Social, Behavioral Scientists Eligible to Apply for NSF S-STEM Grants
Solicitations are now being sought for the National Science Foundation’s Scholarships in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics program, and in an unheralded […]
Hetan Shah on Social Science and the Pandemic
“You don’t have to go back many months,” says Hetan Shah, the chief executive of the British Academy, in this Social Science Bites podcast, “for a period when politicians were relatively dismissive of experts – and then suddenly we’ve seen a shift now to where they’ve moved very close to scientists. And generally that’s a very good thing.”
That Warm, Fuzzy Feeling Has a Name: Kama Muta
Being moved, touched, team pride, patriotism, being touched by the Spirit, burning in the bosom, the feels, or even nostalgia. Many names for what Alan Fiske and his colleagues have determined is one emotion. So theycoined a scientific term for it, ‘kama muta.’
South Africa’s Universal Man: Johnny Clegg, 1953-2019
The late South African musician Johnny Clegg was also an anthropologist both formally, as a lecturer on ethnography, and informally as he continued a teaching career from the stage.
Writing Social Science Fiction in the Age of the Metrix
Burned out by the hamster-wheel of academe and the regime of metrics, John Postill decided the tonic would be to write a spoof spy thriller about a Spanish nerd with a silly name who moves to London in 1994 and accidentally foils a terrorist plot by an evil anthropologist.
Why We Sometimes Hate the Good Guy
Everyone is supposed to cheer for good guys. We’re supposed to honor heroes, saints and anyone who helps others, and we should only punish the bad guys. But is the expression ‘no good deed goes unpunished’ really accurate? New research shows we often do, in fact, punish those who do good deeds.
Nick Seaver on Dissecting the Algorithmic Organism
When discussing the nexus of computer science and social science, the transaction is usually in one direction – what can computer scientists do for social scientists. But a recent paper from Tufts University anthropologist Nick Seaver reverses that flow, using the tool of ethnography to interrogate the tools of engineering.
The Anthropological Roots of Ursula Le Guin
A connection can be made in between Ursula Le Guin’s fiction and her father’s groundbreaking work in anthropology. His ideas – which had a profound influence on his daughter’s writing – stemmed from an important development in the discipline of anthropology, one that viewed human culture as something that wasn’t ingrained, and had to be taught and learned.
Scott Atran on Sacred Values
In this Social Science Bites podcast, anthropologist Scott Atran describes how ‘sacred values’ prove remarkably immune to negotiation and can empower vicious terrorism or victorious revolution.
