scholarly journals Patterns of Disease and Culture in Ancient Panama

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicole Smith-Guzmán ◽  
Luis Sánchez Herrera ◽  
Richard Cooke
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Treponema Pallidum ◽  
Systemic Infection ◽  
Archaeological Site ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
Value Systems ◽  
Central Pacific ◽  
Anterior Teeth ◽  
Cranial Modification ◽  
Human Burials

Cerro Juan Díaz (LS-3) is a large archaeological site located in the coastal lowlands of central Pacific Panama that comprised a pre-Columbian village (200 B.C.–A.D. 1520). A multiyear field campaign (1992–2001) uncovered numerous human burials of diverse antiquity, integrity, complexity, and mortuary goods. This paper considers several aspects of the demography, diet, health, and cultural practices of the earliest mortuary population yet found at LS-3 (A.D. 30–650) through the analysis of human skeletal remains found in the excavation of Operation 3, Features 1, 2, 16, and 94. This research has led to revised interpretations of these important mortuary contexts. Many of the personal adornments traditionally placed at the apex of regional value systems were found with the remains of children, giving support to the notion that, during this time period, age was the primary determinant of the kinds of ornaments that accompanied the dead. Oral pathologies present signal the importance of cariogenic foods, such as maize, in the diet, while lingual surface attrition of the maxillary anterior teeth points to a habitual cultural practice of using the teeth as tools—perhaps to peel manioc tubers prior to cooking. Head shaping appears to have been an important identity marker in the population, with high frequencies of obelionic-type artificial cranial modification. Participation in a male-dominated habitual aquatic activity is revealed by external auditory exostoses in several individuals. Finally, a systemic infection consistent with Treponema pallidum was prevalent in the population, as evidenced by characteristic osseous lesions. Cerro Juan Díaz (LS-3) es un sitio arqueológico en la llanura costera del Pacífico central de Panamá que fungió como aldea precolombina desde 200 a.C. hasta 1520 d.C. Durante campañas de campo que se extendieron por diez años (1992–2001), se descubrió numerosos entierros humanos cuya antigüedad, integridad y complejidad, así como sus ajuares mortuorios, eran disimiles entre sí. El presente artículo adopta un enfoque bioarqueológico con el fin de dilucidar varios aspectos de la demografía, la dieta, la salud y las prácticas culturales de la población mortuoria más antigua que se haya encontrado hasta la fecha en el asentamiento (30–650 d.C.). Nos concentramos en el análisis de los restos humanos correspondientes a las sepulturas más antiguas excavadas en el sitio: Rasgos 1, 2, 16 y 94 de la Operación 3. Dicho estudio conllevó a revisar interpretaciones anteriores de estos importantes contextos mortuorios. Algunos adornos personales que suelen colocarse en el ápice del sistema de valores a nivel regional se encuentran con niños y dan apoyo a propuestas anteriores de que, en esta época, la edad de un difunto era el principal determinante de los bienes que lo acompañaban en la muerte. Las patologías orales presentes incluso en niños pequeños en el sitio señalan la importancia de alimentos cariogénicos como el maíz en la dieta, mientras que el desgaste de la superficie lingual de los dientes anteriores superiores (“LSAMAT,” por sus siglas en inglés) en muchos individuos apunta a la práctica cultural habitual de utilizar los dientes como herramienta, tal vez para pelar tubérculos como la yuca antes de cocinarlos. En esta población, la forma de la cabeza parece haber sido un importante marcador de identidad, de acuerdo con las altas frecuencias de modificación craneal artificial de tipo obeliónico, las que se observaron entre los cráneos hallados en estos entierros. Por otro lado, una consuetudinaria actividad acuática es indicada por la presencia de exostosis auditiva externa en varios individuos, mayormente masculinos. Finalmente, destaca en esta población una infección sistémica compatible con Treponema pallidum, tal y como lo evidencian las características lesiones óseas.

A Qualitative Study Exploring Harmful Cultural Practices and HIV Stigma in North Central Nigeria

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-11
Author(s):  
Bala Augustine Nalah ◽  
Azlinda Azman ◽  
Paramjit Singh Jamir Singh
Keyword(s):  
Hiv Infection ◽  
Hiv Transmission ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Qualitative Interviews ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
Hiv Stigma ◽  
Hiv Positive ◽  
North Central ◽  
Harmful Cultural Practices

Harmful cultural practices have psychosocial implications on stigmatization and vulnerability to HIV infection among HIV positive living in North Central Nigeria. To understand this, we conducted qualitative interviews with purposively selected 20 diagnosed HIV positive to explore how culture influences stigmatization and HIV transmission. Data was collected using audio-recorder, transcribed, and analyzed through thematic analysis using ATLAS.ti8 software to code and analyze interview transcripts. The coded data were presented using thematic network analysis to visualize the theme, sub-themes, and quotations in a model. The findings reveal that lack of education was a significant determinant for the continual practice of harmful cultural rites, thereby increasing the risk of HIV infection and stigmatization. Hence, six cultural facilitators have been identified to include female genital mutilation, lack of education, tribal marks and scarification, postpartum sexual abstinence during breastfeeding, sexual intercourse during menstruation, and gender inequality, polygamy, and inheritance law. We conclude that educational teachings and advocacy campaigns be organized in rural schools and public places on the implications of harmful cultural practice to health and psychological well-being. We recommend that the social workers and behavioral scientists should collaborate with other agencies to employ a behavioral-based intervention in eliminating cultural practices and HIV stigma.

Metal burial: Understanding caching behaviour and contact material culture in Australia's NE Kimberley

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 28-52
Author(s):  
Sam Harper ◽  
Ian Waina ◽  
Ambrose Chalarimeri ◽  
Sven Ouzman ◽  
Martin Porr ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Material Culture ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Raw Materials ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Contact Material ◽  
Northern Australia ◽  
Assemblage Theory ◽  
Close Proximity ◽  
History Of ◽  
Human Burials

This paper explores identity and the recursive impacts of cross-cultural colonial encounters on individuals, cultural materials, and cultural practices in 20th-century northern Australia. We focus on an assemblage of cached metal objects and associated cultural materials that embody both Aboriginal tradition and innovation. These cultural materials were wrapped in paperbark and placed within a ring of stones, a bundling practice also seen in human burials in this region. This ‘cache' is located in close proximity to rockshelters with rich, superimposed Aboriginal rock art compositions. However, the cache shelter has no visible art, despite available wall space. The site shows the utilisation of metal objects as new raw materials that use traditional techniques to manufacture a ground edge metal axe and to sharpen metal rods into spears. We contextualise these objects and their hypothesised owner(s) within narratives of invasion/contact and the ensuing pastoral history of this region. Assemblage theory affords us an appropriate theoretical lens through which to bring people, places, objects, and time into conversation.

scholarly journals Elites and Culture: Social Profiles in the Cultivated Population

2021 ◽  
pp. 174997552199830
Author(s):  
Antonio Ariño Villarroya ◽  
Ramon Llopis-Goig
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Pierre Bourdieu ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
Theoretical Frameworks ◽  
Spanish Society ◽  
Cultural Classification ◽  
Social Profiles

Since the 1990s, the central references of the sociology of cultural practices have been the theoretical frameworks developed by Pierre Bourdieu and Richard A. Peterson around the concepts of distinction and omnivorousness. This article is based on these frameworks; it revises them together with those of Donnat and Lahire and postulates that the terms of cultural classification and especially those of the upper classes (distinguished and omnivorous) require revision. The article also claims that there are diverse socio-cultural profiles due to the fact that there is never a single logic of differentiation of tastes, and that the results of the present research demand a new conceptual framework capable of showing the operation of diverse logics of differentiation and hierarchy. In order to do this, an analysis of the socio-cultural profiles of the cultivated groups in Spanish society is carried out on the data obtained from the Survey of Cultural Habits and Practices in Spain 2018/19. This work proves the existence of three types of cultivated population – classical, modern and syncretic – with notable differences in their cultural interests and practices, as well as in their underlying sociodemographic features and aesthetic logics, and concludes by posing the need to delve into the latter in what it defines as the study of cultural practice regimes.

Afuerxs and Cultural Practice in Shadowshaper and Labyrinth Lost

2020 ◽  
pp. 74-87
Author(s):  
Domino Pérez
Keyword(s):  
Young Adult ◽  
Young Women ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
Great Power ◽  
Physical Form ◽  
Cultural Communities

In the young adult novels Shadowshaper (2015) by Daniel José Older and Labyrinth Lost (2016) by Zoraida Córdova, Sierra Santiago and Alejandra Mortiz are the inheritors of great power in their respective cultural communities: shadowshaping, the ability to provide spirits with a physical form through drawing, murals, sculpture, or storytelling; and the Deathday, a ceremony to celebrate a bruja (or brujo) receiving her particular ability, including elemental control, healing, and/or defense, among others. Yet initially, through acts of refusal, the young women are outside of the material, ritual, and cultural practices of their communities.

Cultural practice and perception

1997 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 189-190
Author(s):  
Angus Gellatly
Keyword(s):  
Visual Experience ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Adult Humans ◽  
The Cross

In adult humans, conscious visual experience – including that of colour – is shaped by particular cultural practices, as evidenced in the cross-cultural literature. In addition, the practices of our own culture already inform attempts to assess the “natural” experience of newborns or other animals.

scholarly journals Influence of cultural practices on food waste in South Africa—a review

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Lethabo Phasha ◽  
Gomotsegang F. Molelekwa ◽  
Matlou I. Mokgobu ◽  
Thabiso J. Morodi ◽  
Michael M. Mokoena ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Human Health ◽  
Food Waste ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Poverty Line ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
Major Influence ◽  
Poor People ◽  
Social Events ◽  
The Government

Abstract Background, aim, and objectives The purpose of the review is to assess the cultural practices and its influence on food waste in South Africa. Furthermore, it explores the reasons for food waste by looking at different cultural practice of various ethnic groups in South Africa. The growing concern of the challenges of waste on human health and the environment has pressured the world to come up with drastic measures on how to manage waste to reduce both environmental and public health impacts. One of the concerns is that food waste has become one of the main contributors to increased greenhouse gas emissions. However, South Africa does not have stringent measures to control or reduce food waste in its communities. Methods An extensive online search was conducted to assess the influence of culture on food waste in South Africa and explore how other countries’ cultural practices contribute to food waste. Information was retrieved from online reports, journals, and books. Results and conclusions The studies showed a diversity of cultures and practices in South Africa compared to other countries. For example, in affluent countries where food is available in large quantities, cultural practices have a major influence on food waste. Moreover, some studies highlighted the fact that even though most developing countries are overwhelmed by poor people, many of whom live below the poverty line, food waste is also a challenge. In South Africa, food waste generated during social activities that are related to cultural practices remains a serious challenge. This is because during the cultural and social events, food is prepared in large quantities, which ends up not being wholly consumed and resulting in an increase in food waste that gets disposed of at the landfill sites. The government of South Africa must institute awareness raising measures to inform communities to avoid or reduce the generation of food waste. This would reduce the emission of greenhouse gases and environmental impact, and to protect human health.

STUDIES ON FOOT AND ROOT ROT OF WHEAT: IV. EFFECT OF CROP ROTATION AND CULTURAL PRACTICE ON THE RELATIVE PREVALENCE OF HELMINTHOSPORIUM SATIVUM AND FUSARIUM SPP. AS INDICATED BY ISOLATIONS FROM WHEAT PLANTS

1934 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-124 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. C. Broadfoot
Keyword(s):  
Root Rot ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Fusarium Culmorum ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
Root Tissue ◽  
Fusarium Spp ◽  
Crown Tissue ◽  
Helminthosporium Sativum ◽  
Relative Prevalence ◽  
Marked Tendency

The crown and root tissue from 43,305 of 47,360 plants examined in this investigation yielded Helminthosporium sativum, Fusarium culmorum and other Fusarium spp., either alone or in combination with these or other fungi and bacteria. It was the exception for any mature plant, the surface tissue of which was disinfected, to be free from fungi or bacteria. None of the various crop sequences or cultural practices used in this study appeared to significantly affect more than another the relative prevalence of either H. sativum or Fusarium spp., as indicated by isolations from the crown tissue of wheat. However, as there was a marked tendency at certain stations each year for H. sativum or Fusarium spp. to predominate, it was concluded that certain factors of the environment were more effective than the crop sequence in modifying the relative prevalence of the two fungi mentioned in the crown and root tissue of wheat plants.

Creolization

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ben Etherington
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Change ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Cultural Theory ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
Caribbean Basin ◽  
Home Culture ◽  
Kamau Brathwaite ◽  
Heated Debate ◽  
The Caribbean ◽  
Interdisciplinary Exchange

Creolization is a key concept in studies of cultural change in colonial conditions. Most typically, it refers to a mode of cultural transformation undertaken by people from different cultural groups who converge in a colonial territory to which they have not previously belonged. This was especially pronounced in the slave plantation economies of the Caribbean basin, where the indigenous peoples largely were wiped out or deported during colonization and the societies that replaced them were largely developed from the intermixture of transplanted Europeans and enslaved Africans. Creolization has been theorized in many different ways by scholars in disciplines across the humanities and social sciences. Three common features can usually be discerned among the diversity of uses found for the term: (1) Creolization involves a “double adaptation” as those arriving into a colonial territory adapt to the new environment and to each other. This usually is driven by those who have no prospect of returning to their home culture and who suffer the effects of racial domination. (2) Creolization has a “nativizing” trajectory according to which the cultural practices formed through the process of mixing and adaptation become a group’s “home” culture. (3) Creolization is incessant: it never arrives finally at a stable cultural compound, but continually undergoes further inter-culturation and transformation. That a diversity of disciplines have found productive use for the concept has made for both rich interdisciplinary exchange and a complex and often contradictory array of different understandings. To navigate the terrain, it is helpful to distinguish between maximalist and particularist positions and between analytic, descriptive, and normative modes of usage. Maximalists tend to abstract from the exemplary creolizing processes found in the Caribbean basin to think about how cultural mixing operates across a world shaped by globalizing imperialism. Particularists tend to stress the uniqueness of the Caribbean (and a small number of other colonial plantation contexts) and local specificities of intermixture, cultural practice, and identification. This polarity often corresponds to modes of interpretation and analysis: particularists tend to use creolization in a descriptive capacity, and maximalists in an analytic capacity. Normative uses can go both ways, affirming either the specificity of Caribbean cultural mixing or the condition of global modernity writ large as being one of mixture and hybridity. In the literary sphere, the contest between particularist and maximalist positions was starkly evident in a heated debate over the term Créolité. This was sparked when a group of male Martinican writers placed Caribbean Creole identity at the center of a creative manifesto. Literary studies of creolization have tended to borrow heavily from creole linguistics (“creolistics”) and cultural theory. For some, literary creolization is simply the literary use of a creole language. This places emphasis almost entirely on linguistic criteria. Cultural theory, and especially the speculative work of Édouard Glissant, has given others a way of thinking inventively about creolization as a space of cross-cultural cultural emergence. A quite different approach can be extrapolated from the historical work of the poet Kamau Brathwaite on “creole society.” In it, creolization is conceived not as a single process but as a totality of concurrent and interacting processes. Understood this way, literary creolization can be studied as one form of creolization within an ensemble of creolizing processes, one that proceeds according to the technical, formal, and aesthetic demands specific to literary practice.

St. Paul and Culture

1997 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-101
Author(s):  
Fergus King
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
Community Life ◽  
Christian Life ◽  
Authentic Community ◽  
In Christ

AbstractIn this article, Fergus King examines the writings of St. Paul, particularly the letters to the Romans and the Galatians and the first letter to the Corinthians, in an attempt to discern Paul's attitude toward culture. Taking issue with H. R. Niebuhr's identification of Paul with his "Christ and culture in paradox" paradigm, King argues that Paul's--and by implication, Christians'-- attitude toward culture is--and should be--complex and flexible. Paul's criteria regarding the acceptability of such cultural practices as eating food offered to idols and Jewish circumcision are, first, soteriological and, second, pastoral. The question of the suitability of cultural practices for Christians is not an abstract one, but one that must be answered in the concrete context of Christian life: Does a cultural practice or value diminish faith in Christ? Does a practice or value place obstacles before one's own faith, or the faith of others? Rather than thinking in terms of a universally applicable principle, King suggests that the Christian attitude toward culture should be shaped in relation to human salvation and authentic community life.

INFLUENCE OF CULTURAL PRACTICES ON SOCIAL SUPPORT OF FEMALE ENTREPRENEURS' STARTUPS

2018 ◽  
Vol 23 (01) ◽  
pp. 1850007 ◽  
Author(s):  
TIANJIAO QIU
Keyword(s):  
Social Support ◽  
Hierarchical Linear Modeling ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Future Orientation ◽  
Power Distance ◽  
Cultural Practice ◽  
Uncertainty Avoidance ◽  
Female Entrepreneurs ◽  
Performance Orientation ◽  
Gender Egalitarianism

Social support of female entrepreneurs' startups is critical for the sustainable development of female entrepreneurship in a country. This study empirically tests how nine cultural practices, including performance orientation, uncertainty avoidance, in-group collectivism, power distance, gender egalitarianism, humane orientation, institutional collectivism, future orientation and assertiveness, impact social support of female entrepreneurs' startups across different countries. For the period between 2009 and 2012, sixty-two countries were analyzed using longitudinal data with hierarchical linear modeling techniques. The empirical findings demonstrate three cultural practices (power distance, uncertainty avoidance and future orientation) play major roles in explaining the variation of social support of female entrepreneurs. In contrast, the effects of cultural practices of human orientation, institutional collectivism, in-group collectivism, assertiveness, gender egalitarianism and performance orientation are negligible. Further moderation tests show that a country's macroeconomic environment significantly moderates the relationship between the cultural practice of uncertainty avoidance and social support of female entrepreneurs' startups. The findings provide practical guidance to policymakers on how to develop robust ecosystems with strong cultural practices that enhance social support of female entrepreneurs.

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