A Companion to Psychological Anthropology: Modernity and Psychocultural Change

by Conerly Casey (Editor), Robert B. Edgerton (Editor)

Overview

This Companion provides the first definitive overview of psychocultural anthropology: a subject that focuses on cultural, psychological, and social interrelations across cultures.

• Brings together original essays by leading scholars in the field
• Offers an in-depth exploration of the concepts and topics that have emerged through contemporary ethnographic work and the processes of global change
• Key issues range from studies of consciousness and time, emotion, cognition, dreaming, and memory, to the lingering effects of racism and ethnocentrism, violence, identity and subjectivity

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780631225973
Publisher:	Wiley
Publication date:	01/14/2005
Series:	Wiley Blackwell Companions to Anthropology
Pages:	548
Product dimensions:	7.10(w) x 10.00(h) x 1.33(d)

About the Author

Conerly Casey is Assistant Professor in the anthropology and psychology programs at the American University of Kuwait. Based on research with Muslim Hausa youths in northern Nigeria, she has published several articles and book chapters about the politics of identity and citizenship, media and mediated emotion, and violence, including 'Suffering and the Identification of Enemies in Northern Nigeria' in PoLAR (1998) and 'Mediated Hostility: Media, "Affective Citizenships" and Genocide in Northern Nigeria' in Genocide, Truth and Representation: Anthropological Approaches (2007), co-edited by Alexander Laban Hinton and Kevin O'Neill.

Robert B. Edgerton is a University Scholar and Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is a past president of the Society for Psychological Anthropology and has published a number of books in the field, including Rules, Exceptions, and Social Order (1985), Sick Societies (1992), and Warrior Women (2000).

Table of Contents

Synopsis of Contents x

Notes on Contributors xvii

Acknowledgments xxv

Introduction 1

Part I Sensing, Feeling, and Knowing 15

1 Time and Consciousness 17
Kevin Birth

2 An Anthropology of Emotion 30
Charles Lindholm

3 "Effort After Meaning" in Everyday Life 48
Linda C. Garro

4 Culture and Learning 72
Patricia M. Greenfield

5 Dreaming in a Global World 90
Douglas Hollan

6 Memory and Modernity 103
Jennifer Cole

Part II Language and Communication 121

7 Narrative Transformations 123
James M. Wilce, Jr.

8 Practical Logic and Autism 140
Elinor Ochs and Olga Solomon

9 Disability: Global Languages and Local Lives 168
Susan Reynolds Whyte

Part III Ambivalence, Alienation, and Belonging 183

10 Identity 185
Daniel T. Linger

11 Self and Other in an "Amodern" World 201
A. David Napier

12 Immigrant Identities and Emotion 225
Katherine Pratt Ewing

13 Emotive Institutions 241
Geoffrey M. White

14 Urban Fear of Crime and Violence in Gated Communities 255
Setha M. Low

15 Race: Local Biology and Culture in Mind 274
Atwood D. Gaines

16 Unbound Subjectivities and New Biomedical Technologies 298
Margaret Lock

17 Globalization, Childhood, and Psychological Anthropology 315
Thomas S. Weisner and Edward D. Lowe

18 Drugs and Modernization 337
Michael Winkelman and Keith Bletzer

19 Ritual Practice and Its Discontents 358
Don Seeman

20 Spirit Possession 374
Erika Bourguignon

21 Witchcraft and Sorcery 389
René Devisch

Part IV Aggression, Dominance, and Violence 417

22 Genocide and Modernity 419
Alexander Laban Hinton

23 Corporate Violence 436
Howard F. Stein

24 Political Violence 453
Christopher J. Colvin

25 The Politics of Remorse 469
Nancy Scheper-Hughes

Afterword 495
Catherine Lutz

Index 499

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“A much needed and impressive book. Soundly linking issues of perennial interest to psychological anthropologists, these chapters make for a truly significant advance in anthropology. The pages sparkle with rich, innovative ideas drawn from carefully rendered research by leading scholars.”
–Robert Desjarlais, Sarah Lawrence College

“On the forefront of discussions about the relationship between culture and psyche, this exciting, wide-ranging collection makes clear how much the field has changed and developed in recent years.”
–Tanya Luhrmann, University of Chicago

Editorial Reviews

A Choice Outstanding Academic Title of the Year

"This ambitious volume argues for the relevance and necessity for psychocultural perspectives for understanding globalization and its discontents.... I can not do justice here to the intriguing examples, case studies, and discussions of methodologies drawn from the authors' own research that make these essays grounded and engaging reading." (Anthropos, 2009)

"Absolutely without an equal among texts in the field ... this volume (is) particularly user friendly for instructors and readers." (Choice)

"What a wonderful surprise! Having edited, reviewed and contributed to many anthologies, I approached this Companion skeptically ... But the uniformly high quality of the writing soon won me over ... This volume achieves its goals of introducing new readers to psychological anthropology and of contributing to 'its growing vigor'." (Ethos: Journal of the Society for Psychological Anthropology)

"Any publication which draws the attention of psychologists to the existence of other cultures is extremely welcome ... This book can be recommended for its broad coverage and its range of interesting ideas. All university libraries catering for courses in psychology or in any sociological field should consider acquiring a copy." (Reference Reviews)

From the Publisher