaries to the emergence and develop- compared to France, based on the greater numbers of
ment of Guadeloupe-specific Creole cooking, cuisine, and and importance given to grooming wares such as barber
eating practices. bowls (p. 145).
Chapter 5 shifts from cooking and food production Chapter 7, a short conclusion, is a too brief theoriz-
to food consumption and thus from cooking vessels to table- ing about the agency of cooks, with a lack of theoretical
wares and the entertaining practices to which they were cen- grounding and some missed opportunities to connect this
tral. Arcangeli details ceramic decoration styles and vessel work to broader anthropological conversations. It would
forms that will serve as critical resources for future compar- have been helpful if Arcangeli had expanded both upon her
ative analyses of tablewares in Caribbean and Guadeloupean statement related to the greater importance of ceramics or
contexts. Furthermore, she delves into important differ- the centrality of ceramic culture in the colony compared
ences between Guadeloupean and French ceramic practices. to French contexts (p. 179) and upon her argument that ce-
The archaeology and inventories from Guadeloupe in general ramic and inventory analyses of the sort presented shed light
show similarities to households in France, yet with a greater on some of the most disenfranchised elements of Creole so-
percentage of the population of Guadeloupe appearing to ciety (p. 180), which this book most certainly does.
have participated in more formal dining practices and meal In short, Arcangeli provides scholars with a trove of
presentations via the medium of ceramic tablewares (p. 111). insights into the variety of Guadeloupes ceramic-related
Such observations go hand in hand with architectural practices from water management to cooking, eating, and
and furniture-related inventory entries that show that grooming and their similarities and differences across class
compared to Parisian residences, Guadeloupean house- and race divides and between colony and metropole that will
holds appeared to have been more purposefully designed resonate for ceramic analyses, future studies of Guadeloupe,
to accommodate frequent organized dining events and broader comparative analyses of colonial contexts across
(p. 135). Arcangeli infers that a greater emphasis on social the globe.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12566 The concept of the social imaginary has not been widely
applied in archaeology, but Ardren argues that it is a useful
Brigitte Kovacevich approach because of its focus on contingent change as a result
University of Central Florida of human actors who make conscious and strategic choices.
She draws on the work of Charles Taylor to define the social
Traci Ardren uses the concept of the social imaginary to imaginary as the way that individuals imagine and create
gain a more nuanced understanding of Classic-period Maya their own existence and experience a sense of communion
social identities. Chapters include investigations into ur- and membership in that social creation.
ban imaginaries, reinvention of past imaginaries, the social In chapter 2 Ardren addresses the urban imaginary at
imaginary of childhood, and gendered imaginaries. These Chunchucmil. She looks at circulations to demonstrate how
diverse topics are relevant to all readers interested in the social and economic exchanges served to construct a so-
construction of social identity. Although she focuses on ar- cial imaginary that was fluid and changing. For example,
chaeological data from her extensive experience at the Clas- she shows that mid-level elites incorporated exotic objects
sic Maya northern lowland sites of Yaxuna, Chunchucmil, acquired through these circulations into everyday practice
and Xuenkal, Ardren also includes diverse social exam- when they needed a different language of power. This social
ples and demonstrates connections to Maya descendant imaginary emphasized external connections but didnt reject
communities. local traditions, showing that circulations are a mechanism
416 American Anthropologist Vol. 118, No. 2 June 2016
by which the social imaginary can be constituted and main- Chapter 5 asks: What artifacts and practices made gen-
tained. Residents may have been drawn to this city for just der self-evident to the Classic Maya? Ardren makes a good
that reason, because it may have had a culture of commer- case for gendered spaces based on contact-period writings
cialism that lent itself to reframing and negotiating social that depict gender-specific activities in particular architec-
identity. tural settings and corroborates this with material culture. She
Chapter 3 examines collapse from the perspective argues for the domestic not as a space strictly for womens
of social memory and the reinvention of social identity. activities but as a representation of or metaphor for idealized
Ardren found that activity at the site of Yaxuna after the femaleness. She discusses possible archaeological examples
collapse focused on shrines near Classic-period monuments. of public mens houses and makes an explicit link with hege-
She demonstrates that there was no residential activity at monic masculinity, civic and ceremonial architecture, and
Yaxuna because the former leaders had become part of the privilege. She points out that the complementarity between
social imaginary of another powerful city, yet the social mens and womens spaces reflected the metaphor of so-
imaginary of Yaxuna was still actively recreated and nested. cial reciprocity and that these two imaginaries were sepa-
She argues that the new identity had to be performed to be rate, yet closely intertwined, and had to be cultivated and
operational, creating continuity and survival. This was facil- maintained.
itated by the social memory of victories and glory but also by In the end, Ardren achieves her three primary objec-
forgetting or reframing defeats. She asks whether inhabitants tives. She uses relational archaeology to investigate relation-
of postcollapse cities remembered or forgot Classic-period ships of power in the past. I can see this approach having
institutions, and the answer appears to be both. broader applications, including further investigating social
The fourth chapter focuses on the social imaginary of imaginaries of elites and commoners and how these groups
childhood, which is often assumed to be biologically deter- differentially experienced collapse or hegemonic masculin-
mined. Ardren demonstrates through burial patterns and ity. Second, she uses archaeological case studies to demon-
grave goods that children at Xuenkal and other communities strate how patterned material culture helps create social
were considered equal to adults and not as lesser or par- identities and how they are shared and manipulated within
tial persons. She points out that partial child burials were the framework of the social imaginary, which could cer-
often incorporated into offerings after circulation among tainly have further applications including nested political
the living, as were precious materials like jade, incense, or affiliations and ethnicities. Finally, Ardren presents primary
shell. She argues that this context suggests that children were data from sites in the northern Maya lowlands that are valu-
viewed as having power and connections to the afterlife sim- able and relevant to Mesoamerican studies. By the end of
ilar to those of other precious substances. Ardren shows the the book, the reader senses that the social imaginary ap-
existence of personhood in objects among the Classic-period proach allows for more freedom and creativity among ac-
Maya, and it becomes apparent that certain social imaginaries tors than do traditional practice-based approaches, which can
can incorporate an understanding of some beings, material tend to focus more on constraining factors and conservative
or human, as numinous. behaviors.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12587 Egypts water in new waysas not only a substance that
is acted upon by humans but as an agent in and of itself
Rania K. Sweis with unique material qualities that invariably shape human
University of Richmond experiences and relationships.
Water, in this study, is the primary ethnographic ob-
In Cultivating the Nile: The Everyday Politics of Water in Egypt, ject. Readers become intimately familiar with its chemical
Jessica Barnes offers a unique and ethnographically rich ac- features, its social life as it flows from the highlands of
count of how Egypts infamous Nile waters are made by East Africa into Egypt, and its critical role in contemporary
a range of actorsfrom farmers to local administrators to Egyptian and regional politics. Readers will learn how it
technocrats to international donorsthrough a variety of is redirected and manipulated according to politically pro-
complex social and political practices spanning irrigation, duced conditions of scarcity and excess, and how Egyptian
drainage, pumping, and diversion. Barnes presents readers farmers and management experts understand its social effects
with a multiscaled account of how we should think about (as in the term mafish mai, no water) and ascribe meaning to
Book Reviews 417
its agency and heterogeneous character (mai mumilih, salty and Irrigating the Desert, Deserting the Irrigated, we gain
water, as opposed to mai hilu, good water). a transnational perspective on water governance through an
Early on, Barnes asks the fundamental question that analysis of water user associations and local land irrigation
frames the entire book: What is Egypts water? Her main practices. In each chapter, Barnes carefully highlights the
argument stipulates that Egypts water resources are not a creative technopolitical practices through which individual
given but are made through daily practices of accessing, mon- actors mold the contours of the Nile in order to access water
itoring, and manipulating. Water, therefore, is an outcome as well as the ways in which these practices are intimately
of social, biophysical, technical and political processes that tied to identity and social hierarchies. The final ethnographic
produce particular quantity and quality characteristics in any chapter, Flows of Drainage, follows the movement of wa-
given time and place (p. 3). Barnes conducted 14 months of ter from canals to soil, revealing problematic points of water
ethnographic fieldwork to access the everyday practices of excess and how these map onto economic inequality and
making water in sites where it is managed and used, such as structural violence.
global water conferences, water user associations, and farm- Most impressive in this book is Barness deployment of
land in the agricultural province of Fayoum. Drawing on diverse methodologies to tell the story of water scale, such
literature in anthropology, political ecology, and technology as tables, charts, maps, firsthand photographs, and ethno-
studies, Barnes uses a multiscaled and multisited ethno- graphic data including observations and interviews. While
graphic approach that links decisions made by international we do not get an intimate traditional ethnographic perspec-
donors, government officials, and technocrats to farmers tive into the social worlds of farmers in their households, we
and their families. The local, national, and international are do understand how waterthe central object under obser-
masterfully woven together in this book, enabling a needed vation in this bookand farmers as well as engineers and
analysis of water and water politics in the contemporary technocrats are deeply intertwined with each other in fields
Middle East. and deserts, government offices, and global water confer-
In chapter 1, The End of a River, readers are intro- ences. In this respect, Barness book is a fresh and innovative
duced to the Nile waters and their primary role in cultivat- addition to the study of inequality, globalization, and Egypt.
ing Egyptian land, past and present. Chapter 2, The Niles Scholars and students in a range of academic disciplines will
Nadir, focuses on the key theme of water scarcity as well as find Cultivating the Nile valuable due to its focus on timely
waters material nature and propensity to erode the channels questions of the humannonhuman and the politicalnatural
it passes through. In chapters 3 and 4, Fluid Governance worlds.
African-inspired religious orthodoxy that is extended, dis- enable the expansion of Santera fluidity (p. 36), creating
torted, or reconfigured in transnational contexts. Santera electrifying embodiments, spirit possession even, and onto-
is probably Cubas best-known religious practice of African logical proximities with co-presences scattered in time and
inspiration. Since the islands post-Soviet era began in the space. Electronic and telecommunicational animisms have
early 1990s, Santera has seen a boom in interest from a long history stemming back to 19th-century spiritualism
foreigners and nationals alike, which has implied that it has (Sconce 2000). But Beliso-De Jesus does something different
traveled globally. But it cannot be described in the singular with these animations. She follows the multiple caminos and
(as only one thing) or independently of other cults (Palmie movements of spectral co-presences to understand how dif-
2013). Indeed, as the author describes, Santera was itself ferent Santera assemblages are put together in a transna-
produced by cosmopolitan religious circuits among Nigeria, tional setting as well as how geontologies are produced
Cuba, Brazil, and others well into the 20th century (p. 197), affectively, drawing on a host of registers including race,
and in a contemporary setting it has competing ritual models gender, sexuality, and nation.
that initiates can follow. But these are not dead debates. On This book is apparently about transnationalism, an
the one hand, Beliso-De Jesus delves into what have been increasingly trendy theme in the contemporary study
inherently controversial gender and sexuality debates, espe- of religion. But in contrast to the bulk of the literature
cially contested heteronormativities in disputes over female encapsulated within this trend, Beliso-De Jesus refuses to
initiations and homosexuality more broadly. On the other separate things here inseparablehistories from stories,
hand, links with Africa are not given but are constantly re- pasts from present(s), spirits from objects, material from
made in discourse and practice. Rather, she argues, Santera immaterial, media from presence, heres from theres
is both raced and gendered in multiple subjective, nationalist, (p. 216), representation from reality. Her rejection of the
and political ways by its actors, Cuban or otherwise. This transcendentalism (and representationalism) so tediously
extends to ontologies of the senses and the production implicit in most transnational religion (and media) studies
of social spaces and distinctionssmells and tastes, for is sophisticated and bold, giving this text its theoretically
instance. multiregistered and ethnographically sensual foot-
The second notion is that thingsvisual and au- ing. This book is a major breakthrough in the conceptualiza-
ditory media, Internet technology, sacred stones, bod- tion of transnational religious ontologies, be they in Cuba
ies, and so onserve to represent or mediate spir- or not.
its and deities. But Beliso-De Jesus, like others who have
worked with Afro-Cuban religions (Ochoa 2010), argues REFERENCES CITED
that concepts of mediation turn on Christian cosmologies Ochoa, Todd R.
that are hardly appropriate in Cubas context of profound 2010 Society of the Dead: Quita Manaquita and Palo Praise in
spiritual immanence. Here is where this books elegance re- Cuba. Berkeley: University of California Press.
sides. Beliso-De Jesus understands videos and other me- Palmie, Stephan
dia productsfor example, those recorded by godchildren 2013 The Cooking of History: How Not to Study Afro-Cuban
in Cuba during initiations and taken to the United States Religion. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
not as referents to something that has already occurred but as Sconce, Jeffrey
living, pulsating spiritual currents whose effects are ontolog- 2000 Haunted Media: Electronic Presence from Telegraphy to
ical rather than merely epistemological. These technologies Television. Durham: Duke University Press.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12589 leged men in Manila in the early 2000s. Overall, the book is
a vital contribution to writing about the urban lifeworld of
Christina Verano Carter 21st-century Manila, globalization, transnationalism, sexu-
Appalachian State University ality in the postcolony, urban anthropology, and Southeast
Asia.
Bobby Benedictos ethnographic project Under Bright Lights is The bright lights scene for Benedicto is not a bounded
an original and theoretically fluid work about an emergent object or place of anthropological arrival and study, although
scene, the bright lights scene, comprising gay and privi- Manila is its main spatiotemporal locus. The reader is invited
Book Reviews 419
along with members of the bright lights scene to a series of Across the book, the most provocative moments are the
automobile rides, plane trips, conversations with scenesters skillfully narrated ethnographic scenes where the dream of
old and new, bars, clubs, private homes, airport lounges, the bright lights scene is disrupted, haunted by gay specters
and Internet portals. Taking a cue from Kathleen Stewart on associated with the lower classes (the bakla, parlorista) or
writing ethnographic affects and worlding (2007), Benedicto by the global gay travelers anxiety over being misrecog-
portrays Manilas elite gay scene as a dreamwork assemblage nized abroad as an overseas foreign worker (the OFW)
of spaces that are on the move, virtual, exclusive, or imagined or careworker, a crystalline shock (p. 116) as the rigor-
as an elsewhere that is anywhere but Manila, seeking to ously policed class borders of home collapse within spaces
rise above or escape from what he terms the noisy matter of transit.
of Manilas diminished standing in the global hierarchy as No doubt Benedicto writes of the bright lights scene
a third world city (p. 3). In the fantasy-world making with some tough love, a critical stance formulated through
of this much desired yet thwarted modern and global gay Lauren Berlants cruel optimism (2011) and one that carves
elsewhere, Benedicto underscores the complicity of bright out the narrative space to make visible the dreamwork and
lights scenesters in the maintenance of neoliberal orders and violent contradictions of global modernist aspirations in the
regimes of social violence at home in Manila. For Benedicto, 21st-century postcolony. This reader is left wondering about
elite gay and queer subjects in and of the third world city are other ways that this elite scenester formation might engage
a knotty transnational entity that when at home pursues the with the multiplicity of scenes, signs, hierarchies, subjec-
dreams of a privileged native and by contrast when abroad tivities, and political investments that do not participate in
experiences, recalling Frantz Fanon, alienation and shame its precarious world-making project. In particular, as a foil
when called out as a racialized other. to toughness, I wonder how Benedicto might cast the more
Arguably the most compelling figure in the book is tender moments when hierarchies of class, gender, and race
the city of Manila itself. To this reader, who has lived in slacken and crystallize as love or other ways of relating within
Manila, Benedictos language arouses the felt experience of the dream of the global gay scene, thereby adding dimension
a city that for writers such as the peripatetic philosopher to the writing of this unfinished world (Stewart 2008).
Alphonso Lingis (who is mentioned in the text) instills feel- In all, however, Benedictos text is a stunning and lyrical
ings that oscillate between attraction and repulsion (1994). piece of writing in the ficto-critical mode, and his effort to
However, for Benedicto, it is by way of Paul Virilios work craft more than a good enough story of gay life in Manila,
on speed and perception (1997), Michael Taussigs nervous but an immersive fiction of being something that feels like
system (1992), or Dilip Gaonkar and Elizabeth Povinellis something (p. 23) is a landmark offering and a marvelous
ethnographies of form (2003) that his writing about the achievement.
city emerges. Initially, Benedicto generates the sensations
and contours of the scenes topography by attending to the
privilege and means of mobility itselfthe luxury of private REFERENCES CITED
automobiles that allow bright lights members the speed, Berlant, Lauren Gail
enclosure, or distance to imagine that they can assert their 2011 Cruel Optimism. Durham: Duke University Press.
class distinction from the infamous traffic snarls of Manilas Gaonkar, Dilip Parameshwar, and Elizabeth A. Povinelli
teeming streets. Thus, desiring-machinic-mobility and dis- 2003 Technologies of Public Forms: Circulation, Transfiguration,
tance constitute a structuring feature of the scene. The play Recognition. Public Culture 15(3):385397.
of nearness and farness resonates throughout, as Benedicto Lingis, Alphonso
artfully illuminates how the signs and images of this global 1994 Abuses. Berkeley: University of California Press.
elsewhere come to roost in the urban landscape as Michel Serres, Michel
Serress angels (1995) or as messengers of things from 1995 Angels: A Modern Myth. Paris: FlammarionP`ere Castor.
afar (pp. 4546). Thus, as the reader tags along for nights Stewart, Kathleen
out between the ultramodern yet deserted climes of the 2007 Ordinary Affects. Durham: Duke University Press.
commercial hub called Global City and the once-upon-a- 2008 Weak Theory in an Unfinished World. Journal of Folklore
time fashionable district of Cubao, place or event names and Research 45(1):7182.
imagery materialize the dream of this fantastic elsewhere Taussig, Michael
in the midst of squalor and poverty, rendering the possi- 1992 The Nervous System. New York: Routledge.
bility of transformation or indexing failed visions of global Virilio, Paul
modernity. 1997 Open Sky. New York: Verso.
420 American Anthropologist Vol. 118, No. 2 June 2016
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12542 relates to what we know of actual neural activity is not dis-
cussed. The implied learning process of mental models seems
Maurice Bloch for the authors to be simply a matter of smooth absorption,
London School of Economics and Political Science and they do not refer to the huge recent literature on cogni-
tive development in psychology. Furthermore, what is his-
This book is a new presentation of a type of research and torically specific in the mental models of the book and what
theory that has best been argued for by Roy DAndrade, is linked to other factors such as the general predispositions
Naomi Quinn, and Claudia Strauss in a number of publica- of our species are not discussed. The much-discussed prob-
tions going back to at least the 1970s. Much of the book is a lematic character of what older U.S. anthropology meant
review of work done in that tradition. The aim of this tra- by culture and cultures is not touched on. The authors
dition is to discover how culture as a mental phenomenon talk of members of a culture as though this was a club.
leads people to produce the culture that an anthropologist Of course, the problem of the program assumes that an-
can observe from behavior including linguistic phenomena. thropologists have access to the workings of the mind and
Trying to understand this link between the inside and the brain, and therefore this is hypothesized from precisely the
outside clearly lies at the core of the anthropological project. data to which the authors want to link. In fact, there is hardly
The way to do this, supported by Bennardo and de Munck any discussion of evidence for the modular character of what
and the other scholars they endorse, is more specific. It is stored in the mind.
assumes not only that there is a culture to be found in The suppression of these difficult questions seems
peoples nervous system but that this culture is made up linked to the methods proposed for discovering mental
of distinguishable units (mental models) that people absorb models. Although other methods are mentioned, the only
from each other and that these then guide their actions in ones for which we have any details concern the frequency
similar ways. This absorption makes people recognizable as of words linked to mental models that are assumed to
members of a culture. exist as distinct entities. Thus we have a comparison of the
The book consists of a first part tracing the development mental model for romantic love to be found in the heads
of this theory through a rather ecumenical sweep of the his- of Lithuanians and North Americans that is based on the
tory of the human sciences in which all kinds of authors from frequency of words used by both groups. Such a method
Kant to Levi-Strauss to Chomsky are presented as though raises difficult questions about recent work on the relation
their work prepared the way for the mental model view. of words to thought and concepts that the authors here do
This is followed by a discussion of methods for discover- not seem to consider.
ing and analyzing mental models. The second part of the The same lack of precision is found in the discussion
book consists of a worldwide tour of different cultures or of culture areas. For example, the discussion of African
culture areas for which work on mental models is to be cultural models focuses on the word ubuntu (presumably
found in the literature. Finally, there is a chapter on the pan-African concept, p. 213), found in a number of Bantu
use of the culture model theory for applied anthropology in languages. For Bennardo and de Munck this term seems
such things as development and business. It seems, however, to indicate a distinctly African concept or mental model,
that for this second half of the book a strict use of the idea although, even in the work of the authors quoted, it is clear
of a cultural model has been abandoned and what is being that, as a lexical item at least, it means different things in
considered is the simple proposition that culture matters. different places. Even more surprising is the fact that many of
It is strange that the two authors seem unaware of the the peoples considered in somewhat more detail (Hai//om,
fundamental criticisms of the terms on which they rely. Mursi, Maasai) do not speak Bantu languages.
They mention these difficulties but quickly move on. The The time has come for a critical review of the mental
foundational authors of the tradition seemed much more model tradition in light of recent research in psychology,
aware of the challenge. For example, what the word mind neurology, and anthropology. Then we will be able to take
refers to is here taken to be largely unproblematic in most of stock of both what is still valuable and what must be modified,
the book. How the mind that the authors take for granted rethought, or abandoned. This book does not do that.
Book Reviews 421
think our role is to support their cause. Browns conclu- others is important and relevant in ways that are often hard
sion reconnects the arguments presented at the beginning of to imagine.
his book, where he discusses the limitations of anthropology
to fully explain the processes that occur among people from REFERENCE CITED
other cultures. His recognition of such limitations does not Starn, Orin
mean that anthropology is not an endeavor worth pursu- 1991 Missing the Revolution: Anthropologists and the War in
ing. On the contrary, for Brown, documenting the lives of Peru. Cultural Anthropology 6(1):6391.
practices and hegemonic discussions. Additionally, it alerts and kings. Do we entertain the possibility of the radically
us to the stakes of any presumed purification of religion from unknown? Do we participate in the quest for the authentic
embodied religiosity. light of reason (p. 188) as de Martino demands? It is precisely
Toward the end of the book, de Martino illustrates, by building on works such as Magic that we keep exploring
occasionally with entertaining outcomes, the concept and how these options might not be mutually exclusive and that
practice of jettatura (jinx) pervasive among the upper bour- we keep extricating justice and arbitrariness, law and abuse
geoisie. Jettatura, in his understanding, is a Neapolitan for- (p. 180). As we work within an always insecure society (p.
mation expressed by Enlightenment thinkers who, unwilling 188), we may occasionally knock on woodand that would
to live out the choice between magic and reason in all se- be okay.
riousness . . . kept to a compromise between seriousness
and facetiousness (p. 170). Its not true, but I believe it REFERENCE CITED
(p. 152) is the phrase that captures such a disposition. de Martino, Ernesto
One may ask whether as 21st-century anthropologists 2005[1961] The Land of Remorse: A Study of Southern Ital-
we are radically removed from the facetious ambiguity ian Tarantism. Dorothy Louise Zinn, trans. London: Free
(p. 186) of these Neapolitan lawyers, judges, courtesans, Association Press.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12588 reflective approach in noting her own role as a long-term re-
searcher is important not only as a corrective to many other
Tok Thompson linguistic works but also as part of her awareness of the
University of Southern California long-term effects of all the personalities (herself included)
involved in the language community. Her thoughtful re-
This book is a compendium of 23 individual essays (plus a flections on the fieldwork process, including acknowledging
29-page introduction) by linguist Nancy Dorian spanning six past mistakes, also help establish her authority on the subject
decades, all focused on the small, dwindling language com- matter and provide a very helpful guide for future linguistic
munity of East Sutherland Gaelic speakers. Dorians long- researchers.
term engagement has produced a careful, detail-oriented, Dorians work is notable for its inclusion of semi-
and nuanced understanding of the sociolinguistics of a spe- speakers of various forms in the dwindling language
cific minority language group. Few scholars could ever hope community and their important roles in such details as gram-
to offer such an overview of a language community as com- mar, morphology, sociolinguistic positioning, and other
prehensive as this one. Given the rapid decline of East aspects. She states that equally crucial to determining
Sutherland Gaelic, this will likely become a eulogy for the important aspects of the semi-speakers role in the bilin-
language as well: the best overall description of its final days. gual community was a long-term observational component
The author might object to this metaphor. In her intro- (p. 11). The merging of grammar, morphology, socioeco-
duction, she decries the terms dying languages and language nomic positioning, ideology, and personal connections (ap-
death due to the implied biological metaphor, rightly ob- propriateness) of discourse over decades of observations
serving that languages are social, not biological, phenomena gives a rare holistic view of a minority language community.
(p. 13). Alongside objecting to the death of languages, she Her descriptions of East Sutherland Gaelic provide an
also rightly objects to conflating saving with document- excellent example of the common tensions between official
ing them, because documenting shifts the idea of language standardized versions and local (especially spoken) dialects.
to a set of abstractions, away from the only place language Dorian pays close attention to what people actually say,
actually exists: with the speakers themselves. It is the highly and these details give a good sense of the variations of oral
social nature of her work that is perhaps the central theme languages from town to town and sibling to sibling and over
that defines her approach and informs her many insights. time. She points out that such variations are an inherent part
In this collection, Dorian details what many parachute of natural (and oral) languages rather than a sign of being
linguiststhose who do not spend considerable lengths of less than perfect, an idea derived from the ideology of
time in the communitywould likely miss. Likewise, her standardization (Milroy 2000:11).
424 American Anthropologist Vol. 118, No. 2 June 2016
Still, her lack of inclusion of standard Gaelic orthog- reflects this, giving the essays a somewhat disjointed flavor
raphy in her renderings of speech can be problematic; for as a whole. This is not an easy collection to read from cover
those who can read Gaelic (presumably much of her po- to cover.
tential audience), such orthography would have been very Nonetheless, there are many gems in this compendium,
helpful. At times, only people familiar with Gaelic grammat- and throughout Dorian provides good comparisons with
ical terminology as well as International Phonetic Alphabet differing linguistic ideologies around the world, establish-
orthography would be able to piece together the recorded ing herself as a major contributor to the global study of
speech. Dorian admits that her knowledge of Gaelic orthog- endangered languages. This book will be an excellent re-
raphy is incomplete to be sure and that she never formally source for those interested in several topics of her work:
studied Gaelic (p. 113). Both would likely have added a layer East Sutherland Gaelic, Gaelic-language revitalizations, the
of comprehensibility and scholarly understanding to the es- fieldwork process, and more generally the sociolinguistics of
says. Also not as strong are her comments on other linguistic marginalized language communities. This is a rich overview
communitiesher work on Ireland, for example, is some- of a career well spent: a passionate and disciplined, if some-
what lacking in variegated scholarship and at times contains what bittersweet, study of a language community fading
inaccurate representations of the language. Troublingly, she forever from the earth.
omits the necessary accent marks on Irish words (e.g., p.
228, Udaras na Gaeltachta and Gaeltarra Eireann [sic]). REFERENCE CITED
Another difficulty is perhaps inherent in such a com- Milroy, Jim
pendium of articles: many details are repeated article after 2000 Historical Description and the Ideology of the Standard
article, particularly the ethnographic settings and introduc- Language. In The Development of Standard English, 1300
tory material. Also, the articles were intended for vari- 1800, Laura Write, ed. Pp. 1129. Cambridge: Cambridge
ous audiences in various academic journals, and the writing University Press.
come at the expense of the familial supportmaterial and quality (p. 172). Here, comfort, convenience, and quality
otherwisethat facilitated their migration and education. follow a particular educational path and are marked by the
While the role of higher education in achieving urban success consumption of brand-name motorbikes, house decor, and
is critical, recognizing the sacrifice of family members to the ability to support families back home. This last marker
facilitate it is equally important. results in a hierarchy of social status within natal families
Chapter 4 examines the long-gendered and competitive although a new flat-screen television is valued in the rural
Vietnamese workplace, gender inequalities in income, and areas from which many of these women migrate, it does not
the performance of femininity within professional spaces. signify the same cultural capital as an urban higher education.
In performing femininity, women and men can strategically Earls ethnography reveals a gap in official Vietnamese
cater to workplace expectations and opportunities for so- state discourse in which educated urban migrant women
cial mobility. Chapter 5 focuses on leisure and recreational are largely absent. Although she recognizes this absence
practicesprimarily food consumptionof newly middle- and offers an ethnographic space in which the daily lives of
class women in Ho Chi Minh City, demonstrating that the these women become visible, this reviewer wonders what
urban landscape shapes and is shaped by women migrants. an official state discourse about this class of women might
Shifts in public and private dining and cafe spaces, along look like. What does this complex migrant class mean for
with conscious decisions to order specific regional dishes or the state and for post-reform policies that may or may not
to dine in specific spaces, affirm the precariousness of a new take gender into account? Earl argues that urbanization in
urban landscape where local and global (fast food) options Vietnam . . . is a salient factor in raising the population out
abound. For the new migrant middle-class woman, navigat- of poverty through state-led development (p. 243), but
ing these precarious spaces becomes a way to express both to what degree does the emergent middle-class Vietnamese
identity and belonging. woman figure into a larger project of state-led development
Chapters 6 and 7 deal directly with consumption, in Vietnam, Southeast Asia, and beyond? Attention
remittances, kinship, and marriage. Situating Vietnamese to these questions is increasingly important as urban
middle-class women in the larger context of the Asian mid- Vietnam and the role of womenin the middle class and
dle classes, Earl argues that they are aspirational and they otherwisewithin these urban landscapes are perpetually
aim to build lifestyles marked by comfort, convenience and changing.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12554 have developed further. One of these involves the inclusion
of more anthropological theory. The book is almost theory
James L. Fitzsimmons avoidant, as stated prominently in the introduction, and has
Middlebury College only two chapters that make explicit use of different mod-
els. We have all read, and perhaps have written, too many
Dedicated to funerary practices in the pre-Hispanic Andes, works touting original fieldwork that are theory driven and
this collection highlights recent excavations and bioarchae- not data driven. When overdone, anthropological theory
ological analyses at sites ranging from Ecuador to Chile. As can indeed distract from actual data, even when the data are
the outgrowth of a symposium, the volume brings together evident. This is presumably what the editors were trying to
scholars from a variety of specialties, with an overall em- avoid. But theory combined with data is not necessarily a
phasis on new field data and bioarchaeological approaches in bad thing. More attention to competing models of behavior
most of the chapters. The main theme of the book, as de- in the Andes, as well as greater use of comparative material
scribed in the introductionbut one consciously contested from the Americas (or elsewhere), would have provided a
by some of the chapter authorsis that deceased ancestors more solid, overarching framework for the papers published
were perceived as being closely involved in the world of in this volume. All this being said, however, there are chap-
the living. Overall, the book is a welcome addition to the ters bearing comparative material: the wonderful chapter by
growing literature on broad mortuary patterns in the Andes. Enrique Lopez-Hurtado, for example, employs comparative
There are, however, a number of areas that the edi- data from other parts of the Americas to discuss the use of
tors of Funerary Practices and Models in the Ancient Andes could ancestor veneration in political competition. More of this
426 American Anthropologist Vol. 118, No. 2 June 2016
material would not only flesh out the volume somewhat but consider negative evidence when creating models for funer-
also make it more accessible to archaeologists working in ary behavior. That there was no more discussion of this in a
other regions of the world. concluding chapter or references among the chapters on this
Another criticism is also tied to accessibility, albeit or other points was a missed opportunity.
mostly in terms of style. The editors chose not to organize Likewise, a theme brought up in the introduction and
the chapters by chronology, geography, or general culture developed further in the final two chapters of the book was
sphere. Instead, they chose to arrange them thematically, the way in which deviant burials help us understand mor-
with topics blending into one another as the volume pro- tuary behavior. The examples presented deal with sacrificial
gresses. This is, of course, a valid approach. Unfortunately, victims in Nasca and Chimu contexts; they explore ideas
the themes are not particularly transparent: it would have about imbuing places with life energy and the ancient uses of
been useful, for example, if the volume had been divided into Nectandra seeds in human sacrifice, respectively. Both were
different parts, perhaps with thematic headings or brief fore- rich subjects for development in a conclusion. Deviant
words. The chapters, because they stand by themselves after burials are not just an interesting subset of mortuary ritual,
the introduction, do not appear at first glance to have any they force us to examine the normative values and behaviors
reason for being where they are. Unless you have already of the people who create them. The Nasca chapter by Oscar
read the book, it is hard to know why, for example, the Llanos Jacinto touches upon this, but it would have been a
chapter on the Tarapaca region in Chile (itself a very strong rich topic for further exploration.
contribution) is included between entries on the north and On the whole, Funerary Practices and Models in the An-
south coasts of Peru. cient Andes is a solid reference work, and one can imag-
Given these issues, the book would also have benefited ine its chapters being used in the classroom. The volume
from a concluding chapter. Two themes run throughout the is at its strongest when it combines bioarchaeology with
volume that I would have liked to have seen explored further. other forms of analysis. Several of these areas rightly
The first of these involves the disagreements between, or pointed out by the editorsrarely if ever used in Andean
different approaches of, the authors about what constitutes archaeology. As a result, the individual chapters are cer-
ancestor venerationdistinct, to my mind, from ancestor tainly valuable contributions to our understanding of An-
worshipand what types of datasets support or refute its dean mortuary behavior. But with more structural tweaks
presence. The chapter comparing Wari and Tiwanaku fu- and perhaps a concluding chapter, as a group they would
nerary practices by William Isbell and Antti Korpisaari, for have come across as even stronger than they individually
example, is bold and refreshing; it argues that we should are.
relocations and plant closings. Much of the books strength native-born African Americans in poor neighborhoods have
lies in Fernandez-Kellys analysis of how the global economy (p. 162).
reconfigured industrialism between the 1970s and 1990s in Subsequent chapters center on the challenges children
this community. Although West Baltimore followed the face. In some cases, the portraits are raw and disturbing.
trajectory of other cities, every new reading of the conse- For example, through the lives of brother and sister Little
quences of deindustrialization offers new insights. Floyd and Clarisse, we see the complex experiences of be-
Fernandez-Kelly shows that while those featured in the ing in the foster care system, child molestation, and child
book have desires congruent with mainstream society, abuse as well as variances of gender expression. We also
issues such as teen pregnancy, failed relationships, substance learn that Fernandez-Kelly uses her access to provide re-
use, and children in foster care create challenges that un- sources for young people that differ from the ways that the
dermine success. We also learn that gender identities are affluent are able to make their lives work in accordance
determined in relation to labor markets (or the lack thereof) with generalized notions of rationality (p. 196). Inner-city
and race. Definitions of masculinity and femininity are recon- residents need bridges to the outside world. With such
figured in the face of nonexistent resources. For example, access points, young peoples vocabulary, both verbal and
unable to find jobs, black men redefine success by rejecting emotional, expands. But when opportunities retract, there
marriage in favor of sexual appeal and personal indepen- is a retreat into marginal existence. Fernandez-Kelly cri-
dence (p. 60). For some men, masculinity and thin kinship tiques agencies of the foster care system and offers an in-
ties are managed by gang membership and, for some women, teresting interpretation of how young children use those
maturity is achieved through childbirth. agencies to resist parental controls. Specifically, sometimes
Chapter 5 offers a historical account of the American charges of child abuse are brought by children against par-
states emergence, drawing upon the work of Andre Gunder ents, which Fernandez-Kelly sees as reframing norms. The
Frank, who theorized about emerging states in Latin America last six chapters focus on Lydia, Towanda, and Manny
(pp. 103108). This framework posits exploitation, extrac- Man, who each represent variations of povertys decima-
tion, the dearth of financial assets, and the departure of tion and the states inability to address poor education and
productive investment. Although this framework has been unemployment.
critiqued for its spatial not temporal focus, Fernandez-Kelly The biographies offer important perspectives, yet so
finds value in its understanding of advanced industrial coun- much of what is revealed in the book seems to reinforce
tries. In this context we see contrasts between European pathology. Is it possible that not one person succeeds in West
immigrants success and African Americans dispossession. Baltimore? What other institutions and systems operate in
She acknowledges that the comparison is irrelevant owing the community, such as community-based organizations and
to immigrants history of assimilation and political partic- religious groups? Are there no black-owned businesses in
ipation. Yet comparing African Americans to the immi- West Baltimore? Any infrastructure plans that could have
grant narrative shows up several times. When discussing been realized but were abandoned? Government agencies
differential treatment of parental discipline of children, she alone cannot bear the blame for persistent poverty; attention
notes that immigrant parents appear to have a larger cul- must be paid to how the capitalist system has underdeveloped
tural and material stock to withstand state interference than black lives.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12579 thus demonstrate how key concepts in deaf worlds circulate
among them. The ethnography begins when Michele
Rashmi Sadana Friedner identifies another deaf woman on a crowded
George Mason University Bangalore bus using a phrase common among deafs in
India: deaf deaf same (p. 2). This idiom and moment of
This engaging and skillful ethnography of young deaf people recognition become a central concept in the book, which is
in Bangalore marks a critical contribution to disability indeed about deaf worlds, how they are created, the value
studies as well as to scholarship on language ideologies and that may be extracted from them, and how these worlds are
neoliberal India. The books five chapters follow the linear inextricably linked to normal ones, another local idiom
development of young people from family to school to used throughout to great analytical effect. From the start,
church to NGO and business worlds. However, the chapters Friedner identifies sites, practices, and structures of feeling
are also arranged as a constellation of urban institutions and that are vital to deaf development, an idea that encapsulates
428 American Anthropologist Vol. 118, No. 2 June 2016
the desire to be part of deaf worlds and to communicate lives: communication with their families, members of whom
among and between them. Being in and of these worlds almost never learn to sign.
and the moral imperatives of such a life are key to this Chapter 2 explains how deaf Christian churches fill an
rich text. important emotional gap for young deaf people and contains
Chapter 1 is compelling for the authors attempt to an interesting discussion about conversion, drawing on the
understand and reconceptualize the meaning of family for work of Gauri Viswanathan, among others. Friedner analyzes
young, deaf Bangalurus. In short, as Friedner shows, family three different church settings and denominations in order
is an impediment to deaf kids in terms of the development of to show how deafs are encouraged to cultivate their unique
their deaf sociality. The families she gets to know, while well orientations rather than paper over them. This kind of deaf
meaning, want their deaf children to be normal, and so they development is in fact what it means to be saved, Friedner
push them toward oral learning, which, it turns out, is a ter- argues (p. 54). One of the many fascinating concepts in this
rible way for deaf people to learn, resulting in not-learning book is sign butter, which refers to the beautiful signing
or learning in a half-half-half way. Curiously, the most re- that young deafs encounter in churches. As for religious
spected deaf schools in India also promote oral education, identity, it is more an issue for families than for Friedners
and Friedner takes us to Chennai, where those schools are deaf friends. As one of them states, At home I am Muslim,
located. Part of the problem is that oral education is not in school I am Christian (p. 58).
matched with the appropriate technologies and expertise to Chapters 3, 4, and 5 delve into the world of work,
align each deaf persons disability with the proper hearing vocational training, NGOs, and multinational corporations
aid (or implant) and its monitoring. In addition, oralism to show the ways in which deaf workers become a source
not so subtly denigrates the use of sign language, which is of value in neoliberal workplaces, from Phillip Morris to
the mother tongue of the deaf, although not recognized by local business start-ups. These chapters offer a detailed view
the Indian state. As a result, deaf Indian kids dont learn into the circulation of the knowledge and resources that
much in school, which becomes a life-long condition leading go into producing the deaf worker and also enable deafs
to normalized practices such as copying (first exams, later to produce themselves. It is a complicated scenario largely
CVs), which in turn homogenizes deaf experience in the because of the not-learning that has occurred in earlier edu-
workplace. What deafs do gain in deaf schools are friends, cational settings. Friedner guides us through the benefits and
real friends, because even though sign language is looked structural inequalities at play, especially with regard to the
down upon by normals and even by most deaf educators in desire and concept of for life, which has to do with stable
the Indian context (who are rarely deaf themselves), deaf employment but also, ideally, a job that would help other
kids start signing with one another the moment they enter deafs develop; hence the term speaks not only to economic
a deaf context. Signing is almost subversive in Friedners but also to social and moral registers. From home to the
telling, and the more I read this absorbing book, the more I world, this book takes a nuanced view of classic questions of
realized that her use of the word friend was a deep reference social stigma and value, while it also reorients the discourse
to what is sorely lacking in many of these young peoples on development in contemporary India.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12555 A key question is why Brahmans were the first in Tamil
Nadu to leave their villages in order to make use of the new
Kathinka Frystad educational and professional possibilities that were opening
University of Oslo up in the colonial cities. Besides pointing to their propensity
for studying and their financial ability to do so, the authors
This monograph analyzes the transformation of Tamil convincingly argue that Brahmans neither identified with
Brahmans from a conservative community of rural landown- other villagers nor had any deep attachment to their land,
ers to an urban and modern middle-class caste centered in given their contempt for agricultural labor.
Chennai but with migration patterns far beyond, including Once in the city, young Brahman men typically stud-
the United States. Drawing on interviews, historical statis- ied law, engineering, or medicinethis last somewhat
tics, and active engagement with former studies of Brahmans less enthusiastically because many of the substances that a
and other privileged communities in South India, C. J. Fuller medical doctor must handle could compromise their caste
and Haripriya Narasimhan have written an impressive biog- status. Nonetheless, Brahmans soon gained an overwhelm-
raphy of one of Indias high-status communities over the past ing dominance in these professions, particularly as lawyers
150-odd years. and government officials. This Brahman raj is what
Book Reviews 429
motivated the anti-Brahman movement and the introduc- Carnatic music and Bharatnatyam dance. Today these art
tion of caste reservation, as detailed in many other studies. forms comprise a high culture with which Tamil Brahmans
Since the 1990s, Tamil Brahmans have excelled in the IT identify so strongly that even many migrants to the U.S.
industry, where their overrepresentation is unfettered by exert pressure on their daughters to learn them.
caste quotas. In this process, they have increasingly come to In terms of analysis, the main thrust concerns the meta-
explain their superiority in terms of intelligence. morphosis of caste into class. Theoretically the authors rely
The most profound change was, however, in gender re- almost uniquely on Max Webers model of long-term trans-
lations. When the marriage age for girls was raised to 14 in formation from economic classes based on profession to
1930, Tamil Brahmans were slow to react, given the imper- status groups, partly as reanalyzed by Anthony Giddens.
ative of marrying off daughters before the onset of puberty, Despite the usefulness of this perspective, the authors re-
since a girls purity was seen to diminish once she reached main silent on perspectives that could have brought out
menarche. When Brahmans eventually responded to this re- more clearly their critique of the current tendency to ana-
form after independence in 1947, girls could complete their lyze classnot least the new Indian middle classthrough
secondary education, if not more, which also turned them the lens of lifestyle and consumption. A deeper theoretical
into better companions for their husbands. Once educated, engagement would also have enabled the authors to position
women gradually began to enter selected professions. To- themselves more explicitly in the never-ending discussion
day many work in the IT industry alongside men, where of the multifarious ways in which caste relates to class to
they claim to experience full gender equality, although they the point of intertwinement. Their lack of engagement with
still struggle to combine motherhood with demanding ca- general analytical debates, frameworks, and concepts is note-
reers. All in all, the authors document a remarkable tran- worthy for a monograph written by two anthropologists. In
sition from a caste superiority anchored in stark gender in- terms of method, for instance, it would have been interest-
equality to a pride in belonging to an educated middle class ing to know what they can add to the debates about doing
that is more gender equal than most other communities in anthropology at home, historical anthropology, and multi-
Tamil Nadu. site anthropology. Also, how is anthropological scholarship
Fuller and Narasimhan also draw attention to some affected by the growing cooperation between senior profes-
startling continuities. In the city, Tamil Brahmans often sors and younger anthropologists who produce most of the
replicate the village residential quarters traditionally re- data?
served for Brahmans in modern apartment complexes re- When this book is read as historical sociology, however,
served for vegetarians. Certain neighborhoods in Chennai these questions vanish. From this angle it is more appropriate
are moreover overwhelmingly Brahman dominated, which to applaud the authors exceptionally thorough engagement
is appreciated by some but resented by women who de- with former scholarship of the region, which allows them to
test their social control. Sanskritic modes of worship remain be unusually clear when documenting change, patterns, and
the norm, not just in the preference for Shiva and Vishnu exceptions. For this very reason, Tamil Brahmans will be a
over Redfieldian little traditions but also in the continued standard reference in the scholarship of Tamil Nadu and the
preference for Sanskrit rather than Tamil as the liturgical conundrum of caste and class in general for many years to
language. Less continuous are the modern inventions of come.
30 core cases of women and interviews with numerous ad- not have consented. But now we feel at ease. . . . The state
ditional women as well as with sonographers, obstetricians, is clever. It has helped our child [the fetus] escape suffering
pediatricians, and 32 families with disabled children. (p. 202).
Gammeltofts provocative theoretical contribution is a The rise of ultrasonography and the use of selective
call for an Anthropology of Belonging as a lens through reproductive technologies have paralleled nationalist calls
which to explore and understand the connectedness of per- for a high-quality population, the privatization of the health
sons and to shift focus from a Foucauldian emphasis on the sector, and a renewed emphasis on science as Vietnams
pregnant woman as individual subject to a connected body economy has rapidly grown. Gammeltoft posits that, simul-
of others. Drawing on Emmanuel Levinass discussion of taneously, public attention to the spraying of herbicides dur-
subjectivity as emerging out of relations with others, Gam- ing wartime seems to have contributed to shifting the birth
meltoft argues that the choices families make about a fetal of anomalous children from a moral-cosmological realm into
anomaly diagnosis reflect a responsibility to one another. the sphere of science (p. 149), opening up new discussions
Such weighty decisions about diagnostic misfortune are made of disability. Ultrasonography is haunted by the specter of
not by an autonomous mother or couple but by the husbands wartime spraying of defoliants, socialist pasts, and cosmo-
extended family. Together, the family determines the cause logical connections to the spirits of ancestors that shape ev-
of the misfortune that has led to the diagnosis and deliberates eryday life (Leshkowich 2008). This results in a propensity
a course of action with regard to the pregnancy, with blame for high numbers of readily available elective scans as women
for the misfortune attributable to causal, accidental, moral, vigilantly monitor their pregnancies.
and cosmological origins. Gammeltoft suggests that the pro- In proposing an Anthropology of Belonging,
cess of deliberating the cause and the action is one of belong- Gammeltoft suggests a justifiable shift from Foucaults
ing. Prenatal ultrasound becomes a means through which emphasis on the individual; however, she could have
ethical maternal and fetal subjectivities are produced (p. 20), explored the limitations of a Foucauldian approach more
as well as a means through which women can demonstrate extensively. In addition, while the disability experiences
maternal belonging to the social collectivity of the extended presented in the accounts appear somewhat uniform and
family via ultrasound and acceptance of the patrilines wishes may not reflect the varied nature of stigma and disability
(p. 27). across different patient groups in Vietnam, Gammeltofts
The idea of belonging extends to the relationship be- discussion of them is likely to foster further productive
tween citizens and the socialist state via the delivery of debate about disability and its visibility. However, none
medicine at state institutions. Doctors insert themselves into of these concerns should prevent scholars from benefiting
moral discussions as interpreters of sonograms. They view from this nuanced and powerful ethnography.
their role as medical experts but also as caregivers to less This book will appeal to scholars and undergraduate
scientifically knowledgeable, and often poor, rural women, and graduate students of the anthropology of reproduction,
for whom the doctors believe caring for a profoundly dis- medical anthropology, disability studies, and ethics, and to
abled child will be a significant economic and social burden. area specialists.
When families accept state-sanctioned science, they do not
question the reliability of the scanning results. As the ma- REFERENCE CITED
triarch of a family that agreed unanimously to terminate a Leshkowich, Ann Marie
pregnancy expressed, we do not have long educations. But 2008 Wandering Ghosts of Late Socialism: Conflict, Metaphor,
science is skillful. We have to recognize that. . . . If we did and Memory in a Southern Vietnamese Marketplace. Journal
not believe in the state (nh`a nuoc), in the doctors, we would of Asian Studies 67(1):541.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12561 to Ireland 40 years after their doctoral fieldwork among the
Irish minority population of Travelling People. Both authors
Jane Helleiner were central to the inauguration of serious scholarship on
Brock University Irish Travellers and have published extensively.
Dedicated to the three extended Traveller families that
Aimed at a broad readership, this book by two well- they knew best in 197172, the book uses text and photos
established scholars offers a compelling account of a return to convey the experiences of reconnecting with many
Book Reviews 431
Travellers and settled people in the summer of 2011 (their 1970s. An important topic is everyday anti-Traveller dis-
trip is also the subject of a 2012 documentary titled Unsettled: crimination (significantly, some Travellers did not appear in
From Tinker to Traveller [McGrath and Bartley 2012]). The the accompanying documentary because they did not want
book features more than 70 stunning photographs taken by their Traveller origins made public). Changes in gender and
George Gmelch. Approximately half of these were taken in intergenerational relations as well as childbearing and child
2011, while the remainder are from the original fieldwork rearing, weddings and feuds, forms of work and consump-
period. tion, and Traveller politics and activism are also addressed.
The first-person text by Sharon Gmelch recounts how, While the text suggests that the greatest changes of the four
while showing some of their original fieldwork photos to decades relate to Traveller settlement and comparative af-
Travellers in 2011, she noticed responses ranging from nos- fluence (p. 42), there is considerable evidence of ongoing
talgia among older viewers to embarrassment on the part (often seasonal) mobility within and beyond Ireland despite
of one young man. After learning that a subsequent exhibit the fact that 86 percent of Traveller families in Ireland live
of the photos at a Dublin library had prompted intense in- in permanent structures (p. 42). Increased education and
terest among many Traveller families, the couple decided wealth for some are, moreover, paralleled by continued
to return to Ireland and to use photo elicitation research marginalization for many others. The realities of a low life
(p. 55) to explore changes in Traveller lives. The resulting expectancy for Traveller men was made evident by the fact
book eschews statistics and new scholarship on Travellers that none of the adult men known to the anthropologists in
in favor of a personal and selective (p. 11) account that com- the 1970s were still alive in 2011.
bines the story of their 2011 visit with extended personal The book weaves together rich detail and insightful
narratives gathered from four Travellers (three of whom are commentary related to the experiences of the two
well-known Traveller leaders) and one settled person whose anthropologists, and the personal narratives emphasize
career as a youth worker centered on Travellers. the diversity and complexity of Traveller lives and
After contextualizing the return visit, Sharon describes politics. While raising many issues for future research,
aspects of the 197172 fieldwork, including the initial ex- the authors offer little new analysis and, as they state,
periences of purchasing a barrel-top wagon, moving into do not incorporate newer Traveller-related scholarship.
a camp, participant-observation in the camp, and beyond. Inmigration to Ireland, the Celtic Tiger, and the subsequent
The remaining chapters intersperse details of the 2011 trip recession (acknowledged to be linked to a defunding of
with the five extended personal narratives mentioned above. many Traveller-related programs) are mentioned only
The trip involved encounters with several Traveller fam- briefly. While they are candid about many other aspects of
ilies, Traveller and non-Traveller individuals, and visits their role as scholars, there is surprisingly little discussion
to varied Traveller-related locations in different parts of of the potential challenges of using photos in research
Ireland (e.g., former camping locations, a museum exhibit (e.g., the ethics of identifying real people and places).
on Traveller culture, and Traveller community centers and While limited as a scholarly work, this beautifully written
group housing sites in Dublin, Cork, Ennis, Galway City, and produced book will appeal to a wide audience and
and Tuam). Some of the encounters were with those already could also be suitable for some introductory anthropology
known to both anthropologists, while others were with new courses.
acquaintances. A few days were spent living in an official
Traveller site in County Cork, for example, among families REFERENCE CITED
unconnected to the original Dublin-based fieldwork. McGrath, Liam, and Kim Bartley
The result is a wide-ranging overview of contemporary 2012 Unsettled: From Tinker to Traveller. Dublin: A Scratch
Traveller life combined with discussion of changes since the Films Production for RTE . Film.
persistence and consistency in challenging Milosevics power very notion of quality is striking. First, as Greenberg argues,
for several years before the October Revolution. What hap- it signifies an unholy alliance between democratic commit-
pened with student activism afterward, and what struggles ments and exclusionist modes of representation. Second, it
have the students fought since then? In her monograph After reveals charged assumptions about which citizens the stu-
the Revolution, Jessica Greenberg provides important clues to dents consider to be democratic or undemocratic in Serbia.
post-revolutionary imaginings and lives of Serbian student Quality is equated here with being well educated, urban,
activists, caught between high hopes and failed expectations. middle class, and West oriented. Should we conclude that
After the Revolution charts students trajectories from the the rest, at least half of Serbias population, are nonqual-
streets to university offices, from rioters to experts craft- ity citizens? Questions also arise when students demand
ing policy documents, from struggling against the state to that the state and university facilitate their entrance into
working for it. Since 2001, Greenberg has engaged with a the labor market. Their suggestion is to cut the number of
number of interlocutors within and around Serbian univer- enrollments, that is, to graduate fewer lawyers, doctors,
sities. She studied their everyday talk about democracy and economists, philologists, and so on. How is that to be done
revolution and looked more closely into institutional prac- in a poor country such as Serbia, which as one of the officials
tices and categories that frame this discourse. Her main focus said still has so few academics? The contradictions are many,
rests on three student organizations in Belgrade, Novi Sad, and it is sometimes hard for this reader to sympathize with
and Nis and their efforts to meet the challenges of unwieldy the students plight. They seem too elitist. Why is that so?
administrative politics and the ambiguity of democratic rep- Greenberg reminds us rightly about the rankings, cal-
resentation as well as their poor prospects in a labor market culations, and reforms coming from the democratization
with one of the highest unemployment rates in Europe. industry (p. 18), which measures newly emerged democra-
Despite significant differences, members of all three or- cies, such as Serbia, on scales of progress. The enforcement
ganizations share a predicament of being shadowed by their of Western political ideals cannot be properly understood
own revolutionary identity and success. At present, stu- without the careful analysis of local practices. In Greenbergs
dents are only one among many internally divided groups in own words, democracy is the name of the game, but what
Serbian society that, through democratic means, contend for that means is entirely up for grabs (p. 185). Among the local
social change. Their fractiousness, difficulties in presenting traditions that she looks into, it is, however, not only the
themselves as influential political actors, the uncertainty of recent socialist past that explains inconsistencies of student
their political engagement, in which the prospect of corrupt- politics. Student activists are among the latest in a long chain
ibility compromises the authenticity of their intentionsall of historical actors who have been trying to bring Serbia
these conditions point to what Greenberg calls the politics closer to the West. Throughout the 20th century, this rela-
of disappointment. Being disappointed and disappointing tionship has been swinging between imitation and rejection
others follow from tensions between ideals and a messy re- of Western Europe and, more recently, the United States.
ality, between stubborn local practices and normative global Similarly, Serbias own legacies have been discarded or el-
policies. evated. This inbetweenness breeds elitism and arrogance
How do these conflicts unfold among Serbian student among quality citizens in Serbia, who remain disappointed
activists? To begin with, they feel betrayed by their parents by the failure of their nation to become modern.
generation, and a short glimpse into Yugoslavias history After the Revolution makes clear that the politics of dis-
tells us why. The adults are blamed for Yugoslavias demise, appointment follows the politics of normative democrati-
and their utopian future-oriented politics (p. 19) is aban- zation. On timelines of progress, one either catches up
doned for a more pragmatic approach among the students. or is left behind. Like many other countries, Serbia has
This approach is, however, more than just pragmatic. For been left behind. This warrants the analysis of its contra-
instance, since 2000, the students have been trying to frame dictory local realities, as Greenberg does in this book, but
their protests as quality protests of quality citizens (p. it also invites a more critical examination of ambiguous
73), that is, particular kinds of valued citizens (p. 19). The Western policies.
Book Reviews 433
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12557 as witchcraft. The last line of the book is, Human beings
have feared witches and chased phantoms for millennia: it
Dennis Gaffin seems unlikely that they are going to stop any time soon
State University of New York Buffalo State (p. 257).
One of the books best accomplishments and insights is
Emeritus Professor of Sociology Richard Jenkins has con- its delineation of differences in the theology and epistemol-
ducted a very detailed investigative history of not-so-well- ogy of Catholicism versus Protestantism in this part of the
known phenomena accompanying the Troubles in Northern world. Jenkins explains that the Catholics and Protestants
Ireland and the Republic of Ireland in the early 1970s. These who took rumors of witchcraft and magic seriously did so
were the presence of reports and rumors of rituals of satanism in different ways: For Catholics the [rumors] were part of
and witchcraft, along with an upsurge in the presence of a world-view of death and mystery that pervaded everyday
bogeymen. The author uses a multidisciplinary approach life, through which the Troubles wove novel strands and
with media studies, folklore, sociology, (a little) cultural an- out of which new specters and moral tales emerged. When
thropology, and historical analysisto convince the reader fervently religious Protestants, who were not a majority,
that there was a strong relationship between the violence of took the rumours seriously, they did so within a world-view
the Troubles, especially in Belfast, and a black magic scare. of strugglebetween good and evil, God and the Devil, the
He terms his approach eclectic and multi-stranded. reformed faith and popery, and Ulster and republicanism
During this period there were reportedly a few inci- that sometimes erupted in almost ecstatic apocalyptic long-
dents that journalists and public figures described as satanic. ings (p. 214). Earlier he states that it is likely that . . . it was
Such incidents included, allegedly, ritual killing of animals fundamentalist Protestants who were most likely to believe
and the disappearance of a young child for apparently evil in the power and threat of an interventionist Devil, because
purpose. By poring through newspaper articles of the day, they had a history of apocalyptic prophecy and preaching
Jenkins clearly exposes the fact that the apparent facts and (p. 209).
reports of these and other linked incidents were inventions After exhaustive (and exhausting) demonstration
of journalists, of usually unnamed experts in satanic cult throughout the book of the inaccuracy, guessing, and in-
behavior, and of the rumor mill. Many people seemed to ventiveness of the press; then-popular subject matters in
be convinced of the factual reality of these phenomena or, fiction and cinema; and the public repetition of rumors and
at least, of the possibility of their factual reality. Jenkins legends, Jenkins concludes that moral conflicts and social
concludes that these primarily unfounded fears and beliefs tensionsdifficult issues of contemporary salienceoften
in what he calls the supernatural dovetailed well with the find expression in fear and blaming (p. 254), moral panics
general fear of conflict in those days of political and religious seem to be disproportionately about children and young peo-
violence. Indeed, they seemed to have fueled one another. ple (p. 255), and economic decline and a loosened political
Jenkinss research is based almost entirely on news- relationship between Northern Ireland and England made
papers, public documents, and other writings during and the time especially stressful for Protestants. All these forces
after those years. His methodology, while quite pointed, combined with the general secularization and so-called moral
is not anthropological, even with his occasional references degeneracy (drugs, sexual promiscuity, and paganism) of the
to anthropological works and perspectives. He sometimes day.
does connect Irish and Northern Irish and Catholic and While the accuracy of the information forming the bases
Protestant perspectives with wider Western concepts, influ- of the rumors and reports is rightly questioned, and while
ences, and trends of the day. But he also sometimes gener- this sociologists exposure of the rumormongering of the
alizes about human behavior and culture without reference press and public figures is insightful, most of his suggestions
to possible significant differences between cultural groups and conclusions are tentative. Nonetheless, Jenkinss work
surrounding the definitions of concepts and behaviors such is must reading for those interested in the Troubles.
Book Reviews 435
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12552 why the majority of deprived Mizrah.i women vote for the
right and how Mizrah.im deny the history of discrimination
Anne de Jong that they and their parents experienced in order to fit into
University of Amsterdam the Ashkenazi middle class mainstream, i.e., to embody
Israeliness (p. 78). She sequentially shows how this
This rigorously researched book is incredibly uncomfortable divinity of the Jewish State combined with Israels state
to read and exactly, therefore, it deserves a wide audience. bureaucracy denies Mizrah.i single mothers their agency
The book begins with an ethnographic description of the (p. 80). That is, the mirage of Mizrah.i and Ashkenazi
205-kilometer-long protest march to Jerusalem of 43-year- Jewish unity to narrate how all Jews should fight a single
old Israeli single mother Vicky Knafo. Literally wrapped front so Israelthe little Davidcan survive surrounded
in the Israeli flag, this Mizrah.ia Jew with origins in the by Arab Goyim Goliaths (p. 80) leaves the women with-
Arab and Muslim worldmother made a strong nationalistic out a claim to discourse while the repetitive, regulatory
claim against deteriorating provisions for single mothers policy of welfare survival strips them of any time, energy,
in Israel. Joined by many other impoverished Israeli single or space with which to change their predicament (p. 108).
mothers, her march resulted in a makeshift protest camp In doing so, Lavie boldly departs from the anthropologi-
dubbed Knafoland. cal emphasis on agency and cynically yet realistically con-
While her book is interesting in its own right, Smadar cludes that there are situations where agency is impossible
Lavie soon makes clear that what follows is not a straight- (p. 80).
forward ethnography about the hardship of single mothers This argument is deepened in the next three chap-
and that she did not attend these protests as a mere re- ters. However, this is done not through a U.SU.K. an-
searcher. Instead, Lavie herself was a welfare mom legally thropological formula (p. 84) but rather through three
stuck in Israel engaged in a vicious custody battle. In order innovative modes of ethnographic writing [that aim]
to stay sane, [Lavie] joined the effort to build the Mizrah.i to overcome the elusiveness of bureaucratic torture
feminist movement, . . . gamely ethnographed everything (p. 84). Each chapter is presented as a take with its own
[and thus] became [her] own informant (p. 15). Skillfully writing style and characteristics. Take 1 in chapter 3 pro-
weaving personal experience with fresh empirics and ro- vides the general model of the interrelationship between
bust analysis, she contends that the everyday experience of democracy and torture (p. 88), and take 2 in chapter 4
Mizrah.i single mothers on welfare consists of a continuous employs the scientific objective gaze through the entry of
process of bureaucratic torture in which bureaucracy devoid the article Ideology, Welfare, and the H.ad Horit that Lavie
of agency amalgamates [the] intersectional, constructionist co-authored with Oxford law scholar Amir Paz-Fuchs (pp.
concepts of gender and race, and then calcifies them into a 115119). These takes consciously exclude voices from the
primordial truism that prohibits identity politics (p. 82). field into the theory as nodal I have been there points
Lavie first meticulously explains the historic con- of proof so as not to appropriate these womens lives and
text and development of gendered race relationsMizrah.i words to glorify [Lavies] theoretical model (p. 89).
as Jews from the Orient versus Ashkenazi as Jews of In stark contrast, take 3 consists of diary entries so
European decentin the Zionist movement and later in personal and vivid that they take you by the throat: Every
Israel. Through the concept of GendeRace, she analyzes summer, I take my son to bear these lines. A dark child
Book Reviews 437
with no trust fund and no one to pull strings for him to get Knafo protest and its relation to suicide bombing: And this
ahead, he must understand the Mizrah.i struggle first-hand to is exactly what we did (p. 148).
survive (p. 124). So you avoid me. You are afraid to look, While some will be disturbed by Lavies unapologetic
scared that your enlightened racism will talk back at you victim narrative (pp. 23, 84) and others may object to her
(p. 130). We glanced at each other, fear in our eyes. We uncompromising accusations and controversial conclusion,
shut up (p. 135). I hold up the mirror so the White woman I find these to be great albeit uncomfortable strengths. If I can
can see the reality she creates for me (p. 139). When in voice one critique, it is only that the title and the cover do not
war, act like its war (p. 151). transmit the relevance of this book to scholars beyond Israeli
Chapter 5 is equally relentless. It forces the lived ex- and Jewish studies. Innovative, uncomfortable, rigorous,
perience of bureaucratic torture upon you, and you cannot thick, accusative, and critical, Wrapped in the Flag of Israel is
help but feel personally addressed. Because you are. Hard indeed a must-read for all.
as it is to read, this essential chapter makes the theory of
bureaucratic torture of Mizrah.i women in Israel come alive. REFERENCE CITED
You may hope to reach the safety zone of chapter 6 but, un- Lavie, Smadar, and Amir Paz-Fuchs
surprisingly by now, the conclusion will give you no solace. 2003 But There Is Discrimination: The State Penetrates the Single
Lavie refuses the pretense of coherence (p. 23) and instead Familys Bedroom [in Hebrew]. Globes: Israel Business News
leaves you with troubling observations about the end of the 1617:3.
In making her case, Legros glosses over possible nega- her intention. Instead, she wants to call our attention to the
tive outcomes of legalizing the wifeconcubine system, and negative impact on offspring born into this system who must
she does not explore the possible emotional and financial construct a meaningful life in the face of their marginalized
difficulties that wives may experience. To be fair, this is not social status.
In narrating the stories of these families, Mattinglys tional personhood that incorporates the kind of agency she
voice is personal, intimate. She presents the moral dilemmas demands for this project of narrative re-envisioning. To med-
that she herself faced in constructing these narratives, the ical anthropology, this book contributes an anthropology of
struggles she went through in figuring out how to write about disability and chronic illness that situates these experiences
the death of a key informant and friend whose death (suicide? firmly in their social contexts. Moral Laboratories also makes
heart attack?) is never explained. She is actively ethnograph- an important contribution to studies of race and health and
ically present in these stories. At the same time, she draws to the anthropology of hope. The book would be suitable for
generously on anthropological and philosophical literature graduate and advanced undergraduate seminars in medical
as she develops and elaborates an ethical concept of rela- anthropology and the anthropology of mind, body, and self.
She discusses the succession dispute between two of Topa Nair presents fascinating interpretations throughout the
Incas sons and also traces the biography of the site forward book and touches on a wide range of theoretical domains,
through the conquest and the entanglements of colonialism, including performance, landscape, materiality, movement,
sifting through the ways that a variety of influences and place making, and phenomenology, among others. At
memories affected the built environment. times I found myself wanting to read more about how
This is an impressive and important contribution the arguments she presents articulate with established
to Andean studies and to the anthropological study of literatures in these areas. This critique aside, At Home with
landscape and architecture. The volume is full of nuanced the Sapa Inca is a wonderful and erudite book that will
analyses of the construction and experience of Chinchero. inform analyses of the Inca state for years to come.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12543 discover that the town residents lack of access to healthcare,
education, and food are the heritage of four hundred years
Stacey Lynn Camp of life and labor at the Hacienda San Miguel Acocotla, as
University of Idaho well as the result of post-Revolutionary reforms introduced
by the twentieth-century Mexican government (p. 65).
Elizabeth Terese Newmans Biography of a Hacienda: Work Newman and her students use a creative, mixed-methods
and Revolution in Rural Mexico is a multisited exploration of approach that involves ethnographic observation of La
Mexicos interconnected past and present through ethno- Soledad Morelos residents as well as the mapping of the
graphic, archival, and archaeological research. Newmans contemporary villages architectural features. They use
work considers the linkages between the historic residents of this work to predict where human burials and artifact
Hacienda San Miguel Acocotla and contemporary residents concentrations could be found in Hacienda San Miguel
of the neighboring village of La Soledad Morelos. Her work Acocotlas archaeological record.
questions how the hacienda structure changed since the late A few areas of the book could have been refined.
1500s by carefully retracing each step of her archaeological Newmans interpretations of archaeological data seem to
and ethnographic investigations. rest on theories of power and inequality, but such theories
The book is organized in a logical fashion that leads the are not explored in depth. This is especially visible in
reader through the stages of archival, ethnographic, and ar- her discussion of jewelry, perfume, and other artifacts
chaeological inquiry. Newman guides readers through the associated with bodily adornment and modification. She
early days of historical research necessary to understand the states that such possessions represent some of those happy
sociopolitical context of historic Mexico in the first chapter, moments common to people around the world (regardless
One Hundred Years: From Independence to Revolution in of economic standing): a mans attempt to begin a flirtation
Mexico. The second chapter provides a thorough literature with a pretty girl, a young womans desire to make herself
review of the historical archaeology of Mexico as well as a pretty in the eyes of her parents, her children, or her
nicely composed section on how revolutions can be under- boyfriend, or a husbands loving birthday gift (p. 186).
stood using anthropological and historical theories. At the This interpretation neglects to consider the broad range of
crux of her argument in this chapter is that while a hegemonic ideologies (e.g., gender, race, class, etc.) structuring indi-
economic system, be it the hacienda system or capitalism, re- viduals agency and choice in dress. This section of the book
quires an underclass living in deprived conditions, people could have greatly benefited from engagement with theorists
still seem to be willing to accept poor economic conditions who grapple with the archaeology of bodily adornment
as long as they remain in control of their homelives (p. 32). and social identity, such as Diana DiPaolo Loren (2001,
Newmans work is most inventive when she seeks to 2010), Barbara Voss (2008), and Carolyn White (2005).
connect events that occurred in Mexicos past with what is If Newman is not finished with this research, she might
taking place in contemporary Mexico. In the fourth chapter, consider reinterpreting this subset of artifacts in a future
The Legacy of Revolution, she explores the impact of the publication.
Mexican Revolution on residents of the modern Mexican Overall, this is a compelling read that provides insight
town of La Soledad Morelos, some of whom are descendants not only into the subject of the authors research but also into
of the hacienda residents. Using the tools of historiography, the process of archaeological discovery. In the past, archaeol-
archaeology, and ethnography, Newman and her students ogists have been guilty of weaving their discoveries into tidy
Book Reviews 441
narratives that neglect to address the many questions that REFERENCES CITED
arise and sometimes remain unanswered once archaeologi- Hauser, Mark W.
cal, oral history, and archival work has concluded. Newman 2012 Messy Data, Ordered Questions, Year in Review: Archae-
is open to what Mark Hauser has termed the messiness of ology. American Anthropologist 114(2):184195.
the past (2012:192); she does not shy away from addressing Loren, Diana DiPaolo
things that are unclear, and she frames her interpretations 2001 Social Sciences: Orthodoxies and Practices of Dressing in
of data in such a way that leaves the door open for addi- the Early Colonial Lower Mississippi Valley. Journal of Social
tional interpretation. This makes for an excellent read for Archaeology 1(2):172189.
students planning to pursue archaeology as a profession who 2010 The Archaeology of Clothing and Bodily Adornment
will also encounter absences in their work. Newmans use in Colonial America. Gainesville: University Press of
of a first-person, conversational tone to tell the story of her Florida.
research reinforces the difficulties in constructing the past, Voss, Barbara L.
as does her repeated interjection of her students and the 2008 Poor People in Silk Shirts: Dress and Ethnogenesis in
local residents observations, questions, and theories about Spanish-Colonial San Francisco. Journal of Social Archaeology
her work. This is perhaps why her use of storytelling to 8(3):404432.
preface or frame her interpretations also works well in this White, Carolyn
book, as it adds another layer of intrigue about life in the 2005 American Artifacts of Personal Adornment, 16801820:
calpanera, the housing provided by a hacienda owner for A Guide to Identification and Interpretation. Lanham, MD:
his/her workers (p. 243). Altamira Press.
The outcome is a masterful historical ethnography ing attention to the stylized class practices of laboring men
of how these disparate formative processes and everyday and the bosses for whom they work. While the latter can
practices intersect and overlap with one another over time to afford to perform acts of public benevolence and meritori-
produce diasporic Chinese citizenship in Malaysia. Noninis ous consumption, the former are engaged in a dialectics of
ethnography is especially compelling, rich, and nuanced disputatiousness with their bosses.
given his deep lodes of data extracted from fieldwork begun Part 2 covers the period from 1985 to 1997, which
in the late 1970s and supplemented with periodic return indexes a different milieu under the neoliberal policies of
visits to his fieldwork site up to the late 2000s. His primary Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad and the push for Malaysia
informants were Chinese merchants and businessmen to be global. By then, the transformative powers of the
(towkays) and the long-distance truck drivers who work for NEP had reconfigured the ways that class formation among
some of these towkays. Ethnographically fleshing out the Chinese capitalists and businessmen had to proceed. Many
differential strategies, tactics, and subjectivities of these resorted to forging new kinds of patronage ties with influ-
two contrastingly positioned subjects in juxtaposition to ential members of the ruling Malay-based political party,
state and global processes forms the crux of the book. the United Malay National Organization, as well as crafting
The book is organized into two parts. Part 1, which joint ventures with business partners from China, Taiwan,
covers the period 1969 to 1985, is longer (six chapters) and and Hong Kong. In Bukit Mertajam, while the Chinese mer-
arguably better developed. The narratives and practices that chant class managed to evolve new business strategies in
Nonini deciphers in this section are set in a milieu when order to survive, many in the working class decided to seek
Malaysian society was in flux after the race riots of May better-paid work overseas.
1969 and the subsequent radical social engineering that un- Getting By is an exemplary piece of engaged schol-
folded under the New Economy Policy (NEP, 197190). arship. It balances judiciously between theoretical so-
Nonini teases out what class formation and class conflict phistication and lucid prose and deserves to be read
look like among the Chinese in Bukit Mertajam by pay- widely.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12544 publication, De los medios a las mediaciones (From the Media
to Mediations), by Jesus Martn-Barbero (1987), considered
Leonardo Cardoso mediatized contexts for the negotiation of cultural distinc-
Texas A&M University tion in Latin America. Focusing on the reception of media
content, the book aimed at carving a more heterogeneous
In the 1980s, two publications introduced innovative ap- understanding of (mass) culture during modernization and
proaches to the study of Latin America. Both books quickly nationalism.
became foundational texts for the study of colonialism and Aurality draws on these two pillars of Latin American
modernity in the region. La ciudad letrada (The Lettered City), scholarship to examine Colombias national project in the
by Angel Rama (1984), offered an insightful analysis of 19th century. Similar to The Lettered City and From the Media
colonial Latin America and its ramifications as the region to Mediations, Aurality offers fresh analytical tools for under-
entered into modernity. Rama argued that the history of standing Latin America through the links between colony
Latin America is entangled with successive attempts to con-
and postcolony, culture and politics. Like Angel Rama, Ana
trol a textual matrix, where the proper manner of con- Mara Ochoa Gautier focuses on the successive demarcation
structing and interpreting texts informs the regulation of of otherness by a literate elite at a historical moment when
the Latin American urban centeritself a metonym for the such an endeavor was an urgent political necessity (p. 2).
nation. From instructions on how to organize the colony into Like From the Media to Mediations, her book is attentive to
ordered settlements to political doctrines for nation- how the heterogeneous reception of social practices both
building, the letrados (lettered men) were invested in erecting mediatizes and mediates the nations cultural field. Different
a literary edifice able to order the social. Only at the turn of from both publications, however, Aurality examines these
the 20th century would such an attempt to master a social processes in close detail, revealing a fascinating collection
reality permeated by symbolic and bodily intrusions find of cosmopolitical projects for Colombia.
(equally textual) opposition from intellectuals more inclined Besides the aforementioned relation to Latin American
to suture popular culture and democratic values. The other scholarship, Aurality dialogues with sound studies and
Book Reviews 443
linguistic, cultural, and sensory anthropology. In reading of indigenous languages. Such debates put into evidence the
the archive against the grain, the book unearths a variety disjuncture between colony and postcolony, particularly
of voices and audile techniques that contributed to but regarding the symbolic, ontological, and juridico-political
also disrupted the project of a lettered city. Rather than status of indigenous groups in the country. Finally, chapter 4
taking for granted certain modes of aural signification (e.g., describes voicing, pronunciation, and orthography as inter-
language and music), Aurality traverses technologies of linked devices in the political endeavor of turning indigenous
inscription in novels, poems, literary histories, songbooks, peoples into modern citizens. The eloquent use of the voice
grammars, ethnographies, and writings on language. In so via the effective training of the ear, the construction of
doing, the book shows how, subsumed under apparent a language genealogy able to filter and folklorize popular
purposes such as the literary, the grammatical, the poetic, verbal expressions as part of the cultural heritage, and the
the ritual, the disciplinary, or the ethnographic (pp. 78), development of an orthographic system of musical notation
sounds have been ambiguously located between nature and (a symptom of the lettered citys logocentric idealism): all
culture, human and nonhuman, signal and noise, textuality suggest modes of vocal (and racial) purification enmeshed
and orality, listening and writing. A quick overview of the in the formation of the res publica.
book will elucidate its scope. In tracing these acoustic assemblages, systems of
Chapter 1 discusses the vocalization of boat rowers on mediation that open space for the mutually constitutive
the Magdalena River, which informed the Westernized and transformative relation between the given and the made
assessment of this riverine group as somewhere between that is generated in the interrelationship between a listening
the human and the animal, their howls standing in contrast entity that theorizes about the process of hearing producing
to emerging European definitions of music and language. notions of the listening entity . . . , notions of the sonorous
The author argues that for the indigenous peoples such producing entities, and notions of the type of relationship
vocalization was less a unifying marker of identity than between them (pp. 2223), Ochoa Gautier provides a
the manifestation of multiple forms of being. Chapter 2 vitally important account of the intricate and heterogeneous
examines debates about popular song through three differ- modes of knowing, being, becoming, and belonging that
ent strategies for inscribing the oral into the literary form: continue to resonate in the postcolonial lettered city.
popular poetry, songbooks, and the novel. By highlighting
such contradictory political and aesthetic endeavors, what REFERENCES CITED
emerges is a more diverse and contested history of the Martn-Barbero, Jesus
senses in the relation between listening, vision, orality, 1987 De los medios a las mediaciones [From the media to media-
and the politics of inscription of sound than implied by the tions]. Barcelona: Gustavo Gili.
notion of the lettered city (p. 16).
Rama, Angel
The ambiguous relation between culture and nature 1984 La ciudad letrada [The lettered city]. Montevideo: Fundacion
reappears in chapter 3 with debates about the inscription Internacional.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12570 Perus middle class. This bias is reflected in Perus remit-
tances, which reach women primarily and are captured by
Enrique Mayer a very small number of households, many of them from the
Yale University countrys better off income groups. Peruvian remittances
therefore enhance existing inequalities in Peru deepening
Karsten Paerregaard has been studying Peruvian migration the gap between the haves and the have-nots (p. 63).
patterns for three decades. He has visited enclaves of Peru- Perus remittances came to 2.788 billion USD for the
vian migrants in the United States, Japan, Spain, Chile, and year 2010, a mere drop in the bucket in the ocean of
Argentina. The essentials are: The bulk of the countrys mi- the worlds remittances. The main source is the United
grants come from the countrys capital city and a few other States with 40 percent, then Spain with 15 percent, Japan
cities on the coast. In addition, they are mostly women, and with 8 percent, and Chile and Argentina with 4.6 and 3.9
many of them have received some form of higher educa- percent respectively, but there are Peruvians in almost ev-
tion. And perhaps most remarkable, the majority belong to ery other country, and these add another 20 percent. The
444 American Anthropologist Vol. 118, No. 2 June 2016
countrys migration-remittance balance is negative given Another example describes how migrants in Hartford, Con-
that 8.5 percent of the population are migrants, while only necticut, who hark back to the District of Bolognesi in the
3.8 percent receive remittances, and the receivers of these Department of Ancash, organize charitable collections to
monies are primarily women. Peruvian destinations changed provide development projects for schools, churches, and
direction in the 1990s; migrants selected Spain, Italy, Chile, organizations in their home district.
and Argentina in response to high demand for domestic la- The final chapter details the circumstances and impor-
bor, while legal measures taken by Japan and the United tance of the motivation to improve ones lot. Superarse (to
States made entry to those countries problematic. Most Pe- overcome) refers to the efforts that remittances play in help-
ruvians work in the service sector. The statistics highlight ing recipients pull themselves up by their bootstraps, either
the urban destination of the migrants, in that they cluster in as individuals or as the family split apart but sticking to-
a few cities where they form distinct support communities gether. Discussed here are how dreams come true through
in the receiving countries. thrift, houses get built, businesses get established, careers get
To understand the motivations behind remittances, the completed, and even rightfully earned pensions that some
book turns to qualitative analysis that allows Paerregaard retired migrants now enjoy are attained. Also discussed are
to map the contexts, the evolving transnational kinship sit- the stubborn and combative efforts by migrants to handle
uations, to interpret the reasons why people send large the immensely difficult processes of overcoming their illegal
portions of their hard-earned income back home. These are status by achieving visas, citizenship, drivers licenses, bank
pledges tied to specific relationships of trust and responsi- accounts, and memberships in organizations in the places
bility between remittance senders and their recipients . . . of their destinations. These are the success stories that lure
which may need reassessment as circumstances evolve, but future waves of migrants.
are understood as an oath (p. 30). In the conclusion, Paerregaard dismisses various
The first type of pledge is called a compromiso, the government-sponsored or internationally sponsored
Spanish word for a commitment made to the household schemes to tap into the resource flow that remittances
that remains in Peru to provide it with the means of liveli- could (if pooled, taxed, or channeled) provide to enhance
hood, but it may also support named individuals with the infrastructure, development, or employment in depressed
means to complete, for example, their education. The many areas. The poverty, inequalities, and lack of opportunities
case studies describe the impact of events against the stub- that initially motivate women and men to leave their homes
born and devoted efforts to keep sending money when their to seek a better future will not change. It is the authors eval-
earning capacity is impaired. The senders often see their uation that remittances will not slow or speed up migration,
compromiso as a heavy sacrifice. Interesting is the analysis of because they are part of the pattern itself. He quite rightly
how these flows are monitored to ensure that the senders states: Remittances represent hard-earned money that
intent is carried out at the receiving end as well as how belongs to the migrants and their families, not to national
conflicts within the family are resolved despite the physical governments and international organizations (p. 207).
separation. This book will be useful for students interested in migra-
The section called voluntad (good will) describes efforts tion issues, because it focuses on one country in depth, stud-
by migrant communities to support collective projects back ied with quantitative data and with many telling long-term
home. Among the cases discussed is the sponsorship of com- trajectories noting individual successes and tribulations. It
petitive and expensive fiestas that migrants undertake to will be useful for scholars who wish to compare the Peruvian
enhance their status back home. The most famous are the case with their own. This study is also a foil for those theories
patron saint festivities of Cabanaconde, in the Colca Valley that focus on macro-economic models, because it concen-
of Arequipa, which individuals in the Washington, DC, com- trates its analysis on the appropriate locus: the family that
munity have undertaken for more than two decades. In cen- sticks together to achieve its dreams. How this solidarity is
tral Peru, members of communities who sign three-year maintained despite the separation is an amazing accomplish-
contracts to work as shepherds on ranches in the United ment. Remittances highlight the role that money transfers
States are charged a fee by the community during their ab- play in maintaining kinship ties over the long run and across
sences that is used to defray the cost of community services. international borders.
Book Reviews 445
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12556 direct result of the transatlantic slave trade should now be
welcomed back home as diaspora African kin, the reality is
Mattia Fumanti more complex as individuals and groups hold different views
University of St. Andrews about the history of the slave trade and how this should be
remembered and about the purpose of reuniting the African
The ways in which people remember the past form the cen- family (p. 7). This dynamic between the personal and the so-
tral theme of this rich ethnography about pilgrimage tourism cial collective, argues Reed, is highly significant in diaspora
of diaspora Africans to Ghana. Building on long-term field Africa pilgrimage tours to Ghana . . . because it illuminates
research with tourists, tour guides, and locals in Cape Coast meaning over notion of identity and belonging (p. 22).
and Elmina in Ghanas Central Region, Ann Reed success- It is around meanings over the notion of identity and
fully conveys a very subtle portrayal of the diverse meanings belonging that this ethnography makes a significant con-
and interpretations of the history and memory of the slave tribution. In seven detailed chapters, Reed explores how
trade held by a variety of social actors directly and indirectly different mediascapes and ideoscapes inform the experi-
involved in Ghanas growing tourism and heritage industry. ences and meanings of the memory of the transatlantic slave
Contrary to previous works that privilege an emphasis on trade for diaspora Africans and Ghanaians. This memory
the economic dimensions of heritage tourism, the author in- is contested, invented, remembered, and reenacted by the
stead argues for an analysis that reclaims the personal and the state, by local and diasporic culture brokers, by tourists, and
subjective alongside the social and the collective. In so doing by Ghanaians living near the heritage sites. It is this pro-
she brings a nuanced understanding of the diverse meanings cess of contestation that brings novel and fresh meaning to
that diaspora Africans and Ghanaians ascribe to their experi- peoples understanding of identity and belonging. Here we
ences of touring, working, and living by the historical sites hear the different and differing voices of these social actors
of the transatlantic slave trade. What ensues is a sophisti- as they debate the meanings, notions, and interpretations of
cated and sensitive account of the wealth of official, popular, the history and memory of the slave trade; how this memory
and personal memories and histories focusing on what the should best be transmitted, produced, and circulated; how
slave trade and its heritage industry mean to people. These, the tourism and heritage industry should best address the ex-
the author convincingly shows, emerge and reemerge and periential and existential needs of diaspora tourists; and how
are created, invented, and debated in local, national, and it should contribute to Ghanas development and economic
transnational public spheres at different historical moments growth.
and in different contexts. They are as much a product of These issues, as Reed shows, are not simply matters
global historical processes as they are of the different social of pragmatics but carry deeply felt emotions and for this
and cultural milieu that generates them and of individual and reason remain profoundly contested. Issues of reparation
personal experiences. and repatriation, the staging of invented traditions and state-
From the onset Reed contends that the experiences sponsored festivals, and discourses of kinship, chieftaincy,
of traveling to Ghana for diaspora Africans are charged belonging, and foreignness are tied to wider discourses about
with complex and overlapping disjunctures that operate at the historical impact of the slave trade on Africa and its
the moral, political, and personal level. Diaspora Africans, diasporas, the continents underdevelopment by colonialism
mostly from the United States, experience this journey and neocolonialism, and the continuous impact of racism on
largely as one of pilgrimage, a defining moment in their Africa and the African diasporas. Here we hear, for example,
lives that holds the potential for personal transformations. about how Ghanaian tour guides often separate white tourists
But in reconnecting with the perceived ancestral land, they from diaspora Africans to avoid personal confrontations and
find that their personal experiences of journeying to Ghana how they adapt their tours to their audiences demands for
as well as their reception by ordinary Ghanaians, local chiefs, specific narratives of the slave trade. In a similar vein, we
and the state yield very different responses. As Reed points hear about culture brokers efforts to cater to diasporic
out, while powerful discourses produced by the state, the expectations of the heritage tours as well as to promote pan-
media, culture brokers, and capitalism contribute to the con- African ideas to the Ghanaian public. These personal efforts
struction of a discourse that African descended folks whose require subtle negotiations over meanings and experiences
ancestors were forcibly removed from the continent as a at the personal, political, and moral level.
Book Reviews 449
In addressing issues of identity, belonging, memory, and contribution to current academic debates about diaspora,
history in the heritage industry in Ghana, Ann Reeds Pilgrim- globalization, heritage tourism, and memory. This is an im-
age Tourism of Diaspora Africans to Ghana makes a substantial portant book that deserves to be widely read.
in the face of colonial disjunction is fundamental to the con- contexts; Rodnings treatment of burials and abandonment
nections Rodning proposes between Cherokee myths and is especially strong in this regard.
legends on the one hand and the archaeological record on the If there is a shortcoming in Rodnings book, it is the sub-
other. title, as Center Places and Cherokee Towns offers more than ar-
Even as Center Places and Cherokee Towns provides a deeply chaeological perspectives on Native American architecture
contextualized account of Cherokee architecture in the and landscape in the southern Appalachians. In reality, the
southern Appalachians, it also contributes to anthropological book comprises a sophisticated multidisciplinary project, in
archaeology more broadly with nuanced considerations which archaeological data, historical sources, and recorded
of landscapes, the built environment, and temporality. oral traditions are skillfully combined to produce a rich ac-
Each chapter includes a discussion of the topic of interest count of Cherokee geography and worldview as well as an
from a theoretical perspective and in comparative cultural important contribution to the anthropology of landscapes.
Hospital, California (1920). The former was an ostensibly graduate course. There are minor issues such as the mis-
all-male military site used during the Civil War, and the spelling of Pamela Gellers name, and some index entries
latter was a psychiatric institution with gender-segregated are not immediately logical. However, this is an important
wards. The reader is left to connect the dots to some extent. overview of many topics that could be used in conjunc-
Nevertheless, I think this book would be a good introduction tion with case studies for an expanded understanding of the
to many of these topics for an upper-division or first-year archaeology of gender in historic America.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12580 of this work was secret and thus information is scanty, but
we do know that Du Bois felt productive and purposeful,
Alice E. Schlegel as did many anthropologists involved in the war effort. Her
University of Arizona work was much admired, and after the war she was honored
by the Thai government for outstanding service.
In this comprehensive biography of one of the founding Du Bois returned to a country mired in the Cold War and
mothers of anthropology, Susan Seymour blends the three paranoid about the communist menace. Her faithful service
dimensions of the life of Cora Du Bois (19031991): the to the nation did not save her from being investigated by the
anthropologist, the patriot, and the very private and some- FBI because of her associations with individuals suspected of
times difficult person. In doing so, she illuminates the having communist sympathies. J. Edgar Hoover was on a cru-
theories, schools, and personalities of midcentury U.S. sade to purge homosexuals from the State Department, and
anthropology. Du Boiss lesbian relationship probably played a part in this.
As a child, Du Bois defended herself against her When UC Berkeley offered Du Bois a tenured position
brothers antagonism and her mothers tirades by distancing in 1949, it seemed like a dream come trueuntil she learned
herself emotionally and turning inward. Perhaps it was this about the loyalty oath. With great sadness, she turned down
early participant-observation that prepared her for fieldwork the offer. Her principled letter of refusal initiated another
in Alor, far from the companionship of like-minded people. investigation by the FBI. In 1965, she accepted an offer from
University of California Berkeley, where Du Bois did her Radcliffe and Harvard: a named chair, to be filled by a distin-
graduate studies, was a happy place for her. In her student guished woman scholar. Her years there were both difficult,
field research among the Wintu of northern California, in that she was effectively ignored, and gratifying, in that she
she developed her interest in the individual in culture. She mentored a line of excellent students who later had distin-
received her PhD in 1932 during the Depression, when guished careers (Seymour was one of these). Her experiences
jobs in anthropology were scarce and usually went to men. with sexism there are neatly captured in a satirical mystery
Women anthropologists picked up jobs where they could. story by Carolyn Heilbrun, writing as Amanda Cross (1981).
For two years, she and psychoanalyst Abram Kardiner Du Boiss last major research effort was the Harvard-
jointly taught a seminar at the New York Psychoanalytic Bhubaneswar Project, begun in 1961 and designed to mea-
Society. She introduced cross-cultural issues into the highly sure sociocultural change in India following independence
parochial psychological theories of the day. in 1947. One gets the impression that she was in over her
With the help of a research grant, Du Bois set out for head, because she lacked the grasp of Indian history, re-
what was then the Netherlands East Indies to test theories ligions, languages, and cultures necessary to fulfill such a
developed in the seminar. Margaret Mead invited Du Bois demand. Although she never wrote the book she had hoped
to join her and Gregory Bateson in working in Bali, and to, by 1973 the project had produced 11 PhDs. Du Bois
she seemed quite miffed when Du Bois preferred her own retired from Harvard in 1969 at age 65.
research siteand Du Bois had some harsh words to say Du Bois was highly principled and courageous, but she
about her. In 1938 she began the 16 months of fieldwork that also seems to have been quite inflexible and dismissive of
resulted in her classic ethnography, The People of Alor (1960). those with whom she profoundly disagreed. Years after their
The descendants of the Alorese villagers still referred to her intimate relationship ended, May Sarton (1992:313314)
in 2006 as a good being and spoke of her returning. still felt bitter (but she was known to hold grudges). One gets
During World War II, Du Boiss knowledge of Southeast the impression of defensiveness, only relaxed when Du Bois
Asia brought her an invitation to join a group of distinguished was with her long-time companion, friends like Paul and Julia
scholars to work for the Office of Strategic Services. Much Child, and some of her students. She expressed her private
452 American Anthropologist Vol. 118, No. 2 June 2016
feelings by writing poetry. Her capacity for deep feeling is REFERENCES CITED
revealed in the appendix to the preface of a two-volume Cross, Amanda
edition of The People of Alor (1960), where she recounts the 1981 Death in a Tenured Position. New York: Ballantine Books.
news that during the Japanese occupation, several Alorese Du Bois, Cora
had innocently spoken of Hamerika. Fearing rebellion, 1960[1944] The People of Alor: A Social-Psychological Study of
the Japanese publicly decapitated them. Pain seeps through an East Indian Island. New York: Harper and Row.
every line of her restrained account. Sarton, May
This book gives an excellent picture of a life, a time, 1992 Endgame: A Journal of the Seventy-Ninth Year. New York:
and a profession. W. W. Norton.
culturally situating contemporary constructions of drug Determining the most appropriate audience for this
use, which Singer and Page set out to do here, is a necessary book presents a challenge. Undergraduates may struggle
step toward dismantling those constructions. with the theoretical language of the text, and experienced
Singer and Page are among the most (if not the researchers may crave stricter argumentationespecially
most) experienced ethnographers of legal and illegal in the chapters analyzing film and print media. Yet there
substance use today. However, little attempt is made to arent many models for a text like this one, in which the
integrate rich, evidentiary ethnographic detail from the epistemological terrain that defines a singular social issue is
authors own research into the text. Given that Singer brought into question. In making such an offering, Merrill
and Page are both captivating storytellers, this feels like Singer and J. Bryan Page continue to cement their legacy
a missed opportunity. Nevertheless, this pair has once as scholars who have tried to talk sense to us about our
again demonstrated their unparalleled ability to synthesize societys most harmful habits of social distinction.
enormous bodies of literature into small, coherent texts.
In this regard, Singer and Page shine, effectively presenting REFERENCE CITED
an impressive breadth of information in not so many Levi-Strauss, Claude
pages. 1963 Totemism. Rodney Needham, trans. Boston: Beacon Press.
Chapter 5 arrives at the expected moment. If winter was regional is an inescapable conclusion of Sissonss work.
comes, can spring be far behind? A season of flaming com- It is not a perfect work. Glosses of Tahitian and Hawaiian
munitas is revealed as the occasion for a re-architecturing terms and, sometimes, ritual texts are poetic or sometimes
of social relations, a reconsolidation of spiritual and chiefly misleadingly based on translations possibly drawn from 19th-
powers, and a literal new architecture via the erection of century mission texts that may have claimed too much or too
Christian chapels, new roads, domiciles, and seats of gov- little for the semantics of certain terms or phrases. Other
ernment. Chapters 6 and 7 further illuminate the return Polynesian seasonalities that may also have played active
of hierarchy and the reestablishment of bipolar seasonality roles in shaping practical dispositions and the motivations
after years of disruption. Chapter 6 is among the most no- that flow from them in everyday and ritual contextsfor
table chapters in the volume. Sissonss close engagement instance, lunar cyclesappear only marginally in this ac-
with David Graebers reworked theory of fetishes leads to count. However, while the historical events of iconoclasm
an illuminating discussion of the role of books and printing or subsequent new instaurations of power may be difficult to
presses in the transformation of chiefs into kings and of chief- perfectly couple to the orchestral movements of the Pleiades
ships into newly potent sacred centers (p. 109) styled after in Eastern Polynesia, Sissonss conclusions at the chiasmus
Western kingships. His discussion of the dynamics in which of Sahlins and Bourdieu, of habitus and improvisation, of
the social agency of God images was transferred to mission hierarchy and communitas, and of two seasons of power
(and later to legal) texts would be fascinating to read against require serious consideration, offer significant opportunities
William Hanks Converting Words (2010). The final chapter for theoretical reflection, and bring the chaos of this critical
is striking for its thoroughly robust re-engagement with his- period in Polynesian history into view with a clarity that
torical theory and also for its introduction of inertia as a deserves applause and gratitude.
tertium quid in the framing of seasonality.
The volume has significant synthetic implications for re- REFERENCE CITED
gional history, repudiating long-standing tendencies to ex- Hanks, William F.
amine the social, cultural, and political transformations of 2010 Converting Words: Maya in the Age of the Cross. Berkeley:
Pacific places in isolation. That the Polynesian Iconoclasm University of California Press.
movements in a country where an independent Ministry of would be better able to judge the connotations of such
Gender Equality and Family was established as early as 2001 statements as the newly launched national pension plan was
under the prerogative of Kim Dae-Jungs government. not trusted because of the state bureaucracys reputation for
Some readers, including myself, might find it helpful if corruption and mismanagement (p. 56) without distortion.
the author had added a little more analysis of this political A national pension plan in South Korea may still be consid-
dimension. ered insufficient but, to my knowledge at least, corruption
Curiosity about political dimension arises particularly and mismanagement have never been major issues. The
because Songs research objects are not just ordinary Korean interpretations and analyses in Songs book rely heavily on
single women but, rather, a specific group of single women: the views of those who are undoubtedly politicized.
most of those interviewed had been radical student activists Although Song could have more clearly positioned the
in the antimilitary state movements, the most vehement women she interviewed, the most interesting aspect of her
opposition movements in the modern history of South Korea book lies in the depiction of the seemingly contradictory
that, in the end, succeeded in bringing about democratiza- combination of leftist political ideologists seeking both so-
tion and the establishment of civilian government in 1993. cial reform and the personal enjoyment and self-cultivation
By continuing to nurture an anti-establishment culture, endorsed by a liberal market ideology that coexist in the lives
despite the fact that the so-called progressive government of the single women she studied. While some readers may
was in power for two consecutive regimes from 1998 to not be thoroughly convinced by the authors theoretical in-
2008, the activists have deeply divided the population. What terpretation of this phenomenon as a form of self-suspension
is often referred to as camp logic (jinyong nolli in Korean) or small vacations from the will (p. 82), Songs detailed
appears to affect every aspect of peoples attitudes toward depiction of the various patterns of postrevolutionary ad-
and understanding of current affairs. If this entrenched polit- justments of former activists in South Korea is in itself most
ical landscape had been more clearly contextualized, readers valuable and deserves attention.
Sidney Mintz in the early 1980s on the life history of sug- is that I wanted to explore the relationship between the
arcane workers in Puerto Rico. The subtitle of the book, anthropologist and his or her research assistants: those lo-
Journeys with a Tamil Brahmin, epitomizes its different chap- cal people who, although sometimes even credited in the
ters, which stand out as a narrative of the protagonist, G. by-lines of our books, somehow remain in the background
Mohandas Iyer (turned into Tajagani Jobdas through Chris- (p. xix). Putting a research assistant in the foreground of a
tian baptism and referred to intimately as Das all through multisited ethnographic narrative and using his lens to view
the ethnography). Das seemed to speak extremely frankly to postcolonial India are definitely novel. Staples has opened
the author; unlike the ordinary Indian, he confessed his illicit new windows not only for anthropology but also for social
sexual liaisons with prostitutes in Mumbai and with a nurse science research in South Asia in general, wherein big themes
who lured him under the threat of alleged rape as well as the like globalization, marginality, and the subaltern conscious-
uncanny invitations from a young European homosexual in a ness still predominate. Interestingly, at the end Das emerges
hotel. Intriguing though it was to read about Dass tramp life as a self-made and self-taught person no less than his ethno-
and religious conversionhis up-and-down sort of life grapher; for example, he possessed no envy of the relatively
his conviction about the dignity of a Brahmin, which he successful family life and career of his brother, with whom
thought he had inherited from his familial ancestry, was more he united in Anandapuram.
interesting to this reader. I believe that this book will help bridge the proverbial
One important justification for writing the book seems gap between the self and the other, the observer and the ob-
significant. I quote Staples: A final reason for writing this served, and the objective and the subjective in ethnographic
bookor at least for doing the research on which it draws representations of the changing nature of caste in India.
workplace hierarchies that make biomedicine effective efficaciously onto spaces and practices of healing, Biomedicine
elsewhere are subverted by local ideologies of Melanesian in an Unstable Place provides a highly perceptive account
egalitarianism: doctors acquiesce to nurses, who ignore of how incompletely this has occurred in Papua New
requests for tests and are told not to act like white doctors. Guinea. With an innovative tweak of James Scotts ideas of
The nonstandard biomedical practices of Madang hospi- legibility, Street shows how patients strive to make them-
tal reflect the rise of fundamentalist Christianity in Melanesia selves visible to doctors in the hope of attracting the at-
as nurses exercise Christian disciplines of pastoral care, of- tention they need to receive effective care. Clinical staff
fering moral direction and exhortations to faith and prayer. too try to bring patients complaints into a form that is
These spiritual approaches to healing assemble a range of visible to their biomedical gaze and can be stabilized in a
techniques and mobilize various powers. Nurses may toler- diagnosis that is treatable. Street argues that these attempts
ate visits from the glasman, a diviner thought to be able to to make the state see (p. 224) reveal a profoundly un-
identify those who cause illness in patients bodies by the certain project of making biomedicine in the postcolonial
use of malicious sorcery. Fearing that their illness is a prod- state.
uct of jealousy from their kinfolk, patients give attention to This excellent book is a compelling and often moving
maintaining or restoring relationships with people back in ethnography. It makes an original contribution to medical
their village homes well beyond the boundaries of the hos- anthropology and the anthropology of the state, institu-
pital compound. In so doing, they make the hospital a site of tions, and infrastructure. Biomedicine in an Unstable Place
the reworking of Melanesian relationships and personhood, also advances the anthropological study of personhood,
even as the staff struggles to practice the best biomedicine Christianity, race, and class. The elegance of Streets prose
that they can. together with her satisfying and succinct analysis of so
Where Foucauldian accounts of biopower typically many complex and urgent issues will make Biomedicine in an
imagine a biomedical therapeutic gaze that imposes itself Unstable Place an outstanding teaching resource.
and art historyin short, why nonmedieval archaeologists The quick turnaround from the conference to print
should care. suggests that the editor commendably produced the book in
The papers feature a welcome variety of methodological record time, although this was perhaps done at the expense
approaches, including excavations, landscape and geophysi- of ensuring consistent quality across all the contributions.
cal survey, artifact studies, historical research, and building Several papers, including the editors own, offer strong,
analysis, representing the wide spectrum of current medieval original scholarship, which bodes well for the future of
archaeology. There is some engagement with theoretical medieval archaeology in North America, but a few are
perspectives, but this is patchyin the articles focused on disappointingly underdeveloped in comparison. The volume
buildings it is good, but in others recent research driving me- is neatly although not lavishly produced, and it is well illus-
dieval archaeological theory forward has been overlooked, or trated with black-and-white photos, maps, and diagrams, but
there is little follow-through on the promised theoretical in- the list price of $81.99 (at the time this review was written)
terpretations. One of the strengths of the volume lies in its in- is too high for the quality offered and will limit its audience.
ternational scope, a perspective that is admittedly often lack- It is generally well edited, although a few typographical er-
ing in British medieval archaeology. It offers papers focusing rors and an instance of missing images have slipped through.
on England, Ireland, Norse Greenland and Vinland, Hun- The choice to put the entire bibliography at the end, divided
gary, Turkey, Germany, and Jordan, with the Middle East- by chapter headings, instead of directly after the relevant
ern articles particularly offering insights beyond the standard contributions seems to offer little benefit and makes finding
Eurocentric perspective of medievalism. The authors of the references more of a hassle than it needs to be. Overall,
Jordan article can be singled out for praise for their thought- while problems with individual papers mar the consistent
ful commentary on the difficulties of locating Islamic archae- academic quality of the volume, I nevertheless commend
ology within a medieval paradigm but also expertly demon- Stull on having the ambition to plan the conference and pro-
strating the benefits of doing so, highlighting the connections duce this book, and I genuinely hope it is a sign that medieval
between Europe and the Levant that persisted throughout the archaeologys future will regularly feature North American
Middle Ages. voices.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12546 and recipients (state agents in Colombia, coca farmers, and
local authorities).
Alejandro Castillejo-Cu ellar The book is divided into four parts. First, Tate discusses
Universidad de los Andes, Colombia the connections between human rights discourse and the mil-
itarization of U.S. aid programs, particularly how these links
Winifred Tates Drugs, Thugs, and Diplomats: U.S. Policymak- technically played out in the final making of the agreement.
ing in Colombia makes an interesting contribution not only The second section deals with the local context of violence
to the field of the anthropology of policy but also to the in Putumayo before the implementation of Plan Colombia.
understanding of Plan Colombia, one of the backbones of It focuses on the regional landscapes of paramilitary terror,
U.S. strategy in its War on Drugs in Latin America. The a topic widely studied by Colombian anthropologists for
extent of this initiative was so broad that it would make more than a decade. Here Tate shows the relationships
Colombia the third-largest recipient of military aid in the between paramilitaries and state agents as part of a broader
world by the end of the 1990s. counterinsurgency strategy. Third, she deals with the myths
Building on her experience as a researcher and analyst of origin of Plan Colombia and the institutions that claimed
at the Washington Office on Latin America, Tate studied the intellectual property of an idea that, at the time, was per-
the process of conceiving, creating, and implementing the ceived by policymakers as a success. Finally, she discusses the
program from the drafting and actual writing of the interstate impacts of Plan Colombia (particularly the massive spraying
agreement to its effects on the ground. Tates proposal, of glyphosate on large tracts of land) and the ways that local
in line with other similar studies, is to approach public organizations tried to contest its implementation by making
policy (an aspect of U.S. foreign policy) from a perspective alternative arguments and building complex alliances among
that explores a series of interconnected spaces where policy local politicians, farmers, and international organizations.
is negotiated and contested: from policy debates among Despite the fact that Plan Colombia was mainly a
politicians and activists in the United States to intermediaries military-oriented aid package, it is clear from Tates
Book Reviews 459
argument that for the U.S. government the deepening of in Cuba and the prospects for a future truth commission in
democracy and human rights in Colombia was a discursive Colombia, revolves around the role that external influences
line necessary to consolidate its legitimacy at home and (in the form of policies, aid packages, and military
abroad. Tates reading of the preparation of Plan Colom- agreements) have had in shaping local forms of violence,
bia highlights the multiplicity of elements that constitute its influencing in this way the dynamics of internal armed
historical context: for instance, the tensions and interests conflict. Should the relationship among paramilitarism,
among members of the political establishment in the United the politics of humanitarian aid, human rights violations,
States and the situation of President Clintonbuffeted by and the security sector not be part of the discussions and
his personal scandalswho could not appear before the investigations of a commission of inquiry? It should.
public as being soft on drugs at a time when they seemed Tates research also deals with the reinvigoration and in-
to be the countrys greatest enemy. Likewise, Tate dis- ternal dynamics of NGOs. Indeed, the connections between
cusses the Colombian situation, where the security sector U.S. military aid to Colombia and human rights violations
particularly the national police and the Colombian army conducted by state forces allowed Washington-based advo-
competed for limited resources and the need to establish a cacy institutions to revitalize and reframe their agendas in
new legitimacy. Also, the perception that the Colombian the late 1990s, after prior decades devoted to this topic in
Revolutionary Armed Forces was gaining more military and Central America. Furthermore, Tate shows how any kind of
economic power at the time is also central. policy-making process implies various kinds of social places
Tate argues that, in this plans framework, the term and interactions where public policy is articulated in a com-
narcoguerrilla emerged as a strategic concept and a kind plex field of local and transnational powers. In the end,
of geopolitical buzzword. The fight against drugs became policy is also shaped by various forms of solidarity, devel-
a fight against guerrillas. Recognizing this genealogy is oped through partnerships between organizations fostering
central to understanding todays political landscape, as the affective geographies and through a number of mechanisms
word subsequently became absorbed by a local version and practices.
of Plan Colombia, that is, Plan Patriota (Patriot Plan, Drugs, Thugs, and Diplomats is an ethnographic approach
from 2003 onward, under President Alvaro Uribe): a to these sites and an invitation to understand them in
counterinsurgency-cum-counternarcotics military offensive their global and local connections. For broader debates in
supported by additional U.S. military aid. What emerges as Colombia, this book furthers interest in the study of present
a question, particularly now in the middle of a peace process policies as they are interlinked with previous processes.
DOI: 10.1111/aman.12567 form as universalizing categories at the end of the 19th cen-
tury and occupy a key position in nationalist imaginings of
Chiara Letizia modernity. The interactional history of these nodes within
Universite du Quebec
a` Montreal
a shifting field of power (p. 9) shows that new formations
were produced on both sides of the interaction, dispelling any
The Modern Spirit of Asia broadens the project of compara- assumption that China and India were merely recipients of
tive historical sociology that Peter van der Veer started in Western modernity. Both countries sought to transform re-
Imperial Encounters (2001), where he showed that the modern ligion into a moral and respectable source of citizenship and
histories and national cultures of India and Britain were mu- national belonging, but in India religion became a resource in
tually constitutive and that the entangled notions of religion the anticolonial resistance, while Chinese reformers adopted
and secularity played a major role in imagining the modern an aggressive antireligious stance.
nation in both countries. Seven chapters analyze the interrelated aspects of this
Focusing on the relation between nationalism and reli- complex encounter. After a rich introductory chapter, chap-
gion, van der Veer offers an ambitious comparative analysis ter 2 demonstrates the impact of the modern Western term
of the impact of Western imperial modernity on the forma- spirituality (produced simultaneously with the secular as an
tion of a modern nation in 19th- and 20th-century India and alternative to institutionalized religion) on the production
China. He argues that the interrelated and mutually defin- of the Orientalist representation of the East as the site of
ing terms religion, secularity, magic, and spirituality (forming spirituality lost in the West. The chapter also discusses the
together what he calls a syntagmatic chain) emerge or trans- creative appropriation of this representation by Indian and
460 American Anthropologist Vol. 118, No. 2 June 2016
Chinese intellectuals and nationalists. The next chapter de- based comparisons of Asian secularisms, would be a good
scribes the reformulation of beliefs and practices in the wake addition to this literature. A wide array of examples (al-
of the emerging fields of Oriental studies and comparative though the comparisons sometimes appear cursory) lead to
world religions and the simultaneous development of both often-brilliant and counterintuitive, sometimes ironic, re-
a universal spirituality and religious nationalism. Chapter 4 marks and connections while dispelling myths of the clash of
deals with the missionary project and local responses, which civilizations, as well as commonplaces and Western-centric
included self-conscious apologetics and reforms but eventu- bias in the theories of secularization and modernization.
ally also anti-imperialist nationalism. Chapter 5 analyzes how Although it was beyond the scope of the volume, this
the European opposition between magic and religion (where reader missed a historical or ethnographic analysis of how
religion is purged of unscientific beliefs and practices) was the different conceptualizations of social practices forming
projected onto the opposition between the modern West the syntagmatic chain operate and interact in specific texts
and the traditional or backward East. This opposition be- or discourses and are translated differently depending on
came part of the ideology of modernizing elites, generating the context of their use. This could be less important for
the persecution of popular religion in China and the Brah- English-speaking India (but see the analysis of the terms
manical idealization of a rational past in India. Chapter 6 andhavisvas and superstition made by Bharati 1970) but would
discusses the impact of the political project of secularism on be fundamental for Chinese terms.
the Indian and Chinese ideas of the nation: while in India Except for the conclusion, where it appears almost as an
secularism is historically articulated as neutral, in nationalist afterthought, Japan is rather absent from this interactional
and communist China it produces an atheistic, anticleri- history. As the author himself acknowledges, Japan, itself
cal form of scientism and rationalism. Chapter 7 describes an imperial force, served as a model for the adoption of
how yoga and qigong, now products of the global market of Western modernity for all of Asia and played a pivotal role
Eastern spirituality, were reformulated as modern and scien- as a translator of the vocabulary of Western modernity for
tific. Finally, chapter 8 describes the impact of Chinese and China.
Indian nationalism on the position of Muslims, constructed This book will be a fundamental point of reference for
as a threatening, internal foreign minority. any ethnography of secularism and for anyone interested in
This book is a model of historical and interactional com- the study of religion, secularism, modernity, and politics in
parison as a double act of reflection on the network of Asia and in the global world.
concepts that underlie our study of society as well as the
formation of those societies themselves (p. 14). For an af- REFERENCES CITED
firmed anthropologist of India to start learning Chinese and Bharati, Agehananda
to undertake new fieldwork in China is itself an inspiring 1970 The Use of Superstition as an Anti-Traditional Device
example of the need to go beyond the specialists focus on in Urban Hinduism. Contributions to Indian Sociology 4(1):
a single nation-state. In an impressive display of erudition 3649.
and cultural breadth, van der Veer synthesizes, in clear and Bubandt, Niels, and Martijn Van Beek
jargon-free language, the works of a large number of (mostly 2012 Varieties of Secularism in Asia: Anthropological Explorations
Western) scholars of India and China and the rich literature of Religion, Politics and the Spiritual. New York: Routledge.
that has been rethinking secularism since the works of Jose van der Veer, Peter
Casanova and Talal Asad. The work of Niels Bubandt and 2001 Imperial Encounters: Religion and Modernity in India and
Martijn van Beek (2012), which provides ethnographically Britain. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
how migrants combat tensions and shape personhood in ev- fuller intervention. For instance, she wields belonging as
eryday life through quotidian practices. Second, her field her major guiding analytic. While she subtly approaches a
site is central Indiana, a midwestern landscape mistakenly definition in the beginningwriting that ethnic belonging
imagined as homogeneous, English-speaking, and free of po- fuses ethnicity, nationalism, transnationalism, and local be-
litical controversy (pp. 56). Her focus on Latino Hoosiers longing (p. 15) there isnt a more complete explanation
challenges the conventional narratives of the Latino presence by the end of the text. We can, however, assume that what
in the Midwest, which has typically located this community undergirds belongingas a tactic of place-making and
in urban centers like Chicago. In this regard, she follows the community buildingis the collapsing of otherwise distinct
work of Dionicio Valdess Barrios Nortenos (2000) and Ann social and legal categories demarcating temporal and spatial
Millard and Jorge Chapas Apple Pie and Enchiladas (2004) in boundaries of inclusion according to cultural and juridical
direct conversation with scholars currently examining mi- logics. While the ethnographic portions push the reader into
grant destinations beyond the U.S.Mexico border region such contexts, the differential and multiple registers of both
(Byrd 2015; Odem and Lacy 2009; Shutika 2011; Smith and time and spaceas elements crucial to competing construc-
Furuseth 2006). tions of place and attachmentare not attended to in their
The research that informs the book took shape during fullest extent. A critical return to the major analytic of the
the 2006 immigrant rights marches; thus the ethnographic entire work would provide a much more cogent threading
focuses are shaped by the political effervescence of that of the books arguments as they relate to the ordinary and
moment. With this in mind, Vega explores the lives of mi- everyday life and how both take place or, in other words,
grants in greater Lafayette, Indiana, with attention to their how both resignify space. Further, while Vega explains why
bicultural experiences, personal histories, and narratives of she prioritizes the use of Latino as a way to include various
migration across generations. Braced by borderlands theo- national origin groups and forms of citizenship, she uses
retical insights that hearken back to the work of Gloria An- the term immigrant without explanation and at times uses it
zaldua (1998) and Alejandro Lugo (2008) and recent voices interchangeably with migrant. This ambiguity does not assist
like that of Gilberto Rosas (2012), Vega makes a case for the reader in conceptualizing the positioning of migrants
how the logics of the U.S.Mexico border reach into far-off in the imaginative sociology of America and how their
places like Indiana and how migrants confront and manage incorporation into the U.S. polity is often a segmented,
them despite their vulnerable position. fractured, and complex process, as past studies have
Vega first traces histories of migration, settlement, and shown (Alba and Nee 2003; Portes et al. 2005; Portes and
racial formation in Lafayette since the 1960s, including how Rumbaut 2001).
the presence of Latinos has been silenced in the towns col- Despite these theoretical concerns, Latino Heartland is an
lective memory. In the chapter Kneading Homeperhaps important read given the current atmosphere regarding the
the crux of the workshe examines practices of community issue of immigration. What is often missing from this national
building in both public and private lives. Here, the most discussion is an understanding of how migrants form part of
compelling ethnographic instances are of cross-cultural vibrant Latino communities. Through Vegas account, we
faith-based work. She follows up on this discussion in her are afforded such a perspective, in particular, the ways in
final chapter with a focus on community organizing and which these communities sustain social bonds in the face of
solidarity work in schools among Latinos and non-Latino antagonistic politics that labor to exclude them.
allies aimed at combating state-level anti-immigrant
legislation. The chapters in between address the emergence REFERENCES CITED
of anti-Latino and anti-immigrant sentiment through Alba, Richard, and Victor Nee
discourse analysisin particular how media and public 2003 Remaking the American Mainstream: Assimilation and
accounts have shaped local perceptions of Latinosas well Contemporary Immigration. Cambridge: Harvard University
as ethnographic renderings of lived moments of micro- Press.
aggression among neighbors and residents. This attention to Anzaldua, Gloria
the spatial dynamics of everyday encountersthat have the 1998 To(o) Queer the Writer-Loca, Escritora y Chicana. In Living
potential to both build and threaten communityoffers a Chicana Theory. Carla Trujillo, ed. Pp. 263276. Berkeley:
fascinating glimpse into interactional contexts where power Third Woman Press.
relations of race, class, gender, and citizenship intersect Byrd, Samuel K.
and subsequently contribute to the marking and making of 2015 The Sounds of Latinidad: Immigrants Making Music and
community. Creating Culture in a Southern City. New York: New York
Despite the richness of her ethnographic accounts, University Press.
however, Vega does not provide an in-depth critique of Lugo, Alejandro
placial constructions in the heartland, and there is a missed 2008 Fragmented Lives, Assembled Parts: Culture, Capitalism,
opportunity to fully theorize the concepts she presents, and Conquest at the U.S.Mexico Border. Austin: University
which would otherwise allow the text to make a much of Texas Press.
462 American Anthropologist Vol. 118, No. 2 June 2016
repurposed oyster shells that lined the base of the root cellar. avoidance of white oppression while reinforcing social and
Faunal analysis indicates that birds were also processed in the economic relationships within black communities.
backyard. Warner suggests that the preponderance of adult Warner provides a striking interdisciplinary analysis
fowl remains indicates that chickens were kept for their egg that confirms that African Americans co-opted an animal
production and then consumed. that once provided slaves their rations, into a vibrant
Comparisons were made between the Maynard-Burgess regional foodway (p. 112). He addresses the broader
households and other post-emancipation, mid-Atlantic sites, cultural meanings attributed to the pig among African
exhaustive details of which are available in appendix B. Com- Americans, drawing upon folksongs and blues lyrics and
parative analysis demonstrates that the preference for pork beautifully crafted quilts. Through his analysis, he provides
is a broader trend found among African American fami- evidence of Maynard-Burgess food choices as everyday acts
lies throughout the Chesapeake region, compared to white of resistance to discriminatory practices. As such, his study
households, which show a preference for beef. Warners re- demonstrates the agency of free blacks in the racialized
view of federal household studies and oral histories similarly climate of 19th-century Annapolis. His book underscores
supports the preference for pork in black households and also the value of zooarchaeological analysis in informing our
conveys the importance of private economies and informal understanding of the past, especially of people devalued
exchange-based networks, in which foods were traded for and muted in our mainstream historical texts. In making
goods and services. Commercial markets were dominated his analysis accessible to audiences outside archaeology,
by white merchants, and with them came harassment and Warner has amplified the contributions of his research to
deception. Exchange networks served as a mechanism of the understanding of African American lived experiences.
The sacrificial economy is deeply entangled in the con- on pacifist grounds. Because pacifism challenges the state
stitution of a regime of value. This hierarchy of value is deployment of violence, it is politically dangerous. On
consequential in terms of which voices and sacrifices in the the other hand, an outright rejection of pacifism is not an
name of conscience are valued. Chapter 3, Confronting option for the military. The way out of this conundrum
Sacrifice, introduces us to the new generation of consci- lies in the production of a specific kind of pacifist subject,
entious objectors, a group of high school students not yet a pathological one. This amounts to the depoliticization of
enlisted. The group consists of both men and women, in pacifism through its psychologization. Psychologizing paci-
sharp contrast to the other conscientious objection organi- fism widens the margins of what is considered permissible
zations, which are dominated by men. In this chapter, as violence.
well as in chapter 5, the hierarchy of value and the con- Chapters 3, 4, and 5 provide an original contribution to
straints and possibilities it sets for the abnegation of sacrifice the analysis of conscientious objection in Israel. However,
are highlighted through the different trajectories followed by I was surprised that the book refers only tangentially
male and female conscientious objectors. Women can be ex- (pp. 1112) to previous waves of conscientious objection,
empted from military service on conscientious grounds due for example, the one that occurred during the 1982
to historical legacies. However, refusal to perform military Lebanon War. It was at this time that conscientious objec-
service on the grounds of conscience is not a legal option for tion emerged as a social phenomenon in Israel. Nonetheless,
men. The bifurcation of the right of conscientious objection Weiss makes a valuable contribution to the subject thanks
along gender lines allows men to abnegate sacrifice, whereas to her theoretical framing of military service and the refusal
women refusers are relegated to the margins of sacrifice and, to perform it in terms of the sacrificial economy. Moreover,
as a consequence, their voices are not heard (pp. 9098). this book would appeal to anthropologists of war and ethics
Chapter 4, Pacifist? Prove It, presents the trials and as well as to a wider audience of scholars interested in the
tribulations experienced by those refusing military service limits and constraints of liberal reason.
Weld details how the physical papers represent two dif- and inclusive dignity, one in which the salience of C. Wright
ferent historical moments with distinct archival logics. On Mills injuncture to turn private misery into public concerns
the one hand, they document the wielding of state power is evident.
through surveillance and ultimately acts of terror and bru- One of the most extraordinary outcomes of these in-
tality. On the other, transformed into usable archives, the tensive years of work was the forging of new social rela-
papers provide documentary evidence of crimes committed tions. Former members of the revolutionary movements of
by the stateviz. the National Policeand expose how the 1970s and 1980s worked alongside young, mostly ur-
impunity for those crimes lies at the heart of a now-rampant ban middle-class Guatemalans, some of whose parents had
lawlessness in all strata of Guatemalan society. Further, by fled the country during the worst years of the counterin-
revealing the logics of state power, the papers dispel any surgency war, while others wanted to understand firsthand
notion that only a few bad apples were responsible for the the recent violent history of Guatemala. Together they nur-
crimes committed, as is often claimed. tured bonds of solidarity and visions of a just future. More-
Converting index cards to archives with their potential over, these memory workers began to reconcile some of the
power to break through the wall of silence that has shielded more intractable contradictions, for example, recognizing
the military, including the National Police, from their re- the humanity of the rank-and-file police, like their foot sol-
sponsibility as perpetrators of crimes against the Guatemalan dier counterparts, who were simultaneously perpetrators as
people was no easy task. There were no funds available in well as victims of the systemic violence that continues to
Guatemala; nor, not surprisingly, was there much political circumscribe Guatemalan society.
will on the part of the state to see this project to fruition. Even In sum, Paper Cadavers is a first-rate work of history
with funds from the international community, the Office of and historical production that importantly demonstrates
the Ombudsman for Human Rights confronted innumerable the power of a rapprochement between anthropology and
challenges. Although far from putting an end to impunity, history.
what the archives accomplish is to bring to the fore what is
at stake for justice to prevail in Guatemala. REFERENCES CITED
This is a story of hope, strands of which are woven Goldman, Francisco
together through what Weld calls memory work in the 2007 The Art of Political Murder: Who Killed the Bishop? New
long, seemingly endless struggle in Guatemala for social York: Grove Press.
justice. Memory of the past became a mechanism to inform Proyecto Interdiocesano de Recuperacion de la Memoria Historica
the futuresolidifying for some of the workers a sense of 1998 Guatemala: Nunca Mas.Guatemala City: Oficina de
struggle, not against only lifes injustices but for a collective Derechos Humanos del Arzobispado de Guatemala.