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Abstract. The Waorani of eastern Ecuador were known for their isolation. A groupof only about 500 people, speaking a language unrelated to any other, they were famousfor having maintained a hostile relationship with all surrounding societies. In effect, untilthe 1958 pacification of the first of their four mutually belligerent territorial groups, allWaorani were at war with the rest of the world. Nevertheless, their culture containedelements that they themselves identified as having come from other peoples. Some ofthese elements were remnants of previous inhabitants of their territory between the Napoand Curaray rivers: Unable to make stone axes themselves, they made gardens with axheads they found in the forest. Some were asserted to be transfers that came with captivegirls abducted from nearby lowland Quichua settlements. One informant suggested thatmanioc mashers were introduced to the Waorani by this route. Others were adopted fromsurreptitious observations of neighboring non-Waorani. After contact, Dayuma,American missionary Rachel Saint's protégé, encouraged intermarriage with lowlandQuichua among her converts, a practice still somewhat contested by those who want tomaintain ethnic and political boundaries. Such incorporation of practices and peoples bythe Waorani continues today as they redefine what being Waorani means in a globalizedworld.Diversidad constitutiva entre los Waorani del Oriente EcuatorianoResumen. Los Waorani del oriente ecuatoriano fueron reconocidos por suaislamiento. Un grupo de solo 500 personas, que hablaban idiomas diferentes. Erafamoso por mantener relaciones hostiles con las sociedades circundantes. En efecto, en1958 se produjo la pacificación del primero de los cuatro grupos territoriales,mutuamente beligerantes. Todos los Waorani estaban en guerra con el resto del mundo.A pesar de lo anterior, su cultura contiene elementos que ellos mismos identifican comoprovenientes de otros pueblos. Algunos de estos elementos son remanentes de lospobladores que les precedieron en el territorio entre los ríos Napo y Curaray. Incapacesde fabricar hachas de piedra por sí mismos, pero sí preparaban sus tierras de cultivo conlas cabezas de hachas que encontraban en la selva. Algunos aseguraban que erantransferencias logradas a través de niñas cautivas secuestradas en las inmediaciones delas tierras bajas de los asentamientos quichua. Un informante sugirió que los pilonespara machacar la yuca fueron introducidos a los Waorani por esta vía y que algunos seadoptaron a partir de observaciones subrepticias de vecinos no Waorani. Después delcontacto, Dayuma, protegido de la misionera estadounidense Raquel Saint, alentó losmatrimonios mixtos entre sus conversos de las tierras bajas quichua; práctica todavíacriticada por aquellos que quieren mantener los límites étnicos y políticos en el grupo.Tal incorporación de prácticas y pueblos por los Waorani continúa hoy en día, ya queello redefine lo que significa ser Waorani en un mundo globalizado.

This case study describes the process of conducting research on the social and cultural factors that shape young adults' sexual and romantic partnerships, sexual decision making, and perceptions of sexual risk. The research was conducted among a predominantly White, middle-class sample of students attending a 4-year university in the northeastern region of the United States. We discuss the impetus for the research and describe the process and procedures of collecting and analyzing sexual health data. By drawing on diverse data sources, including self-report demographic surveys, focus-group discussions, sexual life history interviews, and coital diaries, we triangulated the data to provide a rich, contextualized understanding of the structural, social, and cultural factors that shape sexual and romantic partnerships and patterns of communication and negotiation surrounding sexual behavior and sexual risk prevention. We discuss the challenges and successes of conducting sex research from collecting data to analyzing and interpreting data to publishing data.

Intro -- A Companion to Medical Anthropology -- Contents -- Notes on Contributors -- Introduction -- Part I: Theories, Applications, and Methods -- 1 Re/Inventing Medical Anthropology: Definitional Struggles and Key Debates (Or: Answering the Cri Du Coeur) -- 2 Critical Biocultural Approaches to Health and Illness -- 3 Applied Medical Anthropology: Praxis, Pragmatics, Politics, and Promises -- 4 Research Design and Methods in Medical Anthropology -- Part II: Contexts and Conditions -- 5 Culture and the Stress Process -- 6 Global Health -- 7 Syndemics in Global Health -- 8 The Ecology of Health and Disease -- 9 The Medical Anthropology of Water and Sanitation -- 10 Medical Anthropology of Political Violence and War -- 11 Medical Anthropology at the End of Life -- Part III: Health and Behavior -- 12 The Anthropology of Reproduction -- 13 Anthropological Approaches to Migration and Health -- 14 Current Approaches to Nutritional Health in Medical Anthropology -- 15 Cancers' Multiplicities: Anthropologies of Interventions and Care -- 16 Anthropology and the Study of Illicit Drug Use -- 17 Revisiting Generation Rx: Emerging Trends in Pharmaceutical Enhancement, Lifestyle Regulation, Self-Medication, and Recreational Drug Use -- Part IV: Healthwork: Care, Treatment, and Communication -- 18 Ethnomedicines: Traditions of Medical Knowledge -- 19 Medical Pluralism: An Evolving and Contested Concept in Medical Anthropology -- 20 Biotechnologies of Care -- 21 Medicine: Colonial, Postcolonial, or Decolonial? -- 22 The Politics of Communicability -- Part V: The Road Ahead -- 23 When Workers' Health is Public Health: The Structural Complicity of State Public Health Policies on Covid-19 Spread in Meat-Processing Plants and Minority Communities -- 24 Climate Change and Health: Anthropology and Beyond -- Index -- -- EULA.

Stigma Syndemics explores the linkages of social stigmatization, structural conditions, and how these societal forces affect human health. The authors examine new areas in which biosocial health can be better understood by looking at how social and biological interactions are driven by stigma, through a syndemic framework.