Steven P Black
Biographic Data
| ID | 119732 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Steven P Black |
| GIVEN NAMES | Steven P |
| FAMILY NAME | Black |
| SIGNATURE | BLACK S P |
| AFFILIATIONS | Georgia State University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-4795-9716 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 20 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 132 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 20 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2008 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
Boundary objects and collaboration in a planetary health project in Boruca Indigenous Territory, Costa Rica
Developed in science and technology studies, the boundary objects concept is a tool to "analyze the nature of cooperative work in the absence of consensus" (Star, 2010, 604).It does not describe a particular type of entity but rather can be applied to any entity.The boundary objects concept is part of a theory about the role of particular entities in managing relationships among groups in collaborative work.Specifically, it theorizes how an entit…
Language and Health
Defined broadly, the anthropological study of language and health is as old as the field itself. In early writings, medicine and language were often treated as core aspects of cultural traditions. Since these early influences, four anthropological approaches to this topic have developed. The first approach, rooted in cognitive and psychological anthropology, examines cultural models of illness, explanations of illness, and narratives about illnes…
Descriptions of Improvisational Thinking by Expert Musicians Trained in Different Cultural Traditions
Research about improvisation often focuses on one musical tradition. The current study investigated experts’ descriptions of thinking behind improvisation in different cultural traditions through interviews with advanced improvisers residing in a metropolitan area in the United States. The participants were rigorously trained in their tradition and have performance experience within it. However, as residents of the United States, they are experie…
Portable Values, Inequities, and Techno-Optimism in Global Health Storytelling
In this article, I draw on research on ethics, value, and narrative/storytelling, examining how global health professionals use techno-optimistic stories to position themselves as experts ready to mediate between philanthropists and aid recipients. This techno-optimism involves the coordination of three types of portability-scientific medical, ethico-moral, and monetary. I identify and discuss five key plot elements of techno-optimistic stories. …
Communicability, stigma, and xenophobia during the Covid-19 outbreak
Preview this article: Communicability, stigma, and xenophobia during the COVID-19 outbreak, Page 1 of 1 /docserver/preview/fulltext/lcs.00028.bla-1.gif
How Communicative Approaches Enrich the Study of Care
Video Abstract English Version Read the transcriptWatch the video on Vimeo Video Abstract English Version Read the transcriptWatch the video on Vimeo
Global Health Education and Mediatization of Care in Costa Rica
Costa Rica has become a destination for global health education courses, while funding for global health has increased dramatically over the past thirty years. An examination of one Costa Rican group's efforts to market humanitarian discourses, focusing on website design, provides a window into the workings of global health education and details the sometimes-uncomfortable position of non-US health professionals in educational programming. This c…
Music and Language
The anthropological study of music and language examines the cultural organization of sound in social processes of meaning making. Research on this topic, primarily through ethnographic fieldwork, is complemented by extradisciplinary scholarship in fields such as musicology, philosophy, and neuroscience. Ethnographers of music and language contribute to a long tradition of scholarship on folklore, verbal art, and ritual. Contemporary work draws f…
The Ethics and Aesthetics of Care
This article is positioned at the intersection of linguistic, medical, and psychological anthropology and reviews scholarship on the communicative processes that constitute moral/ethical care. Varying notions of care have become a leitmotif in efforts to include the analysis of agency and creativity in discussions of the lived experience of marginalization. Understandings of care have in common an emphasis on relationality and activity: Communica…
Anthropological Ethics and the Communicative Affordances of Audio-Video Recorders in Ethnographic Fieldwork
This article contributes to the development of professional anthropological discourses about audio-video recording technologies in ethnographic research. Synthesizing scholarship on ethnographic partiality, doing ethnography in sound, and multimedia technologies, the article reflexively applies the concepts of transduction and affordance to analyze how recorders may be theorized as part of fieldwork encounters. This is based on fieldwork with a Z…
Ethical Currents
The Morality of Performance
This article synthesizes anthropological research on morality and performance, drawing from ethnographic fieldwork with a Zulu choir that was an HIV support group and AIDS activist organization. The article responds to an increasing level of anthropological interest in the topic of morality and contributes to an emerging body of literature on language and experience. The concept of moral assemblages is used to examine the embodied communicative d…
The intersubjective space-time of a Zulu choir/HIV support group in global perspective
This article draws from anthropology, conversation analysis, ethnomusicology, semiotics, and phenomenology, using the concept of intersubjectivity to model how the micro-organization of musical communication can be integral in social processes of support, identity maintenance, and activism amid structural inequality. This is based on ethnographic fieldwork in Durban, South Africa, with a Zulu gospel choir that functioned as a support group, activ…
Narrating fragile stories about HIV/Aids in South Africa
This article analyzes narratives about living with HIV/ AIDS amid stigma, using the notion of “fragile stories” to further detail the linguistic practices through which people narrate experiences in danger of not being told. The article is based on fieldwork in 2008 in Durban, South Africa with a Zulu gospel choir in which all group members are living with HIV/AIDS. Close analysis of recorded narratives demonstrates how institutional story framew…
Stigma and ideological constructions of the foreign
In this article I discuss language ideologies and stigma, exploring how a group of South Africans living with HIV confronted the perceived language of HIV and engaged with international aid to live "positive lives" amid stigma. Based on ethnographic fieldwork with a Zulu choir that functioned as an HIV support group and AIDS activist organization, I analyze talk about how others talked about HIV (metapragmatic discourse about HIV) to suggest a la…
Linguistic Anthropology in 2012
In this article, I discuss the accomplishments of scholars of language and culture in 2012 and the questions raised by those accomplishments. I review matters of language-expansions and refinements of existing research topics, including linguistic relativity, language socialization, sociolinguistic variation, and language ideologies. I then consider a trend of research on topics of embodiment, materiality, and the senses, discussing the matter (i…
Laughing to Death
Moving beyond the truism that laughter is the best medicine, this article integrates multiple linguistic anthropological models of humor to theorize why joking is so often used to address issues at or beyond the boundaries of what is considered acceptable to talk about in most other contexts. The article analyzes joking about HIV among members of a Zulu gospel choir who are living with HIV/AIDS in South Africa, identifying the precise linguistic …
The Body in Sung Performance
commentary, Music and Sound, Music and Sound Interest Group, Zulu, gospel music, HIV, AIDS, South Africa, Southern Africa, jazz, North America, performance and festivals
Beyond Words
Creativity and Learning Jazz
This article is about interaction, culture, and creativity. The ethnographic setting is a set of jazz performance classes at a California university. Although I write about jazz music, the reader need not have a background in studying or performing jazz (or music in general) to understand this article. In the title of the article, the term “practice” refers to (1) “listening” as a culturally specific communicative practice, and (2) the practice (…
The Ethics and Aesthetics of Care
This article is positioned at the intersection of linguistic, medical, and psychological anthropology and reviews scholarship on the communicative processes that constitute moral/ethical care. Varying notions of care have become a leitmotif in efforts to include the analysis of agency and creativity in discussions of the lived experience of marginalization. Understandings of care have in common an emphasis on relationality and activity: Communica…
Laughing to Death
Moving beyond the truism that laughter is the best medicine, this article integrates multiple linguistic anthropological models of humor to theorize why joking is so often used to address issues at or beyond the boundaries of what is considered acceptable to talk about in most other contexts. The article analyzes joking about HIV among members of a Zulu gospel choir who are living with HIV/AIDS in South Africa, identifying the precise linguistic …
Anthropological Ethics and the Communicative Affordances of Audio-Video Recorders in Ethnographic Fieldwork
This article contributes to the development of professional anthropological discourses about audio-video recording technologies in ethnographic research. Synthesizing scholarship on ethnographic partiality, doing ethnography in sound, and multimedia technologies, the article reflexively applies the concepts of transduction and affordance to analyze how recorders may be theorized as part of fieldwork encounters. This is based on fieldwork with a Z…
Creativity and Learning Jazz
This article is about interaction, culture, and creativity. The ethnographic setting is a set of jazz performance classes at a California university. Although I write about jazz music, the reader need not have a background in studying or performing jazz (or music in general) to understand this article. In the title of the article, the term “practice” refers to (1) “listening” as a culturally specific communicative practice, and (2) the practice (…
The Morality of Performance
This article synthesizes anthropological research on morality and performance, drawing from ethnographic fieldwork with a Zulu choir that was an HIV support group and AIDS activist organization. The article responds to an increasing level of anthropological interest in the topic of morality and contributes to an emerging body of literature on language and experience. The concept of moral assemblages is used to examine the embodied communicative d…
Stigma and ideological constructions of the foreign
In this article I discuss language ideologies and stigma, exploring how a group of South Africans living with HIV confronted the perceived language of HIV and engaged with international aid to live "positive lives" amid stigma. Based on ethnographic fieldwork with a Zulu choir that functioned as an HIV support group and AIDS activist organization, I analyze talk about how others talked about HIV (metapragmatic discourse about HIV) to suggest a la…
The intersubjective space-time of a Zulu choir/HIV support group in global perspective
This article draws from anthropology, conversation analysis, ethnomusicology, semiotics, and phenomenology, using the concept of intersubjectivity to model how the micro-organization of musical communication can be integral in social processes of support, identity maintenance, and activism amid structural inequality. This is based on ethnographic fieldwork in Durban, South Africa, with a Zulu gospel choir that functioned as a support group, activ…
Portable Values, Inequities, and Techno-Optimism in Global Health Storytelling
In this article, I draw on research on ethics, value, and narrative/storytelling, examining how global health professionals use techno-optimistic stories to position themselves as experts ready to mediate between philanthropists and aid recipients. This techno-optimism involves the coordination of three types of portability-scientific medical, ethico-moral, and monetary. I identify and discuss five key plot elements of techno-optimistic stories. …
How Communicative Approaches Enrich the Study of Care
Video Abstract English Version Read the transcriptWatch the video on Vimeo Video Abstract English Version Read the transcriptWatch the video on Vimeo
Linguistic Anthropology in 2012
In this article, I discuss the accomplishments of scholars of language and culture in 2012 and the questions raised by those accomplishments. I review matters of language-expansions and refinements of existing research topics, including linguistic relativity, language socialization, sociolinguistic variation, and language ideologies. I then consider a trend of research on topics of embodiment, materiality, and the senses, discussing the matter (i…
The Body in Sung Performance
commentary, Music and Sound, Music and Sound Interest Group, Zulu, gospel music, HIV, AIDS, South Africa, Southern Africa, jazz, North America, performance and festivals
Boundary objects and collaboration in a planetary health project in Boruca Indigenous Territory, Costa Rica
Developed in science and technology studies, the boundary objects concept is a tool to "analyze the nature of cooperative work in the absence of consensus" (Star, 2010, 604).It does not describe a particular type of entity but rather can be applied to any entity.The boundary objects concept is part of a theory about the role of particular entities in managing relationships among groups in collaborative work.Specifically, it theorizes how an entit…
Communicability, stigma, and xenophobia during the Covid-19 outbreak
Preview this article: Communicability, stigma, and xenophobia during the COVID-19 outbreak, Page 1 of 1 /docserver/preview/fulltext/lcs.00028.bla-1.gif
Global Health Education and Mediatization of Care in Costa Rica
Costa Rica has become a destination for global health education courses, while funding for global health has increased dramatically over the past thirty years. An examination of one Costa Rican group's efforts to market humanitarian discourses, focusing on website design, provides a window into the workings of global health education and details the sometimes-uncomfortable position of non-US health professionals in educational programming. This c…
Creativity and Learning Jazz
This article is about interaction, culture, and creativity. The ethnographic setting is a set of jazz performance classes at a California university. Although I write about jazz music, the reader need not have a background in studying or performing jazz (or music in general) to understand this article. In the title of the article, the term “practice” refers to (1) “listening” as a culturally specific communicative practice, and (2) the practice (…
The Body in Sung Performance
commentary, Music and Sound, Music and Sound Interest Group, Zulu, gospel music, HIV, AIDS, South Africa, Southern Africa, jazz, North America, performance and festivals
Beyond Words
Laughing to Death
Moving beyond the truism that laughter is the best medicine, this article integrates multiple linguistic anthropological models of humor to theorize why joking is so often used to address issues at or beyond the boundaries of what is considered acceptable to talk about in most other contexts. The article analyzes joking about HIV among members of a Zulu gospel choir who are living with HIV/AIDS in South Africa, identifying the precise linguistic …
Narrating fragile stories about HIV/Aids in South Africa
This article analyzes narratives about living with HIV/ AIDS amid stigma, using the notion of “fragile stories” to further detail the linguistic practices through which people narrate experiences in danger of not being told. The article is based on fieldwork in 2008 in Durban, South Africa with a Zulu gospel choir in which all group members are living with HIV/AIDS. Close analysis of recorded narratives demonstrates how institutional story framew…
Stigma and ideological constructions of the foreign
In this article I discuss language ideologies and stigma, exploring how a group of South Africans living with HIV confronted the perceived language of HIV and engaged with international aid to live "positive lives" amid stigma. Based on ethnographic fieldwork with a Zulu choir that functioned as an HIV support group and AIDS activist organization, I analyze talk about how others talked about HIV (metapragmatic discourse about HIV) to suggest a la…
Linguistic Anthropology in 2012
In this article, I discuss the accomplishments of scholars of language and culture in 2012 and the questions raised by those accomplishments. I review matters of language-expansions and refinements of existing research topics, including linguistic relativity, language socialization, sociolinguistic variation, and language ideologies. I then consider a trend of research on topics of embodiment, materiality, and the senses, discussing the matter (i…
The intersubjective space-time of a Zulu choir/HIV support group in global perspective
This article draws from anthropology, conversation analysis, ethnomusicology, semiotics, and phenomenology, using the concept of intersubjectivity to model how the micro-organization of musical communication can be integral in social processes of support, identity maintenance, and activism amid structural inequality. This is based on ethnographic fieldwork in Durban, South Africa, with a Zulu gospel choir that functioned as a support group, activ…
The Morality of Performance
This article synthesizes anthropological research on morality and performance, drawing from ethnographic fieldwork with a Zulu choir that was an HIV support group and AIDS activist organization. The article responds to an increasing level of anthropological interest in the topic of morality and contributes to an emerging body of literature on language and experience. The concept of moral assemblages is used to examine the embodied communicative d…
Ethical Currents
Anthropological Ethics and the Communicative Affordances of Audio-Video Recorders in Ethnographic Fieldwork
This article contributes to the development of professional anthropological discourses about audio-video recording technologies in ethnographic research. Synthesizing scholarship on ethnographic partiality, doing ethnography in sound, and multimedia technologies, the article reflexively applies the concepts of transduction and affordance to analyze how recorders may be theorized as part of fieldwork encounters. This is based on fieldwork with a Z…
Music and Language
The anthropological study of music and language examines the cultural organization of sound in social processes of meaning making. Research on this topic, primarily through ethnographic fieldwork, is complemented by extradisciplinary scholarship in fields such as musicology, philosophy, and neuroscience. Ethnographers of music and language contribute to a long tradition of scholarship on folklore, verbal art, and ritual. Contemporary work draws f…
The Ethics and Aesthetics of Care
This article is positioned at the intersection of linguistic, medical, and psychological anthropology and reviews scholarship on the communicative processes that constitute moral/ethical care. Varying notions of care have become a leitmotif in efforts to include the analysis of agency and creativity in discussions of the lived experience of marginalization. Understandings of care have in common an emphasis on relationality and activity: Communica…
Communicability, stigma, and xenophobia during the Covid-19 outbreak
Preview this article: Communicability, stigma, and xenophobia during the COVID-19 outbreak, Page 1 of 1 /docserver/preview/fulltext/lcs.00028.bla-1.gif
How Communicative Approaches Enrich the Study of Care
Video Abstract English Version Read the transcriptWatch the video on Vimeo Video Abstract English Version Read the transcriptWatch the video on Vimeo
Global Health Education and Mediatization of Care in Costa Rica
Costa Rica has become a destination for global health education courses, while funding for global health has increased dramatically over the past thirty years. An examination of one Costa Rican group's efforts to market humanitarian discourses, focusing on website design, provides a window into the workings of global health education and details the sometimes-uncomfortable position of non-US health professionals in educational programming. This c…
Portable Values, Inequities, and Techno-Optimism in Global Health Storytelling
In this article, I draw on research on ethics, value, and narrative/storytelling, examining how global health professionals use techno-optimistic stories to position themselves as experts ready to mediate between philanthropists and aid recipients. This techno-optimism involves the coordination of three types of portability-scientific medical, ethico-moral, and monetary. I identify and discuss five key plot elements of techno-optimistic stories. …
Language and Health
Defined broadly, the anthropological study of language and health is as old as the field itself. In early writings, medicine and language were often treated as core aspects of cultural traditions. Since these early influences, four anthropological approaches to this topic have developed. The first approach, rooted in cognitive and psychological anthropology, examines cultural models of illness, explanations of illness, and narratives about illnes…
Descriptions of Improvisational Thinking by Expert Musicians Trained in Different Cultural Traditions
Research about improvisation often focuses on one musical tradition. The current study investigated experts’ descriptions of thinking behind improvisation in different cultural traditions through interviews with advanced improvisers residing in a metropolitan area in the United States. The participants were rigorously trained in their tradition and have performance experience within it. However, as residents of the United States, they are experie…
Boundary objects and collaboration in a planetary health project in Boruca Indigenous Territory, Costa Rica
Developed in science and technology studies, the boundary objects concept is a tool to "analyze the nature of cooperative work in the absence of consensus" (Star, 2010, 604).It does not describe a particular type of entity but rather can be applied to any entity.The boundary objects concept is part of a theory about the role of particular entities in managing relationships among groups in collaborative work.Specifically, it theorizes how an entit…
Sociology (16 works) · Language, Discourse, Communication Strategies (11 works) · Anthropology (8 works) · Linguistics (8 works) · Psychology (8 works) · Art (6 works) · Zulu (6 works) · Aesthetics (5 works) · Multilingual Education and Policy (5 works) · Political science (5 works)