Migrations And Cultures

nted brings his insight and erudition to bear on one of the key issues of the 1996 presidential campaign--immigration--supplying context, insight, and reason to an inflamed debate that could very well dissolve the social fabric of our country.

A landmark work on human migration around the globe, Cultures in Contact provides a history of the world told through the movements of its people. It is a broad, pioneering interpretation of the scope, patterns, and consequences of human migrations over the past ten centuries. In this magnum opus thirty years in the making, Dirk Hoerder reconceptualizes the history of migration and immigration, establishing that societal transformation cannot be understood without taking into account the impact of migrations and, indeed, that mobility is more characteristic of human behavior than is stasis. Signaling a major paradigm shift, Cultures in Contact creates an English-language map of human movement that is not Atlantic Ocean-based. Hoerder describes the origins, causes, and extent of migrations around the globe and analyzes the cultural interactions they have triggered. He pays particular attention to the consequences of immigration within the receiving countries. His work sweeps from the eleventh century forward through the end of the twentieth, when migration patterns shifted to include transpacific migration, return migrations from former colonies, refugee migrations, and distinct regional labor migrations in the developing world. Hoerder demonstrates that as we enter the third millennium, regional and intercontinental migration patterns no longer resemble those of previous centuries. They have been transformed by new communications systems and other forces of globalization and transnationalism.

Around the globe, people leave their homes to better themselves, to satisfy needs, and to care for their families. They also migrate to escape undesirable conditions, ranging from a lack of economic opportunities to violent conflicts at home or in the community. Most studies of migration have analyzed the topic at either the macro level of national and global economic and political forces, or the micro level of the psychology of individual migrants. Few studies have examined the "culture of migration"—that is, the cultural beliefs and social patterns that influence people to move. Cultures of Migration combines anthropological and geographical sensibilities, as well as sociological and economic models, to explore the household-level decision-making process that prompts migration. The authors draw their examples not only from their previous studies of Mexican Oaxacans and Turkish Kurds but also from migrants from Europe, sub-Saharan Africa, the Pacific, and many parts of Asia. They examine social, economic, and political factors that can induce a household to decide to send members abroad, along with the cultural beliefs and traditions that can limit migration. The authors look at both transnational and internal migrations, and at shorter- and longer-term stays in the receiving location. They also consider the effect that migration has on those who remain behind. The authors' "culture of migration" model adds an important new dimension to our understanding of the cultural beliefs and social patterns associated with migration and will help specialists better respond to increasing human mobility.

The tremendous increase in migrations and diasporas of human groups in the last decades are not only bringing along challenging issues for society, especially related to the economic and political management of multiculturalism and culturally effective health care, but they are also creating dramatic changes in traditional knowledge, believes and practices (KBP) related to (medicinal) plant use. The contributors to this volume – all internationally recognized scholars in the field of ethnobiology, transcultural pharmacy, and medical anthropology – analyze these dynamics of traditional knowledge in especially 12 selected case studies. Ina Vandebroek, features in Nova's "Secret Life of Scientists", answering the question: just what is ethnobotany?

nted brings his insight and erudition to bear on one of the key issues of the 1996 presidential campaign--immigration--supplying context, insight, and reason to an inflamed debate that could very well dissolve the social fabric of our country.

This book is the culmination of 15 years of research and travels that have taken the author completely around the world twice, as well as on other travels in the Mediterranean, the Baltic, and around the Pacific rim. Its purpose has been to try to understand the role of cultural differences within nations and between nations, today and over centuries of history, in shaping the economic and social fates of peoples and of whole civilizations. Focusing on four major cultural areas(that of the British, the Africans (including the African diaspora), the Slavs of Eastern Europe, and the indigenous peoples of the Western Hemisphere -- Conquests and Cultures reveals patterns that encompass not only these peoples but others and help explain the role of cultural evolution in economic, social, and political development.

International Migrations have become a central topic in the Humanities in the last years. Understanding migration requires a closer look at the migratory phenomena and the continuities within the societies involved in the migration process. This volume intends to overcome simplistic views on migration and the shortcomings of a push and pull-factor analysis. Instead, the perspective of the migrants themselves orients the approach of "cultures of migration". In this view, migration becomes a complex issue, and motives and acceptance of migration appear to be a matter of negotiations, in the migrants' societies of origin and in the host societies as well. The present volume brings together a number of essays exploring the cultures of migration in various contexts. It is organised in three sections, dealing with "Migrations as Encounters", "Migration as Challenge", and "Transcontinental Migrants". Ten contributions, each based on original fieldwork in various parts of Africa, examine the validity of the concept of "cultures of migration", as explained in the introduction.

“Anyone who believes that the American racial structure is characterized by unmovable white/black boundaries should read this book.” —Michèle Lamont, Harvard University, author of The Dignity of Working Men: Morality and the Boundaries of Race, Class, and Immigration In this groundbreaking study of Puerto Rican and Dominican migration to the United States, Wendy D. Roth explores the influence of migration on changing cultural conceptions of race—for the newcomers, for their host society, and for those who remain in the countries left behind. Just as migrants can gain new language proficiencies, they can pick up new understandings of race. But adopting an American idea about race does not mean abandoning earlier ideas. New racial schemas transfer across borders and cultures spread between sending and host countries. Behind many current debates on immigration is the question of how Latinos will integrate and where they fit into the US racial structure. Race Migrations shows that these migrants increasingly see themselves as a Latino racial group. Ultimately, Roth shows that several systems of racial classification and stratification co-exist in each place, in the minds of individuals and in their shared cultural understandings of “how race works.” “Superb . . . transcends the existing literature on migration and race.” —Michael Omi, University of California, Berkeley, co-author of Racial Formation in the United States “Provides important clarifications regarding the nature of racial orders in the United States and the Hispanic Caribbean.” —Mosi Adesina Ifatunji, Social Forces “Rich with insights.” —Richard Alba, The Graduate Center CUNY, author of Blurring the Color Line “Innovative ethnographic fieldwork . . . Recommended.” —E. Hu-DeHart, Choice “Insightful.” —Edward Telles, Princeton University, author of Race in Another America “A transformative book.” —Clara E. Rodriguez, Journal of American Studies