engage Advantage Books: Humanity: An Introduction to Cultural Anthropology (Paperback)

Product Description
Using engaging stories and clear writing, ADVANTAGE BOOKS: HUMANITY: AN INTRODUCTION TO CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY, Eighth Edition introduces cultural anthropology within a solid framework centered around globalization and culture change. Peoples and Bailey focus on the social and cultural consequences of globalization, emphasizing culture change and world problems. The book's engaging narrative provides new ways of looking at many of the challenges facing the world in this century. As you explore more contemporary issues, including recent debates on gay marriage, cultural and economic globalization, population growth, hunger, and the survival of indigenous cultures, you'll gain a better understanding of the cultural information you need to successfully navigate in today's global economy. The authors emphasize the diversity of humanity and reveal why an appreciation and tolerance of cultural differences is critical in the modern world.

Annual Editions: Anthropology 07/08 (Paperback)

Product Description
This Thirtieth Edition of ANNUAL EDITIONS: ANTHROPOLOGY 07/08 provides convenient, inexpensive access to current articles selected from the best of the public press. Organizational features include: an annotated listing of selected World Wide Web sites; an annotated table of contents; a topic guide; a general introduction; brief overviews for each section; a topical index; and an instructor�s resource guide with testing materials. USING ANNUAL EDITIONS IN THE CLASSROOM is offered as a practical guide for instructors. ANNUAL EDITIONS titles are supported by our student website, www.mhcls.com/online.

Cultural Anthropology: The Human Challenge (Paperback)

I use this book in my cultural anthropology courses in part because it does what is expected: cover the major divisions of what an introductory class should expose students. However, the plus to me is that the last couple of chapters cover culture contact and change based on a dominant culture coming in contact with smaller groups and also covers "globalization" which is directly relevant to the lives of my students. So at the end of our term we can switch a bit from abstract academic discussions to issues happening the in the world today. We examine concepts like "modernization" and whether the western dominant perspective that this is always good (for everyone) is true and we look at global issues that affect our species, nation, security, and subsistence from a diverse perspective. Adding Annual Editions brings the text to life, as well.

Conformity and Conflict: Readings in Cultural Anthropology (12th Edition) (MyAnthroKit Series) (Paperback)

This is an ideal book to use to try to pull people into the study of cultural anthropology. It successfully stays away from the excessive use of jargon. The articles are short enough that even students with the lowest attention spans can't complain. The articles themselves come from many different angles, and while almost all of them are extremely articulate and well-structured, they also tend to be successful at emotionally engaging the reader. If used in a class, students will respond.

Guests of the Sheik: An Ethnography of an Iraqi Village (Paperback)

This book, suggested to me by a professor, was absolutely engrossing. "BJ" Fernea is newly married and accompanying her anthropologist husband Bob from Chicago to the conservative shiite muslim village of El Nahra, where she spends about 1.5 years in the late 50's living, as the native women do, in purdah, veiled from head to foot and almost completely segregated from men. While her husband conducts his studies, BJ, to help her husband's work, involves herself in the daily lives of the women of El Nahra. There are lavish festivals, rampant poverty, marriages, illness, holy celebrations of mourning, enmities created and friendships formed while BJ finds her way through the minefield of social propriety, familial obligation and hard work that composes the lives of these women.

The Arab World (Paperback)

This book is a collection of personal essays by Elizabeth and Robert Fernea concerning aspects of daily life in the several corners of the Arab world where they lived and conducted their anthropological research. The areas covered include Beirut (Lebanon), Amman (Jordan), Marrakech (Morocco), Cairo and Nubia (Egypt), Hail (Saudi Arabia), the West Bank, and Baghdad and Al-Nahra (Iraq). The Ferneas began their acquaintance with Arabia in 1956, when in their first year of marriage, Robert Fernea chose to do his doctoral research in Al-Nahra Iraq, and Elizabeth accompanied him there. After Robert was awarded his doctorate, the Ferneas went to Egypt, where Robert took a teaching post at the American University in Cairo. While in Egypt, Elizabeth wrote her now-classic description of women's life in Iraq, Guests of the Sheikh. Later research projects took the Ferneas, together with their three children, to Nubia and Marrakech. In each location, the Ferneas observed local cultures for their formal academic publications. But they also kept journals of their daily experiences in dealing with the culture and trying to learn the answers to anthropological questions as Westerners, and it is excerpts from these journals that appear here. Interspersed with these descriptions of their personal experiences are short background or follow-up essays that provide further information about some of the associated topics.

In Search of Islamic Feminism: One Woman's Global Journey (Paperback)

Amazon.com Review
To the West, the Islamic world often appears homogeneous and monolithic; the Islam practiced in Iran or Saudi Arabia is our model for Islam everywhere: heavily veiled women, strictly segregated schools and workplaces, the harsh law of sharia demanding a thief's hand cut off or an adulterous woman stoned to death. In reality, the practice of Islam varies widely from place to place and culture to culture; in Turkey, for example, Islam may be the religion of the majority, but the political and legal systems are strictly secular. In Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, politics and religion are one, represented by the power of the mullahs and the ruling family. Uzbeki Muslims are different from Senegalese Muslims, and North African Islam has more than a little sub-Saharan influence to thank for its pantheon of djinns, afrites, and holy saints. Just as religious practices differ from country to country, so does the impact of Islam on women. Muslim women in Morocco, for example, have the legal right to drive a car, while women in Saudi Arabia do not. This being the case, is it even possible to define an Islamic brand of feminism? Elizabeth Warnock Fernea, a professor of Middle Eastern studies at the University of Texas, Austin, certainly tries and, in many cases, succeeds. Her book, In Search of Islamic Feminism, is both an account of her many years spent living and traveling in the Middle East and an attempt to define the issues facing Islamic women today. Though Fernea occasionally comes off as naive, she also makes valuable points about the many faces of Islam and feminism. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.