Tag: anthropology

Decolonizing ‘the field’ in the anthropology of Central Asia: ‘Being there’ and ‘being here’

By Alima Bissenova

This chapter is written in the spirit of contributing to the decolonization of Central Asian anthropology. Drawing on an analysis of the works of the Russian orientalist, Aleksei Levshin (1798-1879), and his Kazakh critic, Chokan Valikhanov (1835-1865), it analyses historical practices of ‘entry into the field’, ‘being in the field’, and publication of the results, i.e., ‘descriptions and stories of the field’, in the West and Russia before the so-called ‘reflexive’ and ‘postcolonial turns’. It examines what Clifford Geertz terms the ‘gap between engaging others where they are and representing them where they are not,’ and discuss how this gap continues to inflect the anthropology of Central Asia today.

Read the full chapter here.

The Private Worlds of Dying Children

By Myra Bluebond-Langner

Photo: Guillaume Piron

“The death of a child,” writes Myra Bluebond-Langner, “poignantly underlines the impact of social and cultural factors on the way that we die and the way that we permit others to die.” In a moving drama constructed from her observations of leukemic children, aged three to nine, in a hospital ward, she shows how the children come to know they are dying, how and why they attempt to conceal this knowledge from their parents and the medical staff, and how these adults in turn try to conceal from the children their awareness of the child’s impending death.

Access the book here.

Symptomspeak: Women’s Struggle for History and Health in Post-War Kosovo

By Hanna Kienzler

Can we feel the pain of others? How does pain connect and reach across histories, gendered realities, and social politics? How is illness shaped by context, and what kind of life worlds rise from it? Symptomspeak explores these questions among women in Kosovo and discovered a unique symptomatic language through which they communicate their pain and suffering about the Kosovo War and post-war hardships. Dr. Kienzler calls this language Symptomspeak.

Through her posts, she explores three main themes: Remembering War and Hardship; Speaking through Pain; Realms of Healing.

Discover her blog here.

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