I had a great time at Congress10 in Montreal last week. More properly, I attended the meetings of the Canadian Anthropology Association (CASCA) which happened to be meeting with Congress. As previously noted, I was part of a round-table discussion of applied anthropology. Our panel discussed the following, pre-distributed questions: 1) What questions are being [...]
I’ll be attending the Canadian Anthropology Society meetings (CASCA) next week. I am part of a round-table discussion on practicing (applied) anthropology. From the session abstract: This roundtable is aimed at sparking a dialogue with/between anthropologists who are practising largely outside academia or within academia but within a largely applied context … The roundtable will [...]
One of my summer projects is to learn more about public attitudes towards indigenous rights in British Columbia. I am also looking for current examples of the stigmas and stereotypes associated with indigenous hunting by non-native people (Figure 2, in which foraging is confused with pastoralism, for example). Conveniently, events surrounding a blockade in Tahltan [...]
Thursday, January 29, 2009
From CBC.ca: there are an estimated several hundred ethnographers in the country looking at the specific ways that workers handle “personal information,” like calendars and contact information.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
On the heels of my less-than-well-researched post about a free topographical map site — Ed pointed out how to get scanned versions of Canadian National Topographic Series (NTS) maps in the comments — let me point you to a terrific site for uploading GPS tracks and logs and plotting those tracks against all sorts of [...]
In his recent post titled “The Rise of Corporate Anthropology” (Harvard Business Online), Tom Davenport discusses the value of using anthropological methods in the corporate world. I am drawn particularly to his observation that anthropology and anthropologists can be difficult: Of course, it’s not easy. Anthropologists can be a pain in the butt. They will [...]
Thursday, October 18, 2007
A presentation by Nokia researcher Jan Chipchase is now available on TED.com. His talk is about cell phones and how to design the cell phones of the future. He asks why, regardless of culture, do people usually carry with them keys, money, and a cellphone. Some of Chipchase’s anecdotes come from observing cell phone users [...]
Thursday, October 4, 2007
Fast Company magazine, famous for its early coverage of corporate anthropology*, has a short piece this month (subscription may be required) on the research that went into Wrigley’s new gum ’5′. The descriptions of the participant-observation research are fantastic: The development of 5 came out of a management edict to make a splash among image-conscious [...]
Saturday, September 1, 2007
After blocking Royal Dutch Shell’s access to their hunting grounds on August 21, Tahltan elders have won a temporary court victory. Shell has postponed their injunction application indefinitely. This is the third summer in a row that Shell has tried to move into the Klappan region of northwestern BC. They own the permits to explore [...]
By now, this story on San Francisco coffee culture is ‘old news’ (March 11, 2007). But it is apropos of my recent link to another post on breakfast culture in Toronto. Besides, many of my students are researching coffeehouse behavior in Vancouver and wanted the link. If you have not read this piece on the [...]
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