Suchergebnisse

This review is written at a time of great activity in mathematical anthropology, including the recent publication of edited volumes by Kay on mathematical anthropology (35), by Romney, Shepard & Nerlove on multidimensional scaling (50), and by Buchler & Nutini on game theory (8). In addition there have been recent reviews of the field by White (63) and Holfman (31). Space does not permit a complete discussion of all instances where mathematics may have a place in anthropology, so I have chosen to emphasize some topics which have not been fully discussed in the other two review articles. These are measurement problems, some probabilistic topics in social organization, and spatial analyses.

We discuss and test competing explanations for polygyny based on household economics, malecentered kin groups, warfare, and environmental characteristics. Data consist of codes for 142 societies from the Standard Cross‐Cultural Sample, including new codes for polygyny and environmental characteristics. An explanatory model is tested for the worldwide sample using regression analysis, and then replicated with regional samples. We obtain convergent results with two different measures of polygyny, cultural rules for men's marriages and the percentage of women married polygynously. We conclude that the best predictors of polygyny are fraternal interest groups, warfare for capture of women, absence of constraints on expansion into new lands, and environmental quality and homogeneity.

Female agricultural contributions decline with agricultural intensification. We formulate and test a theory of the processes of agricultural intensification that explains a high proportion of the variance in female contributions to agriculture. Five variables show replicable effects across two or more regions of the world. These are number of dry months, importance of domesticated animals to subsistence, use of the plow, crop type, and population density. Of these, the first two are the most powerful predictors of female agricultural contributions, while population density has only very weak effects.MICHAEL L. BURTON is Professor of Anthropology. School of Social Sciences. University of California. Irvine. CA 92717.DOUGLAS R. WHITE is Professor of Anthropology. School of Social Sciences. University of California. Irvine.

This study presents a further test of the componential structure of American‐English kinship terminology proposed by Romney and D'Andrade (1964). It includes more terms and sheds light upon the structural (or cognitive) locations of the female kin terms as well as the male terms. Collaterality emerges as the most important dimension.

Food everywhere plays major roles in cultural reproduction. This chapter presents an ethnographic case study of food in the Micronesian island complex of Yap, where the indigenous food system of local cultigens & fish has long been the primary means through which the people express their cultural values. Further, women's preparation of starch foods such as taro & yams, complemented by men's production of fish & other protein foods, has been the core element of the Yapese political economy. Over the last 40 years, however, a growing wage economy has brought both social & economic change. The Yapese diet today includes many imported foods, especially rice, canned meats, & frozen poultry. Not only has the new diet resulted in diabetes, obesity, & hypertension, but cultural customs of almost daily sharing of food between households have diminished. Nonetheless, the Yapese have always used food to build their social world, & though the exchanges may be less frequent, & the foods may now include purchased goods such as rice, beer, & canned fish, the custom of food sharing continues. New to the culture are gatherings of family & friends at parties or picnics at the beach, with barbequed hot dogs & chicken. Thus the Yapese have developed strategies to maintain their cultural values & fulfill their social needs within the new economy. References. J. Stanton

Founded by individuals pursuing higher education in the United States, the Marshallese community in Orange County today also represents family and national interests in access to business opportunities, employment, education, medical services, and other goals. This community has become an "official" Marshallese overseas community, site of the first Marshallese consulate in the mainland United States, and a link between overseas Marshallese and the home islands. Individuals and family units traverse networks of inter-linked households, highlighting processes of Islanders' investments, including at least a short-term reversal of theoretically expected remittance flows. We explore the process of community formation, and compare rural and urban sites in the Marshall Islands to call attention to the community's place in a system of geographically dispersed locations within the global political economy.

Economic and political changes in Palau in the last two decades have led to a rapid increase in the numbers of foreign workers. At current levels of growth, Palauans could become a minority in their own country. We examine the global processes that have produced this phenomenon and discuss their social and cultural impacts on Palau. In doing so we examine ways the meanings of work in Palau are understood, and how these are changing. We conclude that a new distinctly Palauan system of occupations is emerging that is neither traditional nor purely western and that is widely shared between Palauans and non-Palauans.

A model of causes and consequences of sexual division of labor in agriculture is tested using a sample of African societies. Crop type and the presence or absence of slavery are shown to be effective predictors of the degree of female contribution to agricultural subsistence, and the degree of polygyny is shown to be affected by female agricultural contribution and the form of residence. Autocorrelation effects are found and are shown to be a consequence of Bantu societies having higher female participation in agriculture than would otherwise be expected. This effect is an example of one of the kinds of phenomena that anthropologists have referred to as Galton's problem. [sexual division of labor, cultural ecology, Galton's Problem, Africa]