Anthropology

Hola mi Gente,
It’s been a lonnnnnng two weeks, but thanks to the leadership at my organization, I’m seeing a light at the end of the tunnel.

Sculpture: The Raven and the First Men by Bill Reid

When the missionaries first came to Africa, they had the Bible and we had the land. They said, ‘Let us pray.’ We closed our eyes. When we opened them, we had the Bible and they had the land.
 -- Desmond Tutu, South African Bishop

When I attended university, I was in my late 30s, married, and was actually exceedingly well read. I would say, without conceit, that you will probably not meet many people that have read more than I have.

I went to school not so much to learn in the traditional sense, but to become a part of a community of scholars. I didn’t attend school to get a career, or make more money, but because I wanted to engage with like-minded individuals and test what I had learned previously and in that way, learn anew. I learned many things, chief among them that learning in the context of a community is quite different from learning in isolation.

I also discovered that my notions of science, or rather, how knowledge is gathered and accepted (or not accepted) is not as logical as I had thought previously. I quickly wanted to explore the origins of knowledge (epistemology), and how culture impacted our collective concept of knowledge. It has become part of my life’s work, to research the researchers, to focus the light of my curiosity on those who study others.

It led me to a completely new field of work called cultural studies and into the realm of the philosophy of science. It started innocently enough: I was taking a class on counseling and there was a section on cross-cultural issues and I learned that how people describe their ailments have a deep connection to cultural values. I learned Western medical science wasn't so much a science as it was an art, deeply influenced by cultural mores and a body of research conducted mostly by privileged white men.

In addition, much of the research I was coming across regarding Latino/as, for example, seemed to me to be deeply flawed -- not congruent with my own experiences growing up Latino in the US. Then while working as a research assistant, I came across Thomas Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions and I discovered that the history of science wasn’t one that marched in a straight line, with newer innovations replacing older ones as they became known or discovered. Kuhn wrote about paradigm shifts in a way that demonstrated that the history of science is one of fits and starts, rather than a linear evolution.

Then I came across anthropology and in reading earlier anthropological works, I came to see clearly that culture is an inescapable equation when it comes to science. Some of this science history is sad, brutal, and tragic even. As part of a class assignment, I came across the following piece written by a Naïve American poet. See if you get its message:

Anthropology
(excerpt)
Chrystos. (1991). Dream on (1 ed.). Vancouver, BC: Press Gang Publishers.

We have been conducting an extensive footnoted annotated indexed and complicated study of the Caucasian culture hereafter to be referred to as the cauks for ease in translation.

The most important religious ritual, one central to all groups, is the mixing of feces and urine with water. This rite occurs regularly on a daily basis and seems to be a cornerstone of the culture's belief system. The urns for this purpose are commonly porcelain, of various hues, although white is the most frequently used. The very wealthy rulers have receptacles of carved onyx or malachite with gold plated fixtures. We have been unable to determine what prayers are said during this ritual because its solitary nature & the fact that the door to the prayer room is always shut.

The main function of the majority of non-city dwellers is the production of an object called a lawn. Numerous tools for the cultivation of this lawn are sold in the market places. It appears also to have a sacred character, as no activity occurs on it & keeping it short green & square is a constant activity.

The main diet of the culture is available from push-button machines or orange plastic small markets and was found by our researchers to be completely inedible. It is truly amazing what the human animal can subsist on.

Another prominent feature of the cauks is the construction of huge monuments built in clusters in the villages. These are not living quarters but are used about five days a week for a ritual involving papers which appear to be sacred, given the life or death quality with which they are handled. The papers are passed about, often with consternation and eventually cast away when the spell is complete.

The mechanisms for healing disease appear to our eyes to be woefully complex & at the same time, inadequate. People who are seriously ill are quarantined in jails of pale green or white and often used to feed machines which appear to run on human blood.

Children who are born deformed in any way are usually confined to jails built for this purpose. The elderly are also jailed, there being no value system of respect for them. Those passing through transitions are called "crazy" and also jailed. Animals from distant lands again are jailed. In fact, there is some discussion of an alternative theory of central religious belief -- that the actual spiritual purpose of the culture, is to jail as much as possible. Extensive use of fences is the key argument to this theory.

Our data is yet incomplete. We hope by 1992 to have a more comprehensive overview, at which time a traveling exhibition of artifacts (including exhumed bodies to illustrate their burial practices) will tour for the education of all. Their attitude toward all non-cauk peoples is extremely hostile & violent. Many of our researchers have been massacred & yet, in the interests of science, we persevere.

* * *

My name is Eddie and I’m in recovery from civilization…

Saving America's Soul

¡Hola! Everybody...
Most of you know I don’t drink (alcohol). Most of you know why, I am not shy about sharing that:

I am a recovering addict.

Have been for going on 19 years. So, I don’t drink (nor do I take drugs). In fact, if you ever see me with a drink in my hand, you need to drop everything and run away from me as quickly as you can. Do not engage me, do not try to save me, or whatever. If you value what little sanity you can claim, the precarious elasticity of your anal sphincter (if you’re a woman), and everything you hold dear run (don’t walk) away from me as quickly as you can and refuse my calls, or any attempts on my part to suck you into my world. You’ve been warned...

Oh and that anal part? Well, that’s always in danger regardless of whether I’m clean or not. LOL!

My friend Rippa wrote an interesting article on the acquittal of several white youths in the savage murder of a Latino (click here). I had something else prepared today, but I realized I practically wrote today’s blog in his comments section...

* * *

The lynching of Rubin Stacy. Onlookers, including four young girls.

James Weldon Johnson captured the disconcerting tone of this photo when he described the epidemic of whites lynching blacks as a “problem of saving black America's body and white America's soul.”

-=[ Hate Crimes ]=-

Intelligent people can engage intelligently in a constructive dialog on hate crime legislation. As with any social policy issue there are intended and unintended consequences and we must remain vigilant we are to succeed in this experiment we call a democratic society.

However, much of the opposition to hate crime legislation is based on myths and disinformation. The religious right are concerned that under the recently passed Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act, “they may be prosecuted for their religious beliefs if they believe that homosexuality is a sin, that it could gag ministers who preach that, or even if a church may not want to marry a gay couple. There is concern that they could face lawsuits as well.”

However, the assertion that the legislation would allow individuals or groups to “be prosecuted for their religious beliefs” is false: Section 8 of the bill states that “Nothing in this Act, or the amendments made by this Act, shall be construed to prohibit any expressive conduct protected from legal prohibition by, or any activities protected by the Constitution,” and the First Amendment to the Constitution states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. ” Indeed, the House Judiciary Committee’s report on the legislation states that the purpose of Section 8 of the bill is “to lay to rest concerns raised in the 110th Congress mark-up of the legislation, and repeated since then, that religious speech or expression by clergy could form the basis of a prosecution... Nothing in this legislation would prohibit the constitutionally protected expression of one's religious beliefs.”

But let me get to the core of the issue:

Opponents of hate crime legislation will say that every crime should be treated equally. But those that commit crimes out of bias against sexual orientation or race are unusually and especially savage. You rarely, if ever, read about a hate crime resulting from a single bullet or wayward punch. Hate crime victims will be beaten repeatedly with an iron crowbar. They’ll be stabbed over and over or they’ll be stomped to death. Or dragged through the town, hung from a tree... These vicious beatings have more in common with torture and manifest themselves in ways that can only be characterized as evil.

There is also the argument that we shouldn’t punish a hate crime any differently than any other crime. I believe this is bullshit. Hate crimes tear at the very fabric of our society. They seek to intimidate entire groups of Americans, in the process creating division among our people. Hate crimes do more than just harm one victim. They terrorize an entire society. They send a savage and bestial message of hate and intolerance to all Americans. Crimes such these should be punished proportionately.

Finally, allow me to respond to those who claim laws against hate crimes attempt to punish people who hold unpopular opinions. It may be morally wrong to hate entire categories of people, but it should not be illegal. Yet hate crimes laws are aimed at actions, not thoughts -- and our legal system has long recognized the importance of motive in prosecuting some offenses as more serious than others.

::blank stare::

A hate crime does not criminalize thoughts, moral views, or religious beliefs. What it does say is that we cannot go out and enact violence on our fellow human beings simply because we find that their existence offensive to our beliefs. You have to act ...Thought and speech are insufficient to prove a hate crime.

Today, victims of hate crimes are often victimized twice: first by the animals that brutalize them and then by those that are supposed to be the guardians of the law. Make no mistake: what is at stake here, people, is the very body and soul of America.

Paz,

Eddie

About the photo:

According to the New York Times, "The suspect, booked as Rubin Stacy, was hanged to a roadside tree within sight of the home of Mrs. Marion Jones, thirty year old mother of three children, who identified him as her assailant." Six deputies were escorting Stacy to a Dade County jail in Miami for "safekeeping." The six deputies were "overpowered" by approximately one hundred masked men, who ran their car off the road. "As far as we can figure out," Deputy Wright was quoted as saying,"they just picked him up with the rope from the ground-didn't bother to push him from an automobile or anything. He was filled full of bullets, too. I guess they shot him before and after they hanged him."

"Subsequent investigation revealed that Stacy, a homeless tenant farmer, had gone to the house to ask for food; the woman became frightened and screamed when she saw Stacy's face."

Anthropology

¡Hola! Everybody...
This will be one of those lonnnnnng work weeks...

* * *

-=[ Anthropology ]=-

“When the missionaries first came to Africa, they had the Bible and we had the land. They said, ‘Let us pray.’ We closed our eyes. When we opened them, we had the Bible and they had the land.”

-- Desmond Tutu, South African Bishop

When I attended university, I was in my late 30s, married, and was actually exceedingly well read. I would say, without conceit, that you will probably not meet many people that have read more than I have.

I went to school not so much to "learn" in the traditional sense of the word, but to become a part of a community of scholars. I didn’t attend school to “get a career,” or make more money, but because I wanted to engage with like-minded individuals and test what I had learned previously and in that way, learn anew. I learned many things, chief among them that learning in the context of a community is quite different from learning in isolation.

I learned that my notions of science, or rather, how knowledge is gathered and accepted (or not accepted) is not as logical as I had thought previously. I quickly wanted to explore the origins of knowledge, and how culture impacted what we accepted or didn’t accept as knowledge. It has become part of my life’s work, to research the researchers, to focus the light of my curiosity on those who study others.

It led me to a completely new body of work called cultural studies and into the realm of the philosophy of science. It started innocently enough: I was taking a class on counseling and there was a section on cross-cultural issues and I learned that how people describe their ailments have a deep connection to cultural values. I learned Western “medical science” wasn't so much a science as it was an art, deeply influenced by cultural mores and a body of research conducted mostly by privileged white men.

In addition, much of the research I was coming across regarding Latino/as, for example, seemed to me to be deeply flawed -- not congruent with my own experiences growing up Latino in the US. Then while working as a research assistant, I came across Thomas Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions and I discovered that the history of science wasn’t one that marched in a straight line, with newer innovations replacing older ones as they became known or discovered. Kuhn wrote about paradigm shifts in a way that demonstrated that the history of science is one of fits and starts, rather than a linear evolution.

Then I came across anthropology and in reading earlier anthropological works, I came to see clearly that culture is an inescapable equation when it comes to “science.” Some of this science history is sad, tragic even. As part of a class assignment, I came across the following piece written by an American Indian poet. See if you get its message:

Anthropology (excerpt)
Chrystos. (1991). Dream on (1 ed.). Vancouver, BC: Press Gang Publishers.

We have been conducting an extensive footnoted annotated indexed and complicated study of the Caucasian culture hereafter to be referred to as the cauks for ease in translation.

The most important religious ritual, one central to all groups, is the mixing of feces and urine with water. This rite occurs regularly on a daily basis and seems to be a cornerstone of the culture's belief system. The urns for this purpose are commonly porcelain, of various hues, although white is the most frequently used. The very wealthy rulers have receptacles of carved onyx or malachite with gold plated fixtures. We have been unable to determine what prayers are said during this ritual because its solitary nature & the fact that the door to the prayer room is always shut.

The main function of the majority of non-city dwellers is the production of an object called a lawn. Numerous tools for the cultivation of this lawn are sold in the market places. It appears also to have a sacred character, as no activity occurs on it & keeping it short green & square is a constant activity.

The main diet of the culture is available from push-button machines or orange plastic small markets and was found by our researchers to be completely inedible. It is truly amazing what the human animal can subsist on.

Another prominent feature of the cauks is the construction of huge monuments built in clusters in the villages. These are not living quarters but are used about five days a week for a ritual involving papers which appear to be sacred, given the life or death quality with which they are handled. The papers are passed about, often with consternation and eventually cast away when the spell is complete.

The mechanisms for healing disease appear to our eyes to be woefully complex & at the same time, inadequate. People who are seriously ill are quarantined in jails of pale green or white and often used to feed machines which appear to run on human blood.

Children who are born deformed in any way are usually confined to jails built for this purpose. The elderly are also jailed, there being no value system of respect for them. Those passing through transitions are called "crazy" and also jailed. Animals from distant lands again are jailed. In fact, there is some discussion of an alternative theory of central religious belief -- that the actual spiritual purpose of the culture, is to jail as much as possible. Extensive use of fences is the key argument to this theory.

Our data is yet incomplete. We hope by 1992 to have a more comprehensive overview, at which time a traveling exhibition of artifacts (including exhumed bodies to illustrate their burial practices) will tour for the education of all. Their attitude toward all non-cauk peoples is extremely hostile & violent. Many of our researchers have been massacred & yet, in the interests of science, we persevere.

* * *

Love,

Eddie