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This encyclopedia provides description and analysis of the terms, concepts and issues of social and cultural anthropology. International in authorship and coverage, this accessible work is fully indexed and cross-referenced.

Is religion best seen as only a cause of war, or is it a source of comfort for those caught up in conflict? Checkpoint, Temple, Church and Mosque is based on fieldwork in Sri Lanka’s most religiously diverse and politically troubled region in the closing years of the civil war. It provides a series of new and provocative arguments about the promise of a religiously based civil society, and the strengths and weaknesses of religious organisations and religious leaders in conflict mediation. It argues that for people trapped in long and violent conflicts, religion plays a contradictory role, often acting as a comforting and stabilising force but also, in certain situations, acting as a source of new conflict. Additionally, war itself can lead to profound changes in religious institutions: Catholic priests engage with Buddhist monks and new Muslim leaders, while Hindu temples and Pentecostal churches offer the promise of healing. This book will provoke new debate about the role of religious organisations and leaders in situations of extreme conflict and will be of great interest to students of anthropology, development studies, religious studies and peace/conflict studies.

In the past decade, Sri Lanka has been engulfed by political tragedy as successive governments have failed to settle the grievances of the Tamil minority in a way acceptable to the majority Sinhala population. The new Premadasa presidency faces huge economic and political problems with large sections of the island under the control of the Indian Peace-Keeping Force (IPKF) and militant separatist Tamil groups operating in the north and south.This book is not a conventional political history of Sri Lanka. Instead, it attempts to shed fresh light on the historical roots of the ethnic crisis and uses a combination of historical and anthropologial evidence to challenge the widely-held belief that the conflict in Sri Lanka is simply the continuation of centuries of animosity between the Sinhalese and the Tamils. The authors show how modern ethnic identities have been made and re-made since the colonial period with the war between Tamils and the Sinhala-dominant government accompanied by rhetorical wars over archeological sites and place-name etymologies, and the political use of the national past. The book is also one of the first attempts to focus on local perceptions of the crisis and draws on a broad range of sources, from village fieldwork to newspaper controversies. Its interest extends beyond contemporary politics to history, anthropology and development studies.

Written by leading scholars in the field, this comprehensive and readable resource gives anthropology students a unique guide to the ideas, arguments and history of the discipline. The fully revised and expanded second edition reflects major changes in anthropology in the past decade. Alan Barnard is Professor of the Anthropology of Southern Africa at the University of Edinburgh, and a Fellow of the British Academy. Jonathan Spencer is Professor of the Anthropology of South Asia at the University of Edinburgh, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. Preface. Acknowledgements. Introduction. How to Use this Book. List of Entries. List of Contributors. Analytical Table of Contents. Contributions by author. Entries A-Z. Biographical Appendix. Glossary. Name Index. People and Places Index. Subject Index. \"The best one-volume reference source on social and cultural anthropology ... Highly recommended.\" – Choice \"This is an inspired volume. If anyone doubts that anthropology is in a new phase, they should look at the manner in which Second Edition enlarges on the First. A formidable task this, here executed with wisdom, acumen and brilliant collaboration. But what is really inspiring is the way contributors have been teamed up with topics. Some classic pairings, but also interesting and surprising ones. And the quality of the entries makes this not just a book of reference but, almost wherever one lands, an exceedingly good read in its own right.\" - Marilyn Strathern, Emeritus Professor, Cambridge University \"This new edition is a magisterial work. Written by an erudite set of authors and edited with a sure hand, it is much more than a compendium of accumulated knowledge, although it is certainly that as well. It also maps the discipline as practiced today, pointing out its controversies and challenges, its critical edges, its areas of unsettlement. It is an indispensable source for anyone with an interest in things anthropological.\" - John and Jean Comaroff, University of Chicago \" Libraries that found the first edition useful should note that this, while it still contains much of what was in the previous version, has been very substantially expanded, updated and rewritten, so they will probably find it worth upgrading.\" – Reference Reviews \"...a useful addition to the toolkit that practitioners and students of the discipline already have for their research.\" \"...a good resource with many excellent contributions. It is a useful tool for students and scholars starting their research on new topics or wanting to know more about their discipline, its fields of research and different scholarly traditions that distinguish it.\" - Michele Filippo Fontefrancesco, Durham University

Written by leading scholars in the field, this comprehensive and readable resource gives anthropology students a unique guide to the ideas, arguments and history of the discipline. Combining anthropological theory and ethnography, it includes 275 substantial entries, over 300 short biographies of important figures in anthropology, and nearly 600 glossary items. The fully revised and expanded second edition reflects major changes in anthropology in the past decade.

Robust tools are needed to prioritise the management of invasive non-native species (INNS). Risk assessment is commonly used to prioritise INNS, but fails to take into account the feasibility of management. Risk management provides a structured evaluation of management options, but has received little attention to date. We present a risk management scheme to assess the feasibility of eradicating INNS that can be used, in conjunction with existing risk assessment schemes, to support prioritisation. The Non-Native Risk Management scheme (NNRM) can be applied to any predefined area and any taxa. It uses semi-quantitative response and confidence scores to assess seven key criteria: Effectiveness, Practicality, Cost, Impact, Acceptability, Window of opportunity and Likelihood of re-invasion. Scores are elicited using expert judgement, supported by available evidence, and consensus-building methods. We applied the NNRM to forty-one INNS that threaten Great Britain (GB). Thirty-three experts provided scores, with overall feasibility of eradication assessed as ‘very high’ (8 species), ‘high’ (6), ‘medium’ (8), ‘low’ (10) and ‘very low’ (9). The feasibility of eradicating terrestrial species was higher than aquatic species. Lotic freshwater and marine species scored particularly low. Combining risk management and existing risk assessment scores identified six established species as priorities for eradication. A further six species that are not yet established were identified as priorities for eradication on arrival as part of contingency planning. The NNRM is one of the first INNS risk management schemes that can be used with existing risk assessments to prioritise INNS eradication in any area.