Prof. G - Just some thoughts on your posts of late

I have been really enjoying the comments and reactions to Majora Carter's TED Talk and the post on Social Responsibility. I wished more of you responded to my previous post about whether "individual" or "fear" are social constructs. I am very interested in leading you all to consider that if most ideas we live by are socially constructed, like myths we live by, and all human cultures have their own way of thinking, believing, behaving and feeling about this common humanity we share, why is it so difficult to change something we made up? How do we get stuck with these things? It has implications for economics, for how we talk about our times. "We are in a financial crisis" gives a particular point of view of life when we might have had the same amount of money or even more during the Clinton administration boom and been worse off. Why?

Daniela was responding to the TED talk about the South Bronx with Majora Carter who is an excellent and passionate non-profit leader for greening the ghetto. Daniela as well as Edwin made some AWESOME comments--go back and read them. But often we can talk about change and what's missing but because we live in the US more often than not we have the luxury of talking but not necessarily acting.

We have so many luxuries here in the U.S. The luxury of a democracy, of money, of our position in the world, of choice, of free speech. They are awesome and wouldn't trade em for the world.

“Most of the luxuries and many of the so-called comforts of life, are not only not indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind”

Henry David Thoreau (American Essayist, Poet and Philosopher, 1817-1862)

What do you think would have Thoreau say this and what about what you learned this semester from doing/reading/participating-observing/writing about anthropology, what aspects of what you have learned would you use as evidence for your answer?

AFTERTHOGHT: Hey what if "luxury" is something you can simply create (words create worlds)? What would you create in your speaking and how? Maybe it begins with simple pleasures.

Applying Anthropology: Who Identifies the Needs of Locals?

Applied Anthropology is distinct from the academic or theoretical side of the discipline. Through the use of anthropological data, theory, and methods to identify, assess, and solve contemporary problems involving HUMAN BEHAVIOR and social and cultural forces, conditions and contexts. The ethnographic method is an invaluable tools for learning and studying the local firsthand. So who should identify the needs of the local people? Is it the ethnographer, the scientist, who returns home after fieldwork? Or the cultural consultants, the insiders, the locals themselves?

Here's an example of a local from the South Bronx determining development needs for her community. Applied anthropology empowers local people to fulfill their own needs.

Talks Majora Carter: Greening the ghetto