Anthropological Niche

I have been hesitant to write a piece about the death of Clause Levi-Strauss because I have been busy reading what everyone else has to say about his impact on anthropology and the general study of human behavior.

I suppose I will just provide three links... news, blogs and obituaries.

In a Time Magazine interview, Karen Ho describes her applied anthropological research on Wall Street.  From the article,

What I found in my research was that in many ways investment bankers and how they approach work became a model for how work should be conducted. Wall Street shapes not just the stock market but also the very nature of employment and what kinds of workers are valued. These firms sit at the nexus — they are the financial advisers and sources of expertise to major U.S. corporations and institutional investors — and from this highly empowered middle-man role, what they say has a lot of influence.

On the American Anthropological Association Blog, Brian has posted videos of talks about how anthropology has informed technology.  As per the blog, the speaker is "Genevieve Bell, Intel fellow and director of the User Experience Group at Intel’s Digital Home Group".

The Sun has recently posted a pictorial story about the people living in the storm drains under Las Vegas.  It reminds me of The Mole People: Life in the Tunnels Beneath New York City by Jennifer Toth.  I wonder how much truth is to be found in both of these stories...