Hmong textile with snail motif from www.lib.uci.edu/libraries/collections/sea/hmong.html
 Living in a
Pluralistic World

Anth 340 - Sonoma State University - Spring 2007
Taught by Dr. Bruce Owen
Hmong textile motifs from www.quiltersmuse.com/hmong_textile_art.htm

Updated on May 18
This is a PREVIOUS SEMESTER'S website
Some items are obsolete or no longer available.
 Click here for SSU's list of current class web pages
Click here for Bruce Owen's general web page, including old class pages


Click for assigned readings Click for virtual handouts Click for links to related web sites Click to email Bruce Owen

What's posted here?

  • Assigned readings: Online versions of readings from sources other than the books, as indicated in the syllabus.

  • Virtual Handouts: The syllabus, assignment information, study guides, and so on.

  • Links: Links to other web pages about subjects we cover. These are completely optional, but may help you study or pursue questions raised by the course. Many have good photos or maps that add a visual element to the readings. All are highly recommended, and many are fun.

  • Email: Click the "email" button to ask me a question or make a comment, to submit a draft for me to review, or to turn in the computer version of an assignment. If you are not using your own computer, be sure to include your email address so I can reply.

  • Everything on this site has been scanned for viruses and is safe to the best of my knowledge.

Assigned readings

Scroll down if you don't see what you need. If you have been here before, press your browser's "reload" button to see the latest additions. The readings are in PDF (Adobe Acrobat) format and will open in a new window. Move it aside or close it to see this one again. Most computers will open PDF files automatically to view, save, or print. If yours won't, download and install the free Adobe Acrobat Reader plugin for your browser.

Click to go to the free Adobe Acrobat Reader download page

Password: Due to copyright restrictions, some items require a class user ID and password, different from your Peoplesoft ID and password. I will announce these in class.
Be patient: Some items may take many seconds or even minutes to load, especially on a telephone modem connection. Please be patient.

Virtual handouts

Scroll down if you don't see what you need. If you have been here before, press your browser's "reload" button to see the latest additions. The virtual handouts are in PDF (Adobe Acrobat) format and will open in a new window. Move it aside or close it to see this one again. Most computers will open PDF files automatically to view, save, or print. If yours won't, download and install the free Adobe Acrobat Reader plugin for your browser.

Click to go to the free Adobe Acrobat Reader download page

Links to sites related to this course

Interesting, often illustrated, from easy to challenging... check these out. Some may help you prepare for tests or gather background for your critical summaries. Others take you to more about anthropology and class issues. All are optional. If you have been here before, press your browser's "reload" button to see the latest additions.

    General:

  • Anthropology in the News. Links to the latest finds, discoveries, and controversies in cultural anthro, linguistics, biological anthro, and archaeology. Updated frequently.


    Iraq:

  • Satellite photomap of Iraq. The best map I have seen for putting places in the context of mountains, desert, rivers, marshland, and irrigated areas. This is a large, high-resolution image. If it fits on your screen and is hard to read, your browser is shrinking it. Click it with the magnifying glass cursor or pick 100% size to see it clearly. Brought to you by your CIA. (632 Kb)

  • TrekShare: Travelers' pictures of Iraq in 2003. 300+ photos of people, places, and life in Iraq less than four years ago, with short captions, by trekker-tourists.

  • Camera Studies in Iraq (1925). 73 photos of people and places in Iraq, with sometimes archaic captions, taken around 1925.

  • Wikipedia article on Iraq. Lots of background information and links. Wikipedia is publicly edited and changes often, so there may be errors or biases on such a hot topic, but the info is usually good.

  • The Partisans of Ali: The Origins of the Shia-Sunni Split. National Public Radio story about Shi'ites, Sunnis, and history up to the present. Read the text, watch a narrated slideshow, hear the radio broadcast, see maps and images, or link to other aspects. Clear and concise, but skirts some political hot potatoes.


    Afghanistan:

  • Wikipedia article on Afghanistan. Lots of background information and links. Wikipedia is publicly edited and changes often, so there may be errors or biases on such a hot topic, but the info is usually good.

  • Afghanistan Online. A hodgepodge of interesting background. Worth exploring.

  • Photos of Afghanistan by Luke Powell. Hundreds of spectacular photos with brief explanations. In sections by subject.

  • Radio Afghanistan. Listen to documentaries, talk, and music from very cool to, well, less so.


    Hmong:

  • Learn About Hmong. History, culture, images, video, music. You must have broadband for the video and sound features to work.

  • The Hmong Tragedy. Ideosyncratic page with lots of information and personal accounts, very pro-Hmong, with an odd Mormon connection. Worth viewing, but take it with a grain of salt.

  • WWW Hmong Homepage. Lots of links about Hmong issues, history, and culture. Scroll down for the more interesting categories.

  • Hmoob.com, A virtual Hmong Community. Mostly postings and replies by young Hmongs, many personal. Lurk around and get an idea of what Hmong youth are saying right now. It will probably sound familiar.

  • Laos Keeps Its Urns. An informed vistor's account of the Plain of Jars, with good pictures and some archaeological, recent historical, and cultural background.


    US farmworkers, immigration, etc.:

  • US Border Patrol. What they do, in their own words and pictures. Click around for other areas of US Customs and Border Protection (formerly the INS, or Immigration and Naturalization Service) and its parent organization, the Department of Homeland Security.

  • The High Cost of Cheap Labor (Center for Immigration Studies). Report claiming that immigrants consume more in services than they pay in taxes - as do all poor workers. Recommends against allowing undocumented workers to become citizens, because poor citizens would cost taxpayers even more than poor undocumented people.

  • Corporate Press Parrots Sham Study by Far Right Think Tank. A dissenting opinion on the Center for Immigration Studies study.

  • Illegal Aliens in Federal, State, and Local Criminal Justice Systems. They are mostly there for being undocumented.

  • Globalization and the Fight Against Poverty. Report arguing that globalization is good for poor people.

  • Like Machines in the Fields (Oxfam America). Illustrated report on farm labor conditions and an approach for improving them by pressing key large buyers to pay very slightly more for produce. Since farm labor costs are a small fraction of the price, small price increases, if passed down the supply chain, would greatly increase farmworkers' wages. (968 Kb PDF file; will take a while to open)

  • Thomas: Legislation information from the Library of Congress. Complete government info on current and past bills and laws, easily searchable.

Living in a Pluralistic World by Bruce Owen
Copyright (c) 2007, Bruce Owen. All rights reserved.
Please send comments on content and presentation to bruce.owen@sonoma.edu.
URL of this document: http://bruceowen.com/pluralistic/340-07s.htm
Revised: 18 May 2007