Nomads At The Crossroads

Nomadism as a way of life was a logical, valid and productive mode of existence. Pastoral nomads proved to be resistant to external forces. Their land, culture, lifestyle could not overrun by modern civilization. As the world economy is changing drastically, and pastoral nomads everywhere are facing the impact. The book contains interesting portraits of the life and livelihood of the various nomadic groups of the world. From marriage to religion, from animal husbandry to popular justice, all aspects of the culture and daily life of nomads are elaborately described. It also provides authentic information about the existing patterns of nomadic settlements and the challenges confronted by nomads from modern reforms.

The Middle East plays a major role in the history of genetic science. Early in the twentieth century, technological breakthroughs in human genetics coincided with the birth of modern Middle Eastern nation-states, who proclaimed that the region's ancient history—as a cradle of civilizations and crossroads of humankind—was preserved in the bones and blood of their citizens. Using letters and publications from the 1920s to the present, Elise K. Burton follows the field expeditions and hospital surveys that scrutinized the bodies of tribal nomads and religious minorities. These studies, geneticists claim, not only detect the living descendants of biblical civilizations but also reveal the deeper past of human evolution. Genetic Crossroads is an unprecedented history of human genetics in the Middle East, from its roots in colonial anthropology and medicine to recent genome sequencing projects. It illuminates how scientists from Turkey to Yemen, Egypt to Iran, transformed genetic data into territorial claims and national origin myths. Burton shows why such nationalist appropriations of genetics are not local or temporary aberrations, but rather the enduring foundations of international scientific interest in Middle Eastern populations to this day.

First published in 1997. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Discusses how pastoralists are coping and changing as the societies they inhabit change at an unprecedented pace.

Crossroads of Cuisine offers history of food and cultural exchanges in and around Central Asia. It discusses geographical base, and offers historical and cultural overview. A photo essay binds it all together. The book offers new views of the past.

You see them as faceless shapes on the median or in city parks. You recognize them by their cardboard signs, their bags of aluminum cans, or their weathered skin. But you do not know them. In Nomads of a Desert City Barbara Seyda meets the gazes of our homeless neighbors and, with an open heart and the eye of an accomplished photographer, uncovers their compelling stories of life on the edge. Byrdy is a teenager from Alaska who left a violent husband and misses the young daughter her mother now cares for. Her eyes show a wisdom that belies her youth. Samuel is 95 and collects cans for cash. His face shows a lifetime of living outside while his eyes hint at the countless stories he could tell. Lamanda worked as an accountant before an act of desperation landed her in prison. Now she struggles to raise the seven children of a woman she met there. DorothyÑwhose earliest memories are of physical and sexual abuseÑlives in a shelter, paycheck to paycheck, reciting affirmations so she may continue Òto grace the world with my presence.Ó They live on the streets or in shelters. They are women and men, young and old, Native or Anglo or Black or Hispanic. Their faces reflect the forces that have shaped their lives: alcoholism, poverty, racism, mental illness, and abuse. But like desert survivors, they draw strength from some hidden reservoir. Few recent studies on homelessness offer such a revealing collection of oral history narratives and compelling portraits. Thirteen homeless women and men open a rare window to enrich our understanding of the complex personal struggles and triumphs of their lives. Nomads of a Desert City sheds a glaring light on the shadow side of the American DreamÑand takes us to the crossroads of despair and hope where the human spirit survives.

Drawing on a variety of both narrative and archival sources, this study deals with the region of Adana and its new port-city Mersin as part of the transformation of the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century. The book analyzes the socio-economic side of the region’s emergence through cotton production and trade with its nomadic and migrant populaces.