Nabataean Seashell Trade

by

Emma Collett and Dr. David Johnson, Anthropology Department Introduction In Petra, Jordan the ancient civilization of the Nabataeans has been studied for hundreds of years. Even with these years of archaeological research and discovery some aspects of the Nabataean culture have not yet been extensively studied. This past Spring term the BYU archaeology department held […]

Converting Gendered Expectations: Emerging Feminist Discourse among Protestant and Seventh-Day Adventist Hmong

by

Stephanie Parsons and Dr. Jacob Hickman, Anthropology Department Introduction During my second week living in a Hmong village outside of Chiang Mai, I sat down with a middle-aged woman while she was working on her embroidery. She is a Protestant Christian who has been married twice, once to an old culture Hmong man, and currently […]

Up in Smoke: Conservation and Gender on Mount Kilimanjaro

by

Garret Nash and Greg Thompson, Department of Anthropology Introduction Initially, this project aimed to examine cultural factors influencing fuel sourcing habits around Mt. Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. In 2008, a study conducted by Prof. Jeffery Durrant of the BYU Geography Department found that the Chagga (an ethnic group which lives on the lower slopes of Mt. Kilimanjaro) […]

Transnationalism and Civic Engagement: An Ethnographic Study of the Hmong Diaspora in France

by

Introduction Faculty Mentor: Jacob Hickman, Anthropology Hmong are an ethnic minority group from southeast Asia who were displaced as refugees after the Second Indochina War. Before the war, Hmong lived in kinship-based, highland, semi-nomadic, subsistence-based farming communities. In these traditional villages, Hmong developed various means of social mediation and problem solving based on hierarchies of […]

Cerebral Lateralization of Second Language

by

Peterson, Emily Listening Right: Cerebral Lateralization of Second Language Faculty Mentor: Gregory A Thompson, Anthropology Introduction It has been generally accepted that language shows left-hemisphere dominance in right-handed monolinguals. In contrast, current models of L2 lateralization reveal no such consensus. Some studies (Galloway and Scarcella 1982; Gordon and Zatorre 1981; Paradis 1992) have either found […]

Somos Machistas: Paraguayan Perceptions on Machismo

by

Rachel Schwartz and Greg Thompson, Anthropology Introduction Throughout this paper I will argue that the actual real lives and behaviors of Paraguayan men are in contradiction to the discourse of Paraguayans about Paraguayan men. Paraguayans, through their discourse of machismo, have created an ideal type of machismo with carefully constructed categories which defines and describes […]

From Master to Pastor: Conversion, Continuity, and Change in Hills of Vietnam:

by

Danny Cardoza and Jacob Hickman, Anthropology Fong: Mentoring his students down to hell The deceased was damned to hell and there was nothing to be done about it. Of this, Fong was quite sure. It was surprising to hear such a simple pronouncement, which rendered the typically complicated set of Hmong funerary rites—whether ‘traditional’ or […]

Research and Conservation of Peruvian Textiles

by

Taralea Forster and Paul Stavast, Anthropology Department Introduction In 2014, a collection of pre-Columbian Andean textiles was acquired by BYU’s Museum of Peoples and Cultures. Prior to their arrival at the museum, the textiles had been held in poor storage conditions. They had been stored with acidic packing materials in a building with no temperature […]

Additive Schooling: Understanding Latino Education in a South Provo Elementary School

by

Hailey Leavitt and Gregory Thompson, Anthropology My research was a case study of an elementary school in South Provo – Franklin Elementary, which focuses on two, second grade classrooms and the homes of six Latino second grade students. It focused on the similarities and differences found between home and school environments and how they shaped […]