|
| ||
|
|
||
Biocultural Approach (biocultural + approach)
Selected AbstractsAnxiety, Remembering, and Agency: Biocultural Insights for Understanding Sasaks' Responses to IllnessETHOS, Issue 1 2009M. Cameron Hay When someone is ill, people respond by seeking jampi. The more anxiety surrounds the illness, the more fervently jampi are sought. This article offers a biocultural analysis of jampi, tacking between (1) ethnographic descriptions of how jampi are transmitted, recalled, and used and (2) neuropsychological evidence regarding memory, anxiety, and agency. This biocultural approach highlights the central importance of anxiety for enabling the cultural reliance on jampi through its facilitation of memorization, recall, and social action. I conclude by suggesting that through examining the importance of anxiety ethnographically we may gain insight into the embodied experiences and social and healing practices surrounding illness. [memory, emotion, agency, anxiety, illness, Indonesia] [source] Trading Nutrition for Education: Nutritional Status and the Sale of Snack Foods in an Eastern Kentucky SchoolMEDICAL ANTHROPOLOGY QUARTERLY, Issue 2 2003Deborah L Crooks Overweight and poor nutrition of children in the United States are becoming issues of increasing concern for public health. Dietary patterns of U.S. children indicate they are consuming too few fruits and vegetables and too many foods high in fat and sugar. Contributing to this pattern of food consumption is snacking, which is reported to be on the increase among adults and children alike. One place where snacking is under increased scrutiny, and where it is being increasingly criticized, is in U.S. schools, where snack foods are often sold to supplement inadequate budgets. This article takes a biocultural approach to understanding the nutritional status of elementary school children in a rural community in eastern Kentucky. It pays particular attention to the ways in which the schools nutrition environment shapes overweight and nutritional status for many of the children, focusing on the sale of snack foods and the reasons behind the principal's decision to sell snack foods in the school [nutritional anthropology, overweight, snack foods, Appalachia] [source] Diet, energy expenditure, and body composition of lactating Ribeirinha women in the brazilian amazonAMERICAN JOURNAL OF HUMAN BIOLOGY, Issue 5 2007Barbara A. Piperata Lactation is the most energetically demanding part of human reproduction; yet, compared with pregnancy, we know little about the strategies women in different settings employ to cope with these increased energy demands. This paper takes a biocultural approach and reports longitudinal data on the anthropometry, dietary intakes and energy expenditure of a sample of 23 rural, lactating Ribeirinha women living in subsistence-based communities in the eastern Amazon. The dietary intakes of these lactating women were insufficient to meet their lactating energy needs and were least sufficient during resguardo, a 40-day period in the immediate postpartum when the women observed a series of food taboos and work restrictions. Instead, the women in this study met the increased energy demands of lactation by drawing on their energy reserves and reducing their energy expenditure in physical activity. The women showed a significant reduction in weight (P < 0.001), BMI (P < 0.001) and in circumferences (hip, P = 0.01; waist, P = 0.03) and skinfolds (thigh, P = 0.03) in the gluteal femoral region. Total daily energy expenditure (TDEE) was lowest during resguardo and increased as lactation progressed (P = 0.01). While the practice of resguardo reduced maternal energy expenditure and allowed women more time to spend with their newborn infants, it came at a cost (low dietary intake), which appears to be related to the loss of the adult woman from subsistence activities. By taking a biocultural approach this study illustrates the role the social environment plays in shaping the experience of lactating women. Am. J. Hum. Biol., 2007. © 2007 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source] Biocultural interpretations of trauma in two prehistoric Pacific Island populations from Papua New Guinea and the Solomon IslandsAMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY, Issue 4 2010Rachel M. Scott Abstract Two Pacific Island skeletal samples originating from the inland site of Nebira, Papua New Guinea (1230,1650) and a coastal site on the small island of Taumako, Solomon Islands (1530,1698) were examined for evidence of skeletal trauma using a biocultural approach. The types of trauma identified were cranial trauma, postcranial fractures, and piercing and sharp force trauma. Both samples exhibit trauma (Nebira, n = 9/28, 32.1%; Taumako, n = 17/133, 12.8%). Postcranial fractures are significantly higher in males from Nebira (Fisher Exact P value = 0.025). The prevalence of cranial trauma (n = 6/28, 21.4%) is significantly higher in Nebira individuals (Fisher Exact P value = 0.007). There is no conclusive evidence of piercing trauma at Nebira unlike Taumako, which has four individuals with evidence of piercing or sharp force trauma. Both samples show evidence of interpersonal violence and warfare. The results suggest the environment may have contributed to the pattern of trauma at these sites. These patterns are discussed within their cultural and environmental contexts. Am J Phys Anthropol 142:509,518, 2010. © 2010 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source] | |||||||||||||