Susan Greenhalgh

Bio: Susan Greenhalgh is an academic researcher from Harvard University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Population & China. The author has an hindex of 39, co-authored 87 publications receiving 11851 citations. Previous affiliations of Susan Greenhalgh include University of California, Irvine & Population Council.

Encountering Development: The Making and Unmaking of the Third World.

Abstract: Preface to the 2012 Edition vii Preface xlv CHAPTER 1: Introduction: Development and the Anthropology of Modernity 3 CHAPTER 2: The Problematization of Poverty: The Tale of Three Worlds and Development 21 CHAPTER 3: Economics and the Space of Development: Tales of Growth and Capital 55 CHAPTER 4: The Dispersion of Power: Tales of Food and Hunger 102 CHAPTER 5: Power and Visibility: Tales of Peasants, Women, and the Environment 154 CHAPTER 6: Conclusion: Imagining a Postdevelopment Era 212 Notes 227 References 249 Index 275

The Cultural Contradictions of Motherhood

Abstract: \"Hays's intellectually incendiary Cultural Contradictions could add needed nuance to feminist thought-and perhaps ignite change in mothersi overburdened lives.\"-Phyllis Eckhaus, The Nation \"A lucid, probing examination of our culture's contradictory and troubled relationship to motherhood-and how it affects mothers. . . . A thoughtful analysis of the paradoxes that surround mothering. Hays is sensitive to the emotional issues involved-and equally astute in perceiving their sociopolitical context.\"-Kirkus Reviews \"A thoughtful and carefully written new book that provides excellent material for family demography or women's studies courses at the graduate level.\"-Sandra L. Hofferth, American Journal of Sociology An ideology of 'intensive mothering' exacerbates the inevitable tensions working mothers face, claims sociologist Sharon Hays. While women are expected to be nurturing and unselfish in their role as mothers, they are expected to be competitive and even ruthless at work. Drawing on ideas about mothering since the Middle Ages, on contemporary childrearing manuals, and on in-depth interviews, Hays shows that 'intensive mothering' is a powerful contemporary ideology. These unrealistic expectations of mothers, she suggests, reflect a deep cultural ambivalence about the pursuit of self-interest.

Sexual Stratification: The Other Side of "Growth with Equity" in East Asia

Abstract: This paper explores changes in womens status in postwar Taiwan with a focus on the perpetuation and even intensification of the traditional system of sexual stratification with rapid economic development. Using data primarily from northern Taiwan trends in inequality between sons and daughters in the 1960-78 period were examined with respect to 4 socioeconomic resources (education occupation income and property) and 3 areas of personal autonomy ( job selection residence and control of income). The data suggest that the postwar period intensified differences between sons and daughters in Taiwan in personal autonomy and the possession of socioeconomic resources. The central agents in this process were the parents themselves. They often required daughters to leave school early work at low status and poorly paying jobs and send large remittances to their parents. Parents used these remittances to finance higher education for their sons thus securing their own futures. These findings suggest that industrial capitalism has provided new means (education and jobs) for parents to use old tools (sex-differentiated intergenerational contracts) to exacerbate hierarchies based on sexual inequality. It is concluded that policymakers should direct more attention to the importance of womens status. Despite the shortterm benefits the traditional family system has provided for economic development it exerts an upward pressure on fertility and leads to the underutilization of womens labor power.

“Bowling Alone: America’s Declining Social Capital”

Abstract: After briefly explaining why social capital (civil society) is important to democracy, Putnam devotes the bulk of this chapter to demonstrating social capital’s decline in the United States across the last quarter century. (See Putnam 1995 for a similar but more detailed argument.) While he acknowledges that the significance of a few countertrends is difficult to assess without further study, Putnam concludes that crucial factors such as social trust are eroding rapidly in the United States. He offers some possible explanations for this erosion and concludes by outlining the work needed to consider these possibilities more fully.

Techniques to Identify Themes

Abstract: Theme identification is one of the most fundamental tasks in qualitative research. It also is one of the most mysterious. Explicit descriptions of theme discovery are rarely found in articles and reports, and when they are, they are often relegated to appendices or footnotes. Techniques are shared among small groups of social scientists, but sharing is impeded by disciplinary or epistemological boundaries. The techniques described here are drawn from across epistemological and disciplinary boundaries. They include both observational and manipulative techniques and range from quick word counts to laborious, in-depth, line-by-line scrutiny. Techniques are compared on six dimensions: (1) appropriateness for data types, (2) required labor, (3) required expertise, (4) stage of analysis, (5) number and types of themes to be generated, and (6) issues of reliability and validity.

Ethnography in/of the World System: The Emergence of Multi-Sited Ethnography

Abstract: This review surveys an emergent methodological trend in anthropological research that concerns the adaptation of long-standing modes of ethnographic practices to more complex objects of study. Ethnography moves from its conventional single-site location, contextualized by macro-constructions of a larger social order, such as the capitalist world system, to multiple sites of observation and participation that cross-cut dichotomies such as the “local” and the “global,” the “lifeworld” and the “system.” Resulting ethnographies are therefore both in and out of the world system. The anxieties to which this methodological shift gives rise are considered in terms of testing the limits of ethnography, attenuating the power of fieldwork, and losing the perspective of the subaltern. The emergence of multi-sited ethnography is located within new spheres of interdisciplinary work, including media studies, science and technology studies, and cultural studies broadly. Several “tracking” strategies that shape multi-site...

Social capital: implications for development theory, research, and policy

Abstract: In the 1990s the concept of social capital defined here as the norms and networks that enable people to act collectively enjoyed a remarkable rise to prominence across all the social science disciplines. The authors trace the evolution of social capital research as it pertains to economic development and identify four distinct approaches the research has taken : communitarian, networks, institutional, and synergy. The evidence suggests that of the four, the synergy view, with its emphasis on incorporating different levels and dimensions of social capital and its recognition of the positive and negative outcomes that social capital can generate, has the greatest empirical support and lends itself best to comprehensive and coherent policy prescriptions. The authors argue that a significant virtue of the idea of and discourse on social capital is that it helps to bridge orthodox divides among scholars, practitioners, and policymakers.

Sex differences in human mate preferences: Evolutionary hypotheses tested in 37 cultures

Abstract: Contemporary mate preferences can provide important clues to human reproductive history. Little is known about which characteristics people value in potential mates. Five predictions were made about sex differences in human mate preferences based on evolutionary conceptions of parental investment, sexual selection, human reproductive capacity, and sexual asymmetries regarding certainty of paternity versus maternity. The predictions centered on how each sex valued earning capacity, ambition— industriousness, youth, physical attractiveness, and chastity. Predictions were tested in data from 37 samples drawn from 33 countries located on six continents and five islands (total N = 10,047). For 27 countries, demographic data on actual age at marriage provided a validity check on questionnaire data. Females were found to value cues to resource acquisition in potential mates more highly than males. Characteristics signaling reproductive capacity were valued more by males than by females. These sex differences may reflect different evolutionary selection pressures on human males and females; they provide powerful cross-cultural evidence of current sex differences in reproductive strategies. Discussion focuses on proximate mechanisms underlying mate preferences, consequences for human intrasexual competition, and the limitations of this study.