Note: The Editor's Choice columns will begin to change starting with the January '99 semester. The site is posted now so that professors can consider it for adoption; in order to maintain currency, we'll post new columns and materials starting in January, when students first begin using the site.
September 1, 1998
Welcome to the Editor's choice column for courselinks: Anthropology! We're here to serve as your link between your anthropology class and the Internet. Here you will find links to web sites that relate to specific readings in the text, Perspectives: Anthropology as well as to the general topics that you will study. We have also provided some information on introductory courses in anthropology, and a set of online worksheets and exercises to give you a better idea of the kind of things anthropologists do, and what to expect in your anthropology class.
The Editor' Choice column, which will be updated each month, will be devoted to two features: first, it will provide information and links to topics that you will be studying in your introductory course in anthropology; and second, it will provide information and links to national and global events for which anthropology can provide a unique perspective.
To give you an idea of how the Anthropology courselinks site can help you with course topics, let's take a look at a central doctrine of cultural anthropology, that of cultural relativism. Cultural relativism is the idea that we must look thoughtfully and open mindedly at the beliefs and practices of others. Cultural anthropology is concerned with understanding the broad array of beliefs and behaviors that characterize human societies both in the present and the past. Consequently it is not difficult to find practices or ideas that may seem bizarre or shocking even to trained anthropologists. The problem is how must we look at these practices or beliefs? Should we judge them to be "right" or "wrong," "good," or "bad"? There are, for example, the beliefs of the Ilongots of the Philippines, who believe they must kill an enemy to obtain a human head they can throw away in order to diminish the grief and rage they feel at the death of a kinsman or kinswoman. Then there were the Aztecs of Mexico who believed that the universe underwent periodic destruction, and the only way to ward off disaster was to pluck the hearts from live sacrificial victims to offer to the gods. Among some societies in the Sudan, women are subject to genital mutilation to ensure their chastity and virginity, a practice that often requires additional surgery later in life to allow intercourse and childbirth.
Of course, behaviors and practices in our own society may seem bizarre to others; what might the Ilongot, who share most of their possessions, think of a society where millions are homeless, while others live in sumptuous luxury? And what might the Aztec think of a society that imprisons people for smoking marijuana, but openly advertises and encourages the excessive drinking of alcoholic beverages or the smoking of cigarettes? And what might members of some other societies think of the male genital mutilation (circumcision) to which most male infants are subject to in our own society?
The problem of cultural relativism is whether or not there is a point at which understanding and tolerance should cease, and where we must openly condemn the beliefs and practices of others. A good example is the practice of genital mutilation included in your readings in Perspectives: Anthropology: "Unmasking Tradition" and "Tug of Taboos: African Genital Rites vs. U.S. Law." There are many places on the Internet where you can find information. You might consult Tommi's Medical Anthropology Page. There you can find information on female circumcision in Somalia, an essay on the origins of infibulation in Somalia, read a United Nations report on female genital mutilation, or contact the Female Genital Mutilation Research Homepage. Then, just to illustrate that many think our own practices are as wrong, you can also evaluate the efforts of activists in our own country to ban male infant circumcision, which many feel is as wrong as female circumcision. You can check out the Circumcision Information and Resource Pages or check out the extensive list of web sites on male and female circumcision compiled by Bernard and Adele (Abrahamson) Knott.
In addition to providing a connection between the topics in your introductory course in cultural anthropology and the Internet, we will also be providing information on current global events that relate to your studies. For example, the AIDS epidemic threatens to overwhelm the already fragile medical services of countries all over the world, an epidemic you can read about in the Perspectives reading, "AIDS in the Caribbean." You can find out more about the economics of AIDS at the World Bank or access the United Nations and World Health Organization's Report on the Global HIV/AIDS Epidemic. Or, if you want to find out more about the subject of sexually transmitted disease, you can go to the 1998 Guidelines for the Treatment of Sexually Transmitted Disease.
Another recent event is the famine in Sudan. Food production and distribution systems comprise another area of anthropological interest. One question posed by anthropologists, as well as other scientists, is why are over one billion of the earth's inhabitants hungry? There is certainly more than enough food produced to feed everyone; moreover, even more could be produced, if people could pay for it. The famine in the Sudan provides lessons on why people go hungry. You can find out more about it at the U.S. Center for Refugees or at Out There News: Sudan's man-made famine. Or you can get some background on Sudan in the CIA World Factbook: Sudan.
In sum, at the courselinks site for Anthropology, we will be providing you with access to material that will broaden the range of your studies, and help you delve as deeply as you like into the knowledge base of the Internet.