Journal Analysis

The journal that I have been reading from for my blog posts is Medical Anthropology Quarterly, which is published for the Society for Medical Anthropology by the American Anthropological Association. It addresses topics in human health and disease from an anthropological perspective.  Now for the rhetorical analysis...  

The structure of the material that I read in Medical Anthropology Quarterly was all scholarly journal articles that were divided into specific headings, like most other professional articles are divided.  The abstract section at the beginning of each article gave a preview of what was going to be discussed in the article, but as Linton mentioned, there was never really a conclusion or explicit main idea listed in the abstract.  The abstract just contained the reason that the research was being done, the main idea, and the researcher's hypothesis about the subject.  The headings in the article can be somewhat confusing if you are not familiar with the layout of journal articles because they seem to list things somewhat out of order, but once you understand the flow of journal articles, they are almost easier to read and understand than regular papers. 

The referencing done in the articles in Medical Anthropology Quarterly were just like those of most science type writing because the research done is all building on existing work.  The journal articles were not meant to replace any previous research that was done on the subject, but to expand on the topics and note any major changes that have occurred since the last research was done.  The formatting of the references are not in direct quotes like those of writing in the humanities. All of the references are integrated into the text, with only the most important parts of the information listed. 

The language of the articles also has a very scientific tone.  Many of the articles that I read were actually just building on previous research, and tying different areas of previous research together, not really disagreeing with previous researchers.  However, the disagreement that is expressed in some of the articles is directed toward the methodologies used, not one person in particular.  One convention that is used in the articles, that was mentioned by Linton is "hedging".  The researchers carefully added in phrases such as "it is reasonable to conclude" and "the research suggests".  These phrases convey a slight doubt or serve as a notice that their research is not a 100% fact, it is just that, research.

The epistemology of the articles has a very realist tone.  The writing is not meant to be flowery or include any unnecessary details.  The words are used to convey the research that was done, not be entertaining.  In this way, the reader is supposed to "look through" the writing and understand the point that the writer is getting across, not analyze the way that it is written. This is why many scientific journal articles are written in the same format.  People reading the article can skip to specific sections in order to read the part that they are interested and all of the information is very concise. 

I think that the audience for Medical Anthropology Quarterly is mainly the medical population that is interested in anthropological research.  The articles are heavy in medical jargon, and many of them reference previous studies in a way that makes it seem like you are expected to have previous knowledge of these research studies.  Someone with less of a medical background would be capable of reading the journal, but it would just take longer to figure out what the article was actually trying to convey.

Traditional vs. Modern Medical Practices

This week I read another article about islands out in the Pacific Ocean.  This time, the article that I read focuses specifically on on the Tonga Islands, which are an archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean south of Samoa, also known as the Friendly Islands.  Tonga is made up of 176 islands, 36 of them are inhabited. The article that I read focuses on the health care system of the islands. 

Tonga serves as example of enduring medical pluralism which incorporates traditional medical practice and Western medical practice, while accommodating contemporary political and social change. Western formal medicine is represented by the hospitals and the community health centers, and  traditional, native medicine is practiced in homes healers. Both types of therapies are popularly used for different ailments or for the same problem at different points in the illness.  

This coexistence of medical traditions is very common throughout the world, Tonga is just seen as a very clear example of this cooperation. In the United States many old world treatments are no longer seen as valid, but the people in Tonga continue to use many of these treatments because they seem to ease the pain of illnesses and give the people more peace of mind. 

The main reason that the traditional and modern treatments coexist so well in Tonga is that there is no real organized health care system on the islands, so people just try a variety of treatments until one works.  This seems to work for the people on the islands because they do not have the money to create an organized health care system.  

I found this article to be interesting because there are many things about the Tongan health care ideas that are so different than ours in the United States, and there are some that are extremely similar.  The Tongan system is like health care in the Untied States in the 1700's  mixed with the latest and greatest biomedical advances, all at one time.

Navajo Alcohol Abuse

The article that I read this week is about the changes in patterns of alcohol use and abuse among Navajo Indians from the mid-1960s to the late 1990s.  Historically the Navajo have been widely criticized for their alcohol abuse.  The prevalence of alcohol dependence in the Navajo remains higher than in the general United States population, but remission is much more common in the Navajo people than was initially thought.  The Native American (peyote) Church has been widely credited with helping people stop alcohol use and abuse.

This study helped to shed light on the reasons why the Navajo tend to abuse alcohol. Navajo men have much higher rates of alcohol dependence than women.  The men tend to engage in heavy drinking in response to the drinking of those around them. But it has been shown that Navajo women tend to drink in response to psychiatric disorders, depression, and abuse by their partners.

This study shows an encouraging trend amongst the Navajo.  They still have a higher prevalence of alcohol abuse than the general population, but the Church and other rehabilitation programs focused on the Navajos are slowly helping to reverse this trend.   

Carolina in the Carolines

The title of the article that I read this week is "Carolina in the Carolines: A Survey of Patterns and Meanings of Smoking on a Micronesian Island".  First of all, you might be asking, what/where are the Micronesian Islands? Micronesia is subregion of Oceania.  It is made up of thousands of small islands in the western Pacific Ocean. Micronesia is found to the west of the Phillipines and Indonesia.

The title of this study is meant to show the connection between the Caroline Islands, found in Micronesia, and the Carolinas of the United States.  This connection comes from the "tobacco road" that originally referred to the tobacco-producing area of North Carolina, and the American manufactured tobacco products that people in Micronesia have now begun to consume.

People in the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) were considered to be unusual for not using any psychoactive substances before contacting the outside world.  Tobacco was the first of these substances that were brought to the islands, and now they have been exposed to alcohol, marijuana, and betel.  However, cigarettes  remain the most widely consumed of these substances. 

This study looks at the way that cigarettes have been marketed to the FSM and the effect that cigarettes have had on the country as a whole. FSM smokers are hooked on cigarettes and spend a large amount of their small income on purchasing them.  The World Health Organization has deemed tobacco use as the number one preventable cause of death.  However, cigarettes are continually sold because of the high profit (average profit margin of about 35 cents per cigarette in 1994) and the highly addictive nature of tobacco. In fact, the study found that 20% of smokers in FSM smoke more than 20 cigarettes a day! 

Young people are initiated into smoking by taking a drag of another person's cigarette on the islands.  This shows some of the cultural motives for smoking in the FSM.  The study also found that the islanders prefer Winstons over the previously popular unfiltered Camels.  The brands that the islanders prefer may have changed over time, but the study shows that the demand for cigarettes from the United States continues to remain consistent.  

                     

Schizophrenia Stigma

I am a biology major, so I have chosen to read from Medical Anthropology Quarterly, which is a  journal that publishes research and theory in the field of medical anthropology. 

If you want to know what medical anthropology is, you can check out the Wikipedia entry, but it's "citation may be unclear", so as usual, use at your own risk. But basically medical anthropology looks at health and disease in humans and populations from a more holistic and cross-cultural perspective than usual medical studies do. 


The study that I chose to read about is called "Stigma Despite Recovery".  This study identifies the strategies used by people with schizophrenia-related illness to resist the social stigma associated with their disorder and addresses the experiences that they must go through everyday. In the study, 96% of the participants reported experiencing some sort of social stigma due to their disorder.


This study is considered to be significant right now because a new generation of anti-psychotic drugs has allowed people with schizophrenia and other related disorders to carry on more "normal" lives and keep their psychotic episodes to a minimum. 

The title of the study, "Stigma Despite Recovery" refers to the idea that the patients have begun to recover/have recovered from their schizophernia, thanks to the new drugs, but these people still have a social stigma surrounding their mental illness.

Some of the common strategies found to avoid social stigma are:

• Concealing diagnosis or medications
• Avoiding others 
• Attempting to pass for normal
• De-emphasizing the illness 
• Educating others about mental illness 
• Confrontation and opposition
• Humor and joking
• Socializing with others with mental illness or those who sympathize 

Each strategy to avoid social stigma can be considered beneficial or detrimental, based on the situation.  But I think that the most interesting strategy is known as "reproduction of stigma".  This is when people with schizophrenia make a clear distinction between themselves and others with similar illnesses in order to keep themselves from being included in the "mentally ill" category. I think this is interesting because those people that are reproducing the stigma are also the ones who are trying to avoid stigma themselves.  The whole thing is just a vicious cycle, really.  People are always going to compare themselves to others that are "lower" or "sicker" than them in order to make themselves feel better. 

Genres...

The concept of a genre seems like a simple idea, but in reality it is very complex, as shown by the Miller article that we are reading in class.  Most people give no consideration to what a genre is/how they are decided.  On a basic level I think that genres are a necessary evil.  I understand some of the points that Miller presents about how a genre should present the end goal of something, not just what that something contains.  But when it comes to something like music, how would you decide WHAT the goal of that music is?  I feel like you do need to classify the music on the specific things that it contains, otherwise how are you going to find what you are looking for? Or either I am just used to music being grouped by country, rock, hip hop, disco, etc.

On the other hand, there are now countless different genres of music, as shown in the picture below...

People make up these genres everyday, so it becomes difficult to sort out what they all mean.  And many artists can be categorized into multiple genres, where do they show up in i-Tunes or in Wal Mart?  I don't really have the answers to any of these questions, I just find it interesting.  So if anyone can enlighten me, please do.

Wikipedia

Wikipedia has always been a topic of much debate in classes.  I honestly didn't realize that you could edit Wikipedia until my freshman year of college.  Yeah, just a minor detail that I managed to overlook all through all of high school.  I discovered that Wikipedia wasn't 100% reliable when one of my friends edited an article about his hometown and listed himself as the mayor of the town. 

Now there are a lot more checks in place to make sure that articles remain as accurate as possible.  In order to edit an article you have to register a username, so I would imagine that keeps some people from editing just for fun.  Also, you can view the history of editing on each article by clicking the "View History" tab in the top right corner.  The only problem with this is that each person is listed by their user name, not their actual name, as Andrew Keen mentioned in the Wales-Keen debate.  So you only know as much about a person as they list on their user page.

However, I don't think that Wikipedia should be totally banned when writing papers.  I understand why you wouldn't want to use it as your primary source, but I think that Wikipedia is a great place to start out looking for basic information.  You just have to make sure to double check all of the information that you find if you aren't familiar with the topic that you are looking at.