Beyond black: re-thinking the colour/culture divide

This article is an exploration of theoretical approaches to 'difference' in relation to black and Asian communities in Britain. It argues that, in the wake of the splintering of 'black' as a politically inclusive term, two opposed versions of difference have emerged to dominate understandings of race and ethnicity, and have been applied differentially to African-Caribbean and Asian identities. Black/African-Caribbean identities have been theorized through the 'politics of difference', whereas Asian groups have been transfixed through attributions of 'cultural difference'. The essay is a challenge to this theoretical dichotomy, and calls for a reworking of notions of difference to fully account for the intersection of culture and structure, and the application of theory to empirical accounts of identity creation.     

Beyond barcodes: complex DNA taxonomy of a South Pacific Island radiation

DNA barcodes can provide rapid species identification and aid species inventories in taxonomically unstudied groups. However, the approach may fail in recently diverged groups with complex gene histories, such as those typically found on oceanic islands. We produced a DNA-based inventory of taxonomically little known diving beetles (genus Copelatus) in the Fiji archipelago, where they are a dominant component of the aquatic invertebrate fauna. Sampling from 25 localities on five islands and analysis of sequences from one nuclear (328bp histone 3) and three mitochondrial (492bp rrnL, 786bp cox1, 333bp cob) gene regions revealed high haplotype diversity, mainly originated since the Pleistocene, and subdivided into three major phylogenetic lineages and 22 statistical parsimony networks. A traditional taxonomic study delineated 25 morphologically defined species that were largely incongruent with the DNA-based groups. Haplotype diversity and their spatial arrangement demonstrated a continuum of relatedness in Fijian Copelatus, with evidence for introgression at various hierarchical levels. The study illustrates the difficulties for formal classification in evolutionarily complex lineages, and the potentially misleading conclusions obtained from either DNA barcodes or morphological traits alone. However, the sequence profile of Fijian Copelatus provides an evolutionary framework for the group and a DNA-based reference system for the integration of ecological and other biodiversity data, independent of the Linnaean naming system.     

Labor and the materiality of the sign: Beyond dualist theories of culture [1]

Conclusion What I hope to have shown is that the labor theory of culture developed here has much to contribute to an understanding of culture as meaning, and that there need not be a contradiction between pragmatic and symbolic approaches to culture as a result. It may appear that this reconciliation depends upon a break with the economic theory of labor as instrumental action, which is implicit in the very operation of capitalist society, and therefore impossible to transcend at will. No doubt the lived weight of the mental/manual division of labor in our society will continue to exercise an inordinate influence on popular opinion and common sense for some time to come. But I have nevertheless argued that what is truly impossible are the theories of meaning which result from this division of labor, whose attempts to definitively separate meaning from practice could only be realized by abolishing both. We have already seen that the notion of culture as pure reason has never been anything more than an ideology. By the same token, no specimen of completely instrumentalized labor has ever been discovered, and would not even be worth exploiting if it did exist: in any physical work, even the most degraded and mechanical, there exists a minimum of technical qualification, that is, a minimum of creative intellectual activity [126].The integrity of labor is therefore at least as demonstrable as its division, and is finally a more primordial and insuperable fact. Despite the way it has been stigmatized by dualist thought, labor continues to maintain our world, not just in a material sense, but also in a meaningful sense, as it has always done. This is something that we can point to in the here-and-now as the basis for an alternative cultural theory, one which is both more realistic and more optimistic than dualism. For in revindicating this neglected reality of labor, our concept of culture is also affirmed in new and important ways.Peter Gose is Professor of Anthropology, Department of Anthropology, University of Lethbridge, Canada.     

利用改良培养基探究西太平洋海水可培养细菌多样性

[目的]西太平洋复杂的海洋生态环境孕育了其独特的生物群落,蕴含着种类丰富的海洋微生物资源.本研究基于分离培养技术探究了西太平洋海域不同水深细菌的多样性,并尝试通过改良培养基提高海洋细菌可培养性.[方法]采用改良的2216E固体培养基(IMA)、R2A固体培养基(R2A)、MBM固体培养基(MBM)、TCBS固体培养基(...     

Pasifika diaspora connectivity and continuity with Pacific homelands: Material culture and spatial behaviour in Brisbane

This paper presents an interesting discussion and analysis of Pasifika (specifically Tongan and Samoan) migrants in Brisbane, and the diverse adaptive cultural practices they use to promote a sense of wellbeing and cultural continuity in diaspora contexts. Pacific Island migrant perspectives of wellbeing and worldviews are linked to their spatial behaviour and material cultural adaptations within places like Brisbane. The characteristics of the Brisbane urban landscape create the material cultural adaptations that have been observed in diaspora contexts, including places of dwelling, community and church gatherings. They are commonly displayed during family or community events, in both private and public spaces. In order to understand the significance of material cultural adaptations we must also consider the underpinnings of the materials and templates used within context. Preliminary qualitative findings have been drawn from a wider‐scale research project that has explored Pasifika migrants (of Samoan and Tongan descent) perceptions and experiences of wellbeing during 2015?2018. This inquiry has rendered significant evidence of cultural values and identity elements originating from Samoa and Tonga and retained by generations of Brisbane‐based Pacific Islanders, through adapted material culture and shared spatial behaviour.     

Research Ethics: Beyond the Guidelines

There is international recognition of the need for sustainable research ethics committees to provide ethical review of human subjects research in developing countries, but many developing countries do not have such committees (often called 'IRBs'). Theoretical and practical uncertainties encountered by an IRB on the Caribbean island of Grenada offer insight into ethical review of research in developing countries. Theoretical uncertainties include questions about whether means of ensuring confidentiality and obtaining informed consent will be effective in local settings, and whether deviations from Western norms are justifiable. International guidelines are helpful in addressing these concerns, but are subject to interpretation. Guidelines are less helpful in practical areas like selecting members or chairs. They do not address what sort of procedures and paperwork will work in a developing country, or IRBs' relationships to governments that have no mandate for them. Experiences presented here show that IRBs in developing countries can sustainably adhere to international standards. Sustainability requires knowledge, personal commitment, and an official mandate to uphold international standards. Capacity building must therefore focus on educational programs to make developing country leaders knowledgeable about the value of international guidelines to their nations. Such knowledge is needed before people will become motivated to promote, implement, and uphold the guidelines. People in developing countries must help design bridges to help their nations put international standards into practice. The structure of such bridges may, of necessity, vary in different settings.     

Beyond the Taboo: Imagining Incest

This article provides an overview of anthropology's 150-year discussion of the incest taboo in light of the last 30 years of feminist and psychoanalytic discoveries about the incestuous abuse of children, it invites anthropologists to explore incest ethnographically and offers three suggested ways: one biosocial, a second social relational, and a third psychoanalytic, focusing on a connection between what psychologists call dissociation and what anthropologists call trance or possession. [Key words: incest taboo, childhood sexual abuse, dissociation, trance/possession, innate avoidance mechanism]     

Glycosphingolipidoses: Beyond the enzymatic defect

The glycosphingolipid lysosomal storage diseases are a group of monogenic human disorders caused by the impaired catalytic activity of enzymes responsible for glycosphingolipid catabolism. Clinical presentation of the diseases is heterogeneous, with little obvious correlation between the kind of accumulating glycosphingolipid and disease progression or pathogenesis. In this review, we discuss clinical symptoms of this group of diseases, and attempt to link disease progression and pathology with the biochemical and cellular pathways that may be potentially altered in the diseases.     

Beyond the superfamily: the lipocalin receptors

Lipocalins are characterized by multiple molecular recognition properties including the ability to bind to cell surface receptors. Receptors for a number of lipocalins have been identified. These include receptors for alpha-1-microglobulin, insecticyanin, glycodelin, retinol-binding protein, alpha-1-acid glycoprotein, beta-lactoglobulin and odorant-binding protein. The properties of these receptors are summarized and discussed.     

Becoming Sinless: Converting to Islam in the Christian Solomon Islands

ABSTRACT   Islam is beginning to have a significant presence in the predominantly Christian nation of Solomon Islands. A few well-educated Islanders were drawn to Islam's elegant monotheism and promise of unity in the 1980s and early 1990s, but numbers have grown significantly in the years following a violent civil conflict (1998–2003). Many of these new Muslim converts, especially those from the island of Malaita, seem preoccupied with the problem of sin and blame Christianity for destroying customary rules, especially those enforcing gender segregation. Echoing long-standing Malaitan critiques of Christian freedom, they say that Christians rely too heavily on God's grace and their own ability to resist temptation. Unlike Christianity and similar to the traditional religion of the islands, Islam provides clear moral rules for living. Seeking an escape from a cycle of sin and redemption, these ex-evangelical Christians now see in Islam the possibility of becoming sinless.