Conflict Nightmares and Trauma in Aceh

In both the Acehnese and Indonesian languages, there is no single lexical term for “nightmare.” And yet findings from a large field research project in Aceh that examined post traumatic experience during Aceh’s nearly 30-year rebellion against the Indonesian state and current mental distress revealed a rich variety of dream narratives that connect directly and indirectly to respondents’ past traumatic experiences. The results reported below suggest that even in a society that has a very different cultural ideology about dreams, where “nightmares” as such are not considered dreams but rather the work of mischievous spirits called jin, they are still a significant part of the trauma process. We argue that it is productive to distinguish between terrifying and repetitive dreams that recreate the traumatic moment and the more ordinary varieties of dreams that Acehnese reported to their interviewers. Nightmares that refer back to conflict events do not appear as an elaborated feature of trauma as the condition is understood by people in Aceh, but when asked further about their dreams, respondents who reported symptoms suggestive of PTSD were more likely to report PTSD-like dreams, memory intrusions that repeat the political violence of the past.

Defining and explaining culture (comments on Richerson and Boyd, Not by genes alone)

We argue that there is a continuum of cases without any demarcation between more individual and more cultural information, and that therefore “culture” should be viewed as a property that human mental representations and practices exhibit to a varying degree rather than as a type or a subclass of these representations and practices (or of “information”). We discuss the relative role of preservative and constructive processes in transmission. We suggest a revision of Richerson and Boyd’s classification of the forces of cultural evloution.     

Mathematical biology of social behavior

When an individual grows up in a society, he learns certain behavior patterns which are “accepted” by that society. He may in general have a tendency toward behavior patterns other than those which are “accepted” by the society. This tendency toward such unaccepted behavior may be due to a process of cerebration which results in doubt as to the “correctness” of the accepted behavior. Thus, on the one hand, the individual learns to follow the accepted rules almost automatically; on the other hand, he may tend to consciously break those rules. Using a neural circuit, suggested by H. D. Landahl in his theory of learning, a neurobiophysical interpretation of the above situation is outlined. Mathematical expressions are derived which describe the social behavior of an individual as a function of his age, social status, and some neurobiophysical parameters.     

Sexes,species, and genomes: why males and females are not like humans and chimpanzees

This paper describes, analyzes, and critiques the construction of separate “male” and “female” genomes in current human genome research. Comparative genomic work on human sex differences conceives of the sexes as like different species, with different genomes. I argue that this construct is empirically unsound, distortive to research, and ethically questionable. I propose a conceptual model of biological sex that clarifies the distinction between species and sexes as genetic classes. The dynamic interdependence of the sexes makes them “dyadic kinds” that are not like species, which are “individual kinds.” The concept of sex as a “dyadic kind” may be fruitful as a remedy to the tendency to conceive of the sexes as distinct, binary classes in biological research on sex more generally.     

“Not <Emphasis Type="Italic">Here</Emphasis>”: Making the Spaces and Subjects of “Global Health” in Botswana

This essay argues that what makes “global health” “global” has more to do with configurations of space and time, and the claims to expertise and moral stances these configurations make possible, than with the geographical distribution of medical experts or the universal, if also uneven, distribution of threats to health. Drawing on a study of public–private partnerships supporting Botswana’s HIV/AIDS treatment program, this essay demonstrates ethnographically the processes by which “global health” and its quintessential spaces, namely “resource-limited” or “resource-poor settings,” are constituted, reinforced, and contested in the context of medical education and medical practice in Botswana’s largest hospital. Using Silverstein’s work on orders of indexicality, I argue that the terms of “global health” are best understood as chronotopic, and demonstrate how actors orient themselves and others spatio-temporally, morally, and professionally by using or refuting those terms. I conclude by arguing that taking “global health” on its own terms obscures the powerful forces by which it becomes intelligible. At stake are the frames within which medical anthropologists understand their objects of study, as well as the potential for the spaces of “global health” intervention to expand ever outward as American medical personnel attempt to calibrate their experiences to their expectations.     

Facing Death,Gazing Inward: End-of-Life and the Transformation of Clinical Subjectivity in Thailand

In this article, I describe a new form of clinical subjectivity in Thailand, emerging out of public debate over medical care at the end of life. Following the controversial high-tech death of the famous Buddhist monk Buddhadasa, many began to denounce modern death as falling prey to social ills in Thai society, such as consumerism, technology-worship, and the desire to escape the realities of existence. As a result, governmental and non-governmental organizations have begun to focus on the end-of-life as a locus for transforming Thai society. Moving beyond the classic outward focus of the medical gaze, they have begun teaching clinicians and patients to gaze inward instead, to use the suffering inherent in medicine and illness to face the nature of existence and attain inner wisdom. In this article, I describe the emergence of this new gaze and its major conceptual components, including a novel idea of what it means to be ‘human,’ as well as a series of technologies used to craft this humanity: confession, “facing suffering,” and untying “knots” in the heart. I also describe how this new subjectivity has begun to change the long-stable Buddhist concept of death as taking place at a moment in time, giving way for a new concept of “end-of-life,” an elongated interval to be experienced, studied, and used for inner wisdom.     

Giving an Account of One’s Pain in the Anthropological Interview

In this paper, I analyze the illness stories narrated by a mother and her 13-year-old son as part of an ethnographic study of child chronic pain sufferers and their families. In examining some of the moral, relational and communicative challenges of giving an account of one’s pain, I focus on what is left out of some accounts of illness and suffering and explore some possible reasons for these elisions. Drawing on recent work by Judith Butler (Giving an Account of Oneself, 2005), I investigate how the pragmatic context of interviews can introduce a form of symbolic violence to narrative accounts. Specifically, I use the term “genre of complaint” to highlight how anthropological research interviews in biomedical settings invoke certain typified forms of suffering that call for the rectification of perceived injustices. Interview narratives articulated in the genre of complaint privilege specific types of pain and suffering and cast others into the background. Giving an account of one’s pain is thus a strategic and selective process, creating interruptions and silences as much as moments of clarity. Therefore, I argue that medical anthropologists ought to attend more closely to the institutional structures and relations that shape the production of illness narratives in interview encounters.     

Traumatic Amputation: A Case of Laotian Indignation and Injustice

Culture is an essential variable of diagnosis and treatment. A cultural perspective draws attention to the social context within which symptoms arise, are given meaning, and are managed. Ethno-cultural work on illness narratives suggests that most people can provide culturally-based explanations for their symptoms. While these explanations are inconsistent with biomedical theory, they relieve patient distress by allowing the patient to create meaning for symptoms. Exploring the characteristics, context, and antecedents of the symptoms enables the patient to convey them to the clinician who may have a divergent explanation of sickness. This case study uses the Outline for Cultural Formulation of the DSM-IV created for clinicians to elicit a narrative account of the illness experience from the patient. Our study examines how the patient, a Laotian used social indignation (“Kwam khem keuang”) as an explanatory model for his ailment. He was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder after having undergone a traumatic amputation. In the process of explaining his illness through a cultural idiom, the patient was able to reveal both personal and collective meaning of repressed anger and frustration, expressing them in a context that was acceptable to him. This cultural idiom allowed the patient to reflect upon the structure of the health care system and the specific context in which symptoms and their possible origins are recounted and explored. It also clarified to the treating clinicians some categories of experience and causal explanations that did not fit easily with western biomedical and psychiatric understanding. The case study illustrates how a cultural approach to illness from the patient’s perspective offers a reflexive stance on the clinician–patient interaction that allows for better patient care.     

The Rise of Modern Humans

Human beings are distinguished most strikingly by their unique “symbolic” way of processing information about the world. Although based on a long evolutionary history, the modern human cognitive style is not predicted by that history. It is not the product of a process of incremental refinement but is instead “emergent,” representing an entirely distinct level of complexity. Physically, Homo sapiens is very distinctive, its peculiarities clearly resulting from a significant developmental reorganization with numerous skeletal ramifications and quite plausibly others as well. It seems reasonable to suppose that the structural underpinnings of symbolic thought were acquired in this reorganization. Still, the fossil and archaeological records indicate that the first anatomically recognizable members of the species predated the first humans who behaved in a demonstrably symbolic manner. So while the biological potential for symbolic thinking most likely arose in the morphogenetic event that gave rise to H. sapiens as a distinctive anatomical entity, this new capacity was evidently exaptive, in the sense that it had to await its “discovery” and expression, clearly through a cultural stimulus that was plausibly the invention of language. One manifestation of symbolic reasoning is the adoption of technological change in response to environmental challenges, in contrast to earlier responses that typically used existing technologies in new ways. As climates changed at the end of the last Ice Age, this new technophile proclivity was expressed in a shift toward agriculture and sedentary lifestyles, precipitating a fundamentally new (and potentially self-destructive) relationship with Nature. Both of the two most radical and fateful evolutionary innovations in the history of life (symbolic thinking and sedentary lifestyles) were thus very recent occurrences, well within the short tenure of H. sapiens.     

Interactive Bodies: The Semiosis of Architectural Forms

In this paper architectural forms are presented as symbolic forms issued from the complex semiosis that characterises human cognition (Ferreira (2007, 2010)). Being semiotic objects, these symbolic forms are, consequently, context- dependent_they emerge and have meaning, i.e., they are assigned a functional and/or aesthetic value, in particular physical, social and cultural frameworks. As it happens with all semiotic objects, architectural forms, whatever their nature, are not static but highly interactive. In fact, they act as agents of specific semiotic processes, engaged in a permanent dialectic relationship with the environment they are embedded in. From this dialectics important physical, social, cultural and economic changes frequently arise, redefining this way the original framework for decades to come. As Pallasmaa (2009) points out: “Architecture is existentially rooted, and it expresses fundamental existential experiences, the complex condensation of how it feels to be human being in this world. Architecture grounds and frames existence and creates specific horizons of perception, understanding and identity.” Architecture happens in the context of particular landscapes both natural and man-made, individuating spaces, assigning them an identity, turning the frequently undifferentiated physical environment into “locus”, “place”, “site”, “ort”, definitely contributing to the definition of the mental map that individual minds are able to share collectively. The fundamental role played by architectural forms in the definition of “place” and identity and in the shaping or reshaping of a physical, social and cultural environment is analysed in this paper through a case study that observes the consequences of this dynamics in the development of the social and cultural tissue of a particular city.     

From “Lists of Traits” to “Open-Mindedness”: Emerging Issues in Cultural Competence Education

The incorporation of “culture” into U.S. biomedicine has been increasing at a rapid pace over the last several decades. Advocates for “cultural competence” point to changing patient demographics and growing health disparities as they call for improved educational efforts that train health providers to care for patients from a variety of backgrounds. Medical anthropologists have long been critical of the approach to “culture” that emerges in cultural competence efforts, identifying an essentialized, static notion of culture that is conflated with racial and ethnic categories and seen to exist primarily among exotic “Others.” With this approach, culture can become a “list of traits” associated with various racial and ethnic groups that must be mastered by health providers and applied to patients as necessary. This article uses an ethnographic examination of cultural competence training to highlight recent efforts to develop more nuanced approaches to teaching culture. I argue that much of contemporary cultural competence education has rejected the “list of traits” approach and instead aims to produce a new kind of health provider who is “open-minded,” willing to learn about difference, and treats each patient as an individual. This shift, however, can ultimately reinforce behavioral understandings of culture and draw attention away from the social conditions and power differentials that underlie health inequalities.     

Macroevolution via secondary endosymbiosis: a Neo-Goldschmidtian view of unicellular hopeful monsters and Darwin’s primordial intermediate form

Seventy-five years ago, the geneticist Richard Goldschmidt hypothesized that single mutations affecting development could result in major phenotypic changes in a single generation to produce unique organisms within animal populations that he called “hopeful monsters”. Three decades ago, Sarah P. Gibbs proposed that photosynthetic unicellular micro-organisms like euglenoids and dinoflagellates are the products of a process now called “secondary endosymbiosis” (i.e., the evolution of a chloroplast surrounded by three or four membranes resulting from the incorporation of a eukaryotic alga by a eukaryotic heterotrophic host cell). In this article, we explore the evidence for Goldschmidt’s “hopeful monster” concept and expand the scope of this theory to include the macroevolutionary emergence of organisms like Euglena and Chlorarachnion from secondary endosymbiotic events. We argue that a Neo-Goldschmidtian perspective leads to the conclusion that cell chimeras such as euglenids and dinoflagellates, which are important groups of phytoplankton in freshwater and marine ecosystems, should be interpreted as “successful monsters”. In addition, we argue that Charles Darwin had euglenoids (infusoria) in mind when he speculated on the “primordial intermediate form”, although his Proto-Euglena-hypothesis for the origin of the last common ancestor of all forms of life is no longer acceptable.     

Direct use values and passive use values: implications for conservation of large carnivores

We made a quantitative analysis of the responses of urban and rural residents in Sweden to arguments supporting and opposing conservation of large carnivores. The most important arguments in favour of conservation were: “I want them [the large carnivores] to exist in Sweden, even if I will never see any of them”, “Sweden should share the responsibility of conserving the large carnivores” and “We owe it [conservation of large carnivores] to future generations”. We found only small differences between rural and urban residents. For arguments opposing conservation, the difference between rural and urban areas was slightly greater. The most important arguments opposing conservation of large carnivores were: “They may have serious negative impact on livestock farming”, “They may have serious negative impact on reindeer husbandry” and “May inflict suffering on injured livestock”. We conclude that there seems to be less support for direct use values such as hunting, ecotourism or just experiencing large carnivores, this may imply that the minimum viable population size can be used as a long-term management goal for large carnivore populations, possibly with an exception for bears. We also conclude that a separate conservation or management plan is needed for each species, since the conflicts with human interests vary greatly between the different carnivore species.     

Social support and distress among Q'eqchi' refugee women in Maya Tecún, Mexico

This article addresses issues of vulnerability and distress through an analysis of the relationship between social support networks and traumatic stress in a Q'eqchi' refugee community in southern Mexico. The sociopolitical violence, forced displacement, and encampment of Guatemalan Mayan populations resulted in the breakdown and dispersal of kin and community groups, leaving many Q'eqchi' women with weakened social support networks. Research involving testimonial interviews and traumatic stress and social support questionnaires revealed that Q'eqchi' refugee women with weak natal kin social support networks reported greater feelings of distress and symptoms of traumatic stress than did women with strong networks. In particular, a condition identified as muchkej emerged as one of the most significant symptoms reported by women with weak natal kin support networks. I critically consider muchkej as an idiom of distress and argue that aid organizations should consider the relationship between social support and traumatic stress, as expressed through such idioms, when attempting to identify vulnerable members of a refugee population.     

The Moral Aesthetics of Simulated Suffering in Standardized Patient Performances

Standardized patient (SP) performances are staged clinical encounters between health-professional students and people who specialize in role-playing the part of patients. Such performances have in recent years become increasingly central to the teaching and assessment of clinical skills in U.S. medical schools. SP performances are valued for being both “real” (in that they involve interaction with a real person, unlike written examinations) and “not real” (in that the SP does not actually suffer from the condition portrayed, unlike an actual patient). This article considers how people involved in creating SP performances reconcile a moral commitment to avoid suffering (to keep it “not real”), with an aesthetic commitment to realistically portray it (to keep it “real”). The term “moral aesthetic” is proposed, to indicate a sensibility that combines ideas about what is morally right with ideas about what is aesthetically compelling. Drawing on ethnographic research among SPs and SP program staff and medical faculty who work closely with them, this article argues that their work of creating “realism” in simulated clinical encounters encompasses multiple different (and sometimes conflicting) understandings and practices of realism, informed by three different moral aesthetics: (1) a moral aesthetic of induction, in which an accurate portrayal with a well-documented provenance serves to introduce experientially distant forms of suffering; (2) a moral aesthetic of inoculation, in which the authenticity and emotional impact of a performance are meant to inoculate students against the impact of future encounters with suffering; (3) a moral aesthetic of presence, generating forms of voice and care that are born out of the embodied presence of suffering individuals in a clinical space. All are premised on the assumption that risk and suffering can be banished from SP performances. This article suggests, however, that SP performances necessarily raise the same difficult, important, fundamentally ethical questions that are always involved in learning from and on human beings who are capable of suffering, and who need and deserve recognition and respect as well as care.     

Ontogeny, anatomy, and the problem of homology: Carl Gegenbaur and the American tradition of cell lineage studies

Summary In this paper we analyze Carl Gegenbaur’s conception of the relationship between embryology (“Ontogenie”) and comparative anatomy and his related ideas about homology. We argue that Gegenbaur’s conviction of the primacy of comparative anatomy and his careful consideration of caenogenesis led him to a more balanced view about the relationship between ontogeny and phylogeny than his good friend Ernst Haeckel. We also argue that Gegenbaur’s ideas about the centrality of comparative anatomy and his definitions of homology actually laid the conceptual foundations for Hans Spemann’s (1915) later analysis of homology. We also analyze Gegenbaur’s reception in the United States and how the discussions between E.B. Wilson and Edwin Conklin about the role of the “embryological criterion of homology” and the latter’s argument for an even earlier concept of cellular homology reflect the recurring theme of preformism in ontogeny, a theme that finds its modern equivalent in various genetic definitions of homology, only recently challenged by the emerging synthesis of evolutionary developmental biology. Finally, we conclude that Gegenbaur’s own careful methodological principles can serve as an important model for proponents of present day “evo-devo”, especially with respect to the integration of ontogeny with phylogeny embedded in comparative anatomy.     

J D Bernal (1901–1971) in perspective

Conclusion We must conclude that the sub-title of Bernal’s “The Social Function of Science” — “What science does: what science could do” is still the relevant challenge and indicates Bernal’s chief contribution, besides the foundation of molecular biology to our civilization. It is manifest that resources spent on armaments are a monstrous pathological symptom of our social structure. The ancient problem of “what is property” and what may be “owned” and by whom or by what organs of society is awakening.     

The Poetics of Purpose

Hackles have been raised in biosemiotic circles by T. L. Short’s assertion that semiosis, as defined by Peirce, entails “acting for purposes” and therefore is not found below the level of the organism (2007a:174–177). This paper examines Short’s teleology and theory of purposeful behavior and offers a remedy to the disagreement. Remediation becomes possible when the issue is reframed in the terms of the complexity sciences, which allows intentionality to be understood as the interplay between local and global aspects of a system within a system. What is called “acting for purposes” is not itself a type of behavior so much as a relationship between a dynamic system that “exists for a purpose” and its microprocesses that “serve purposes.” The “intentional object” of philosophy is recast here as the holistic self-organized dynamics of a system, which exists for the purpose of self-maintenance, and that constrains the parts’ behaviors, which serve the purpose of forming the system. (A “system” can be any emergent, e.g. an abiotic form, an adapted species, a self, a conditioned response, thought, or a set of ideas.) The self-organized whole, which is represented to the parts in their own constrained behaviors, assumes the guiding function so long attributed to the mysterious “intentional object.” If emergent self-causation is not disallowed, creative originality, as well as directionality, becomes part of the definition of purposeful behavior. Thus, key tools used here, required for understanding emergence, come from poetics rather than semoitics. In the microprocesses of self-organization, I find what I call “accidental” indices and icons — which are poetic in the sense that they involve mere metonymic contiguity and metaphoric similarity — and which are preferentially selected under constrained conditions allowing radically new connections to habituate into an “intentional” self-organized system that, not coincidentally, has some of the emergent characteristics of a conventional symbolic system.