Vital Relations
Vital Relations

Author: Susan McKinnon

Publisher: School for Advanced Research Press

Published: 2013

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781938645013

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For more than 150 years, theories of social evolution, development, and modernity have been unanimous in their assumption that kinship organizes simpler, "traditional," pre-state societies but not complex, "modern," state societies. And these theories have been unanimous in their presupposition that within modern state-based societies kinship has been relegated to the domestic domain, has lost its economic and political functions, has retained no organizing force in modern political and economic structures and processes, and has become secularized and rationalized. Vital Relations challenges these notions. It will be of interest to anyone who wishes to gain a different perspective on the concept of modernity itself, and on the place of kinship and "family" in modern life.

Vital Decomposition
Vital Decomposition

Author: Kristina M. Lyons

Publisher: Duke University Press

Published: 2020-04-17

Total Pages: 149

ISBN-13: 1478009209

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In Colombia, decades of social and armed conflict and the US-led war on drugs have created a seemingly untenable situation for scientists and rural communities as they attempt to care for forests and grow non-illicit crops. In Vital Decomposition Kristina M. Lyons presents an ethnography of human-soil relations. She follows state soil scientists and peasants across labs, greenhouses, forests, and farms and attends to the struggles and collaborations between farmers, agrarian movements, state officials, and scientists over the meanings of peace, productivity, rural development, and sustainability in Colombia. In particular, Lyons examines the practices and philosophies of rural farmers who value the decomposing layers of leaves, which make the soils that sustain life in the Amazon, and shows how the study and stewardship of the soil point to alternative frameworks for living and dying. In outlining the life-making processes that compose and decompose into soil, Lyons theorizes how life can thrive in the face of the violence, criminalization, and poisoning produced by militarized, growth-oriented development.

All Our Relations
All Our Relations

Author: Winona LaDuke

Publisher: Haymarket Books

Published: 2017-01-15

Total Pages: 257

ISBN-13: 1608466612

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How Native American history can guide us today: “Presents strong voices of old, old cultures bravely trying to make sense of an Earth in chaos.” —Whole Earth Written by a former Green Party vice-presidential candidate who was once listed among “America’s fifty most promising leaders under forty” by Time magazine, this thoughtful, in-depth account of Native struggles against environmental and cultural degradation features chapters on the Seminoles, the Anishinaabeg, the Innu, the Northern Cheyenne, and the Mohawks, among others. Filled with inspiring testimonies of struggles for survival, each page of this volume speaks forcefully for self-determination and community. “Moving and often beautiful prose.” —Ralph Nader “Thoroughly researched and convincingly written.” —Choice

Vital Diplomacy
Vital Diplomacy

Author: Chloe Nahum-Claudel

Publisher: Berghahn Books

Published: 2017-11-01

Total Pages: 301

ISBN-13: 1785334077

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In Brazil, where forest meets savanna, new towns, agribusiness and hydroelectric plants form a patchwork with the indigenous territories. Here, agricultural work, fishing, songs, feasts and exchanges occupy the Enawenê-nawê for eight months of each year during a season called Yankwa. Vital Diplomacy focuses on this major ceremonial cycle to shed new light on classic Amazonian themes such as kinship, gender, manioc cultivation and cuisine, relations with non-humans and foreigners, and the interplay of myth and practice, exploring how ritual contains and diverts the threat of violence by reconciling antagonistic spirits, coordinating social and gender divides, and channelling foreign relations and resources.