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This article proposes an artistic performance to reflect on the labour of fieldwork. The experimental method consists in installing myself at a café in Lisbon and Tbilisi for 35 hours beyond the reach of smartphones and laptops and then doing nothing. Across this exercise, time slows, opening a clearer window into ordinary life. The intervention raises questions about the way digital technologies transform the temporality and experience of ethnographic fieldwork. The essay sets up to make a methodological contribution to a growing literature on 'inactivity' and about experimental methods, reminding us that observation is a tiring physical experience and that slow time is correlated with anthropological quality. Doing nothing appears as a slow time being in front of others, which enables a break of consciousness, suspends politics of relevance, and leaves space for serendipity and embodied imagination. ; Peer reviewed

In comparison to other social groups, India's rural poor – and particularly Adivasis and Dalits - have seen little benefit from the country's economic growth over the last three decades. Though economists and statisticians are able to model the form and extent of this inequality, their work is rarely concerned with identifying possible causes. Employment, Poverty and Rights in India analyses unemployment in India and explains why the issues of employment and unemployment should be the appropriate prism to understand the status of wellbeing in India. The author provides a historical analysis of policy interventions on behalf of the colonial and postcolonial state with regard to the alleviation of unemployment and poverty in India and in West Bengal in particular. Arguing that, as long as poverty - either as a concept or as an empirical condition - remains as a technical issue to be managed by governmental technologies, the 'poor' will be held responsible for their own fate and the extent of poverty will continue to increase. The book contends that rural unemployment in India is not just an economic issue but a political process that has consistently been shaped by various socio-economic, political and cultural factors since the colonial period. The analysis which depends mainly on ethnography extends to the implementation of the 'New Rights Agenda', such as the MGNREGA, at the rural margin. Challenging the dominant approach to poverty, this book will be of interest to scholars working in the fields of South Asian studies, Indian Political Economy, contemporary political theories, poverty studies, neo-liberalism, sociology and social anthropology as well as development studies. ; Peer reviewed

Chris Gregory's Gifts and Commodities (1982) is widely regarded as a classic in economic anthropology as well as in studies on Melanesia. The work offers a lucid typology and definition of the concepts of 'gift' and 'commodity'based on the tradition of political economy and economic anthropology. It shows how in colonial Papua New Guinea (PNG) gift and commodity economies articulated with each other and—contrary to the assumption of neoclassical economists—expanded simultaneously. In recounting how labour and primary production were commodi ed in colonial PNG, Gregory analyses the development and demise of the plantation economy and utilizes the concept of the 'labour frontier' that moved to new areas and eventually closed leading to the crisis of the plantation sector. In this essay I will briefly discuss Gregory's notion of the 'labour frontier', relate it to later theorizations of the concept of 'frontier' and discuss how Gregory's accounts helped me to understand contemporary dynamics of oil palm development in contemporary PNG. ; Non peer reviewed

The chapter introduces one way in which ethnographers can engage with social and symbolic boundary marking in a complex suburban setting where globally produced sectarian and political discourses intersect with immigrant regimes and multicultural policies. The Iraqis in diaspora in Finland who hold contrasting religious and political perceptions and complex personal histories of persecution must come to terms with the fact that the rapid fragmentation of Iraqi society is in many ways present in the form of tense social and symbolic boundaries in the multicultural suburban contexts in Finland. The Iraqis in diaspora in Finland are caught up in a collision of discourses not only with relation to violence and social fragmentation at home; they also stand between the increasingly contradictory refugee regime and multicultural social policies that essentialize identities on religious and sectarian terms. Multicultural work attempting to build bridges between diasporic communities and the Finnish state often fail to recognize the internal divisions within the diaspora and thus engender particular types of responses: silences and forms of silencing that are rooted in cultural and religious practices. ; Recent decades have witnessed a change in European governments' policies from benign neglect to active management of religious minorities. With respect to these minorities, it is Muslims who are often seen as the most challenging for the social order of a multicultural European society. Consequently, there is a growing need for studies on the opportunities that societies create or restrict for the development of Islam in Europe. One important issue concerns the Islamic religious education in European state schools. In Finland, Islamic education programmes are incorporated in the public school system. This chapter will look at the governance of Islamic religious education in Finland on three levels of administrative hierarchy: the state as a creator of legal opportunity structures, curriculum as a site of external regulation, and teachers as actors in internal regulation. ; Peer reviewed

Reviewed book: Anu Lounela, Eeva Berglund & Timo Kallinen (eds.). 2019. Dwelling in Political Landscapes: Contemporary Anthropological Perspectives. Helsinki: Finnish Literature Society. ISBN 978-951-858-087-7 (Print) ISBN 978-951-858-114-0 (PDF) ISBN 978-951-858-113-3 (EPUB) ISSN 0085-6835 (Studia Fennica) ISSN 1796-8208 (Studia Fennica Anthropologica) ; Non peer reviewed

In geography, the notion of scale has been discussed within diverse theoretical frameworks. The concept of geographical scale indicates socio-spatial organization within a bounded geographical area – usually labelled as size (such as province or continent) or level (such as global, national, regional, local, and even household). Besides these 'technical' definitions, recent research also includes more nuanced elaborations. The introductory chapter discusses four conceptualizations for understanding and utilizing the concept of scale that are critical in underscoring the power relations in heritage. These conceptualizations – scale as a hierarchy, scale as an instrument of power, scale as a process, and scale as a network – function as a point of departure in developing 'politics of scale' as a theoretical and methodological approach. ; Peer reviewed

Sarah Green and Patrick Laviolette were editors of the journal Social Anthropology/Anthropologie Sociale when this article was written. ; This commentary revisits the "Rethinking Euro-anthropology" Forums published in the journal Social Anthropology/Anthropologie Sociale. It reconsiders three specific issues: who are the subjects of European anthropology, who are its others, and who are its authors? Noting that European anthropology does not imply a spatial fixity (there is no "there there" in European anthropology), we suggest instead that European anthropological scholarship is the outcome of diverse forms of crossborder and transborder exchanges. Yet as a project that is both intellectual and political, we further discuss some of the contradictions, ambiguities and paradoxes behind this "worlding" of the discipline. By observing that E(e)uropean anthropology in particular should constantly strive to relate the locating endeavours of ethical practice, empirical evidence, historical reflection and humanistic theorising, we call for innovative forms of academic collaboration, narrative creations and belonging to/with places. ; Peer reviewed

For people on the move, family reunification has become a major 'channel' to Europe, and the 'right to family' is a widely recognized principle in international human rights protection and domestic legislations. Yet in practice exercising this 'right' is often difficult and migration buraucracies leave applicants unsure not only of the outcome of their applications but of the criteria that are relied on in the decisions. In this article we analyze this dynamic via the case study of Finland and a close analysis of 253 appeals on family reunification applications at the Administrative Court of Helsinki between 2003 and 2014. Our sample includes all decisions that mention 'DNA,' which has become a routinely utilized biotechnological tool in family reunification applications internationally. Our analysis focuses particularly on the 51 cases in which DNA testing has confirmed the existence of biological family ties but the applications have, nevertheless, been rejected. This article is contextualized in scholarship analyzing the recent spread of biotechnological tools and biometrics in immigration management. Simultaneously we discuss the quest for 'information,' 'certainty' and 'truth' that characterize family reunification applications. Relying on the recently flourished ethnography of documents, this article is ultimately about the indeterminacy and intrinsic superficiality of 'the law.' ; Peer reviewed

Social and Cultural Anthropology: the Key Concepts is an easy to use A-Z guide to the central concepts that students are likely to encounter in this field.Now fully updated, this third edition includes entries on:Material CultureEnvironmentHuman RightsHybridityAlterityCosmopolitanismEthnographyApplied AnthropologyGenderCyberneticsWith full cross-referencing and revised further reading to point students towards the latest writings in Social and Cultural Anthropology, this is a superb reference resource for anyone studying or teaching in this area

In this chapter, the author explores the phenomenon of flamboyant girls' fifteenth birthday parties (quinceañeras) as a gender–specific ritual. The author discusses the ways that this life–cycle ritual celebrates the girl's entry into sexual adulthood, portrays her as an object of heterosexual desire, while simultaneously granting the girls ritual and exotic agency. The author concludes that contemporary quinceañera rituals also reflect the island's recent political and economic turn toward a more capitalist society and displays the growing racialized and gendered inequalities on the island. ; Peer reviewed

Desire for what is good—and for a good life—is one of the human universals spanning across all societies and cultures. Yet, how people imagine a good life differs significantly according to the individual, and it also depends on numerous social, political, cultural, economic and geographical variables. In this book we explore what a good life looks like for young people in a place that, at first glance, may appear difficult or hostile for human inhabitation: the Arctic region. The Arctic is often portrayed in popular and scientific literature as a frontier characterized by the catastrophic impacts of a changing climate and resource extraction. This adds to the image of the Arctic as a region that is ill-fit for human wellbeing and emplacement, where outmigration should be the default goal of the young generation. In a globalized world, however, youth have more choices than ever where to emplace themselves and how to realize their dreams. This introduction focuses on three principal questions from a theoretical vantage point rooted in the anthropology of wellbeing. What affordances does the Arctic offer for a good life as young people make their choices? What can empirical evidence from working with young people in the Arctic contribute to our general understanding of wellbeing as a concept in the social sciences? Which factors make Arctic towns attractive as places for youth to realize their dreams in life? The chapters in this volume all approach these questions in their own way with empirical evidence from various places in the Arctic. ; Peer reviewed

This chapter explores the ways in which different people engage with and understand the material legacy of the German presence in Finnish Lapland from the time of the Second World War. The different notions of 'scale' are assessed through the ways in which scale relates to the so-called 'dark' heritage of this period and place, at local, regional, national and international levels. The research starting point has been the history of Finnish Lapland in the Second World War, including the so-called 'Lapland War' (1944–45), with contestations appearing between the public and private spheres, and differently-scaled notions of heritage making. ; Peer reviewed

cited By 0 ; The Ghost Dance was a distinguishing phenomenon in Lakota history that caused a lot of friction and divisiveness among the Lakota people in 1890. From the very beginning, however, the Lakota Ghost Dance was studied mainly from the perspectives of white Americans, and the Lakota views were only in passing incorporated into this narrative. The earliest accounts created a tradition of treating the Lakota Ghost Dance as a military, political, or religious-political movement. This approach is characterized by phrases such as Sioux outbreak, Messiah Craze, or Ghost Dance war, so often used even in the titles of these works The tradition continued into the late twentieth century, when alternative interpretations began to emerge. However, there is still much to be understood about the Ghost Dance from the Lakota point of view. In The Lakota Ghost Dance of 1890, I was able to locate and use a number of Lakota accounts of the Ghost Dance that had not been used before. Since the Lakota voice was only one part of that study, much of the material could only be used partially or had to be left out. Some of the documents are long, 15–20 pages each, some are written in Lakota or Dakota and need time-consuming translation. Some of the documents have been at least partly published before, while others have not been used so far. In this article, I will present and analyze excerpts of some of the key documents representing different approaches to the Ghost Dance among the Lakotas. © 2017 Plains Anthropological Society. ; Peer reviewed