Ear Piercing and Other Body Modifications
In Advanced Search, the Add Subjects function can be used to select “body modification” as an OCM Subject. This and other Subjects can be used to search across all cultures, or to search within a…
Tag Archives: culture
New and Forthcoming Cultures and Traditions in eHRAF World Cultures & Archaeology (2020-2021)
A popular annual request from our members is for information about how we are growing our culture collections in our eHRAF databases. Below is a brief summary of what cultures and traditions we have added…
Researchers Use eHRAF World Cultures to Demonstrate “Universality and Diversity in Human Song”
Does vocal music, or song, exist across all known human cultures? What behaviors are commonly associated with it? Do the musical features of a song predict the behavioral context in which it is performed? Samuel…
Reflections on teaching with eHRAF
“I must admit that through my college career so far, this was the most enjoyable topic to research! Thank you for the opportunity and teaching us how to use eHRAF. I will be using this database for…
Remembering Lévi-Strauss and pre-digital HRAF collections: A conversation with Bernadette Bucher
Editor’s note: The following post contains contributions from Bernadette Bucher, Professor Emerita of Anthropology and Comparative Literature, Fordham University. The early history of the Human Relations Area Files from 1949 in North America is public…
Food Anthropology on Television: Ethnographic Culinary Adventures
Today, popular television shows featuring ethnographic culinary adventures bring food and film together for the enjoyment, entertainment, and enlightenment of foodies and anthropologists alike. While most of us do not have the opportunity to travel…
The Mesoamerican origins of chocolate featuring eHRAF Archaeology
In their book, The True Story of Chocolate, husband and wife co-authors Sophie Coe and Michael Coe make claim to the idea that chocolate – which originated in ancient Mesoamerica – is far older than…
Five New Culture Collections
Our anthropologists and programmers have been hard at work to bring you five new culture collections: Babylonians (MH07) Hadza (FN11) Kanak (OP04) Kimam (OJ82) Mao (MP19) These collections include 46 new documents in total, with…
The Return of the Comparative Method in Anthropology
Where Have All the Comparisons Gone?, a recently published series from the Society for Cultural Anthropology, revisits a longstanding topic in the social sciences: the debate over the value of comparative cultural studies. In this…
Shaman Lords, Spider Diviners, and Hoards: An Archaeology of the Objects We Bury
Jeffrey Vadala Throughout history, humans have collected and buried groups of objects together, whether for ritual purposes (e.g., offerings to the gods) or pragmatic reasons (e.g., for secret stores of food). Today, many cultural groups…