Anthropology News 

About: Anthropology News is an academic journal published by Wiley. The journal publishes majorly in the area(s): Applied anthropology & Sociocultural anthropology. It has an ISSN identifier of 1541-6151. Over the lifetime, 1855 publications have been published receiving 7792 citations. The journal is also known as: AN.

Anthropology of Policy

Abstract: Anthropological Findings and Contributions The call for attention to women’s issues even inspired the Toronto Star to highlight anthropological fi ndings, usually given short shrift by press at the IAS conferences. In somewhat journalistic style, “How Equality Saved a Tribe,” was the lead featured on the front page for the opening weekend, a description of research conducted by Richard Lee and myself. In an interview with reporters, Lee noted that up till now, women living in the Ju’/hoansi villages of the Kalahari appear to have more fl exibility to negotiate their relations with Ju men and lower rates of AIDS than the surrounding populations. Although this situation is rapidly changing as roads, tourism, housing construction and other forms of investment engulf the Ju region, Ju women and men have joined village councils in the attempt to limit the dangerous impact of such developments. In most parts of southern Africa today, the onewoman-to-one-man HIV prevalence ratio found at the onset of the epidemic is now three young girls to one young man in the 15–29 age groups. In the face of such disproportionate rising rates of HIV/AIDS among women and particularly the growing mortality rates of young girls, some concerned health leaders are now calling for interventions with men, as those generally wielding greater power in heterosexual relationships. But as the many speakers at the IAS demonstrate, women’s mobilization is still of prime importance. No less significant than recognizing the changing views of men and women, is to understand the perceptions among cosmopolitan policymakers in New York, Washington DC and Geneva. What options do such influential groups regard as culturally appropriate for the women confronting the epidemic? International decision-makers and local governments and health professionals, relying on static images of tradition, culture and modesty, can too easily fail to grasp the capacities of people to change and learn new methods or for communities to work collectively against the epidemic. Women and men are already constructively responding to desperate circumstances. Early in the conference, plenaries shaped by boards and funders presented AIDS as a measurable problem with scientific solutions. Meanwhile, in the Women’s Networking Zone of the Global Village (where activists did not have to pay the $1,000 registration fee), on panels, over coffee, neglected by daily press reports, women worked to craft a social movement that would confront the real dilemmas of grassroots change in the political-economic sphere where AIDS does its deadly work.