Annual Review of Anthropology - Volume 26, 1997

This essay explores the continuing relevance of Marx's work in anthropological theory by examining three dimensions of his thought, concentrating on a central text in each: historical materialism (The German Ideology), the analysis of capitalism (Volume 1 of Capital), and political analysis (The Eighteenth Brumaire). Each of these dimensions is related to present-day discussions in anthropological and social theory, but the emphasis remains on an interpretation of Marx's work.

The effort to know and interact with an otherworld tends to demand highly marked uses of linguistic resources. In contrast to less marked speech situations, in religious contexts the sources of words, as well as the identity, agency, authority, and even the very presence of participants in an interaction, can be especially problematic. Different religious practices alter any of a variety of formal and pragmatic features of everyday language in response to their distinctive assumptions about the world, otherworlds, and the beings they contain. These practices are also mediated by speakers' assumptions about the nature and workings of language. Because such assumptions bear on the presumed nature of human and nonhuman subjects, religious debates often dwell on details of verbal and textual practice. The study of religious language touches on more general problems concerning relations among performance, text, and context. It also reveals chronic tensions between transcendence and the situated nature of practices, with implications for the nature of agency and belief.

This review is an overview of the newly developing field of language rights. It distinguishes between (a) historical/descriptive studies where language rights are treated as the resultant variable with no attempt to predict consequences, and (b) exhortatory and ideologically based studies in which language rights are considered a causal variable. An attempt at definitions follows, set within the field of language planning. Principal concerns, such as territoriality versus personality principles and individual versus collective rights, are discussed.

The review ends with an argument to consider language rights as emic rights, which is to say culture-language-context–specific rights, rather than to consider linguistic human rights from a universal rights perspective which overstates issues and masks rights to as also being rights against. We need a careful exploration of the nature of language rights and their consequences.

This review examines aspects of the trajectory of economic change in South Asia, particularly the development of markets, money, commercial production, and certain specialized economic institutions, in light of the longer historical experience of posturban polities. A review of archaeological and historical evidence from the Early Historic (500 bc–ad 500) through the Middle Period (ad 500–1600) highlights several consistent themes: urbanization and related transformation of settlement; monetization and the increasing role of production for markets; the volatile relationship between long-distance exchange and local political and economic structure; the intensification of production; and the shifting roles of religious and other institutions such as monasteries, temples, and guilds.

The integration of gesture with speech production is described, and the various ways in which—in conversational settings—gesture functions in relation to spoken discourse are discussed. Cultural differences in gesture use are outlined, and the possible relationship between these differences and language differences, on the one hand, and the microecology of social life, on the other, are considered. Conventionalization in speech-associated gestures and in gestures that can be used without speech is discussed. Various kinds of “gesture systems” and sign languages used in speaking communities (alternate sign languages) are described along with their relationships to spoken language. Fully autonomous sign languages, as developed among the deaf, are briefly considered in regard to how signs and signing may be related to gestures and gesturing.

Between 100 BCE and 200 CE, the city of Teotihuacan grew rapidly, most of the Basin of Mexico population was relocated in the city, immense civic-religious structures were built, and symbolic and material evidence shows the early importance of war. Rulers were probably able and powerful. Subsequently the city did not grow, and government may have become more collective, with significant constraints on rulers' powers. A state religion centered on war and fertility deities presumably served elite interests, but civic consciousness may also have been encouraged. A female goddess was important but probably not as pervasive as has been suggested. Political control probably did not extend beyond central Mexico, except perhaps for some outposts, and the scale and significance of commerce are unclear. Teotihuacan's prestige, however, spread widely in Mesoamerica, manifested especially in symbols of sacred war, used for their own ends by local elites.

The study of colonialism erases the boundaries between anthropology and history or literary studies, and between the postcolonial present and the colonial past. From the standpoint of anthropology, it is also reflexive, addressing the colonial use and formation of ethnography and its supporting practices of travel. Since the 1960s, the study of colonialism has increasingly presented a view of colonialism as struggle and negotiation, analyzing how the dichotomous representations that Westerners use for colonial rule are the outcome of much more murky and complex practical interactions. By thus treating Western governmentality as emergent and particular, it is rewriting our histories of the present.

Fossils pose special problems for making phylogenetic and functional inferences about evolution. One reason is that bones have numerous functions and grow through a variety of processes, some of which are under strong genetic control, but many of which are highly influenced by external stimuli. Analyses of the angular kinetics, cross-sectional geometries, and microstructural properties of bones reveal information not only about the forces generated by habitual activities but also about osteogenic responses to such forces. Consequently, comparisons of osseous characters are at best an indirect and frequently misleading source of systematic information. By integrating functional and phylogenetic studies of the skeleton with analyses of how bones develop, we may find a useful solution to these problems.

This review addresses issues of governmentality for Mesoamerica's earliest kingdoms. About 3200 years ago the Olmecs instituted stratified society based upon sacred kingship. Supervision of public works projects, the creation and deployment of monumental art, and control of ritual and ideology were the kings' principal means of governance within their kingdoms. Evidence for Olmec governance outside their region is equivocal. Olmecs may have conquered the societies of the Mazatan region, but they interacted with societies in the Mexican Highlands on a less coercive and more equitable basis.

Pastoralist societies face more threats to their way of life now than at any previous time. Population growth; loss of herding lands to private farms, ranches, game parks, and urban areas; increased commoditization of the livestock economy; out-migration by poor pastoralists; and periodic dislocations brought about by drought, famine, and civil war are increasing in pastoralist regions of the world. Mongolia and China, however, have seen a revitalization of pastoral production with decollectivization. This review examines problems of pastoral governance and development including the “tragedy of the commons” debate, threats to common property rights, the effects of commercial ranching on pastoral economies, decollectivization in the former socialist countries, and the current state of development policies of Western donor countries. Case examples from the Maasai and Barabaig of East Africa and pastoralists of Mongolia and China illustrate these changes.

Evolution is considered controversial by a substantial minority of Americans. Religious opposition explains this, but this opposition is comprised of a broad continuum of religious views. It runs from “young earth creationism” through “old earth creationism” (including “day-age,” “gap,” and “progressive creationism”) to “theistic evolutionism.” Historically, antievolutionists have attempted to ban evolution and to present it on an equal footing with “creation science.” Scholars largely ignored antievolutionism until efforts to pass “equal time for creation and evolution” laws stimulated both political and scholarly activism. Lately, there are efforts to discourage the teaching of evolution by requiring teachers to read disclaimers before teaching it, to teach it as “theory, not fact,” or to present fancied “evidence against evolution.” Recently, “intelligent design theory,” a restatement of William Paley's Argument from Design, has surfaced. Although rejected by scientists, intelligent design arguments and publications are appearing at the college level (in nonscience courses) as accurate representations of scientific scholarship.

The linguistic relativity hypothesis, the proposal that the particular language we speak influences the way we think about reality, forms one part of the broader question of how language influences thought. Despite long-standing historical interest in the hypothesis, there is relatively little empirical research directly addressing it. Existing empirical approaches are classified into three types. 1. Structure-centered approaches begin with language differences and ask about their implications for thought. 2. Domain-centered approaches begin with experienced reality and ask how different languages encode it. 3. Behavior-centered approaches begin with some practical concern and seek an explanation in language. These approaches are compared, and recent methodological improvements highlighted. Despite empirical advances, a theoretical account needs to articulate exactly how languages interpret experiences and how those interpretations influence thought. This will entail integrating theory and data concerning both the general relation of language and thought and the shaping influence of specific discursive structures and practices.

Many measures in human biology that are studied as immutable traits are actually fluctuating physiological functions that adjust body systems to rapid changes in the environment. This overview discusses what has been learned about the response to the stressors inherent in continuously changing microenvironments in modern Western societies of two related physiological functions: the release of catecholamines and blood pressure. The review shows that many factors that are part of or influence lifestyle—including perception and cognitive state, the nature of the social situation, foods, stimulants and exercise—and external conditions such as temperature, continuously alter catecholamine levels and blood pressure. Because lifestyle stress may be an important selective force in human populations, studies of dynamic functions that react to it, such as catecholamine release and blood pressure, may be important in understanding the ongoing dynamics of human evolution.

Despite decades of research that has revolutionized the neurosciences, efforts to explain the major features of human brain evolution are still mostly based on superficial gross neuroanatomical features (e.g. size, sulcal patterns) and on theories of selection for high-level functions that lack precise neurobiological predictions (e.g. general intelligence, innate grammar). Beyond its large size we still lack an account of what makes a human brain different. However, advances in comparative neuroanatomy, developmental biology, and genetics have radically changed our understanding of brain development. These data challenge classic ideas about brain size, intelligence, and the addition of new functions, such as language, and they provide tools with which we can test hypotheses about how human brains diverge from other primate brains.

Linguistic population structure is described in terms of language families. Geographical distributions of language families respond to climate, latitude, and economic factors. Characteristic shapes of phylogenetic descent trees for language families reflect particular types, rates, directionalities, and chronologies of spread. Languages move in predictable ways in particular geographical, economic, and social contexts. In this chapter, the linguistic prehistories of four continents are surveyed with regard to linguistic spreads, linguistic diversity, and language family origins.

Anthropology has always involved men talking to men about men, yet until fairly recently very few within the discipline had truly examined men as men. This chapter explores how anthropologists understand, utilize, and debate the category of masculinity by reviewing recent examinations of men as engendered and engendering subjects. Beginning with descriptions of four distinct ways in which masculinity is defined and treated in anthropology, special attention is paid to the relations of difference, inequality, and women to the anthropological study of masculinities, including the awkward avoidance of feminist theory on the part of many anthropologists who study manhood. Specific topics discussed include the diverse cultural economies of masculinity, the notion of cultural regions in relation to images of manhood, male friendship, machismo, masculine embodiment, violence, power, and sexual faultlines.

In the past decade, archaeologists have given considerable attention to research on gender in the human past. In this review, we attempt to acknowledge much of this diverse and abundant work from an explicitly feminist perspective. We focus on reviewing a selection of approaches to gender that are anchored to specific theoretical standpoints. In addition, we highlight several approaches that challenge an archaeology of gender that does not explicitly engage with the implications of this topic for research, practice, and interpretation. From our perspective, we suggest the value of situating gender research within an explicitly feminist framework, and we draw attention to some of the important insights for archaeology from the wider field of feminist critiques of science. Last, we draw attention to the crucial implications for the practice of archaeology.