After several years of development and months of beta testing, the new look for our eHRAF World Cultures database is scheduled to launch in Fall 2021. The official public rollout will begin in the Fall,…
Carol R. Ember and Ian Skoggard In many societies known to anthropology, people look to their gods for help and for explanations of unfortunate and traumatic events. Anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski (1948) suggested that religion is…
Food is a universal human experience. People everywhere must eat to survive, yet what foods are eaten and how they are enjoyed can vary widely across cultures and time. “Comfort foods” made a comeback in…
If the number of cute animal memes on the internet is a fair benchmark, then the human love of pets is a powerful and global phenomenon. For many pet owners, their furry (or scaly) domestic…
In January, HRAF shared an update which included projections for new cultures and traditions that we expected to add to the eHRAF databases in 2020. Below is a list of the cultures we have added…
From pop culture to evolutionary psychology, we have come to take kissing for granted as universally desirable among humans and inseparable from other aspects of affection and intimacy. However, a recent article in American Anthropologist…
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…
During the end-of-year “holiday season” throughout much of the Western world, we are often reminded to be grateful for the things that we have, and even to go out of our way to be gracious…
During the Summer 2020 term, HRAF’s member services manager Matthew Longcore taught an online course for the University of Connecticut. ANTH 1006 Introduction to Anthropology introduces students to the four subfields of anthropology: cultural anthropology,…
As part of our ongoing commitment to supporting faculty engaged in online and hybrid teaching, HRAF is pleased to announce the launch of eHRAF Workbooks. Designed to complement any introductory textbook or anthropology curriculum, eHRAF…