Pertti J Pelto
Biographic Data
| ID | 3583041 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Pertti J Pelto |
| GIVEN NAMES | Pertti J |
| FAMILY NAME | Pelto |
| SIGNATURE | PELTO P J |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Connecticut |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 68 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 335 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 67 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1961 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2019 |
| H-INDEX | 9 |
Methodology in Macro-Micro Studies
This chapter suggests that some methodological approaches for anthropological work on microlevel/macrolevel relationships. It discusses the necessity of paying greater attention to the rubrics of linkage, the rules for studying and demonstrating articulation of different levels in terms of space, time and causality. Growing interest in the study of microlevel/macrolevel linkages calls for the development of suitable methodologies to guide empiric…
Micro and Macro Levels of Analysis in Anthropology
Mixed Methods in Ethnographic Research
Mixed Methods in Ethnographic Research: Historical Perspectives captures the dynamic history and development of mixed methods research in a narrative of personal discovery, growth, and experience. Distinguished ethnographer and methodologist Pertti Pelto, who first called for the integration of qualitative and quantitative research methods nearly half a century ago, establishes a direct line between the earliest examples of ethnographic research …
Applied Ethnography
This comprehensive, engaging guide to applied research distills the expertise of the distinguished ethnographer and methodologist Pertti Pelto over his acclaimed 50-year career. Having written the first major text promoting mixed qualitative and quantitative methods in applied ethnography in the 1970s, Pelto now synthesizes decades of innovation, including examples from around the world that illustrate how specific methods yield immediate results…
Remembering Dr. Jayashree Ramakrishna
Huwa Rog, Parhej, and Desi Dawai
Although more maternal deaths occur in the postpartum period, this period receives far less attention from the program managers. To understand how the women and their families perceive postpartum health problems, the culturally derived restrictions, and precautions controlling diets and behavior patterns, we conducted a mixed-method study in Rajasthan, India. The study methods included free listing of maternal morbidity conditions, interviews wit…
A Model for Translating Ethnography and Theory into Culturally Constructed Clinical Practices
What Is So New About Mixed Methods
In this article, I dispute claims that mixed methods research emerged only recently in the social sciences. I argue that some anthropologists and sociologists (and others) have used mixed methods in fieldwork for at least 80 years, and there are studies from early in the 20th century that clearly fall within the definition of "mixed methods." I explore some of the history of the mixing of qualitative and quantitative data in earlier ethnographic …
Intimate relationships of Devadasi sex workers in South India
Global literature on female sex workers suggests that being in an intimate relationship is associated with barriers to practising safe sex behaviours. Condom use within intimate relationships is often seen as a sign of infidelity and fosters mistrust which could affect longevity, trust and intimacy within partnerships. Using qualitative data from Devadasi sex workers and their intimate male partners in Bagalkot District, Karnataka, India, we exam…
Community mobilisation programme for female sex workers in coastal Andhra Pradesh, India
BACKGROUND: This paper describes the process of setting up community-based organisations (CBOs) of sex workers during the 5-year community mobilisation initiative of the Swagati project, an HIV prevention programme in nine coastal districts of Andhra Pradesh. METHOD: The Swagati project facilitated the formation of 11 CBOs through partnerships with local non-governmental organisations and meetings with groups of sex workers. Activities included p…
A methodology for building culture and gender norms into intervention
Abortion in Asia
Gammeltoft Chapter 4: Violence, Poverty and 'Weakness'- Interpersonal and institutional reasons why Burmese women on the Thai border utilise abortion Suzanne Belton Chapter 5: Quality of care and pregnancy terminations for adolescent women in urban slums, Bangladesh Sabina Faiz Rashid Chapter 6: Choosing abortion providers in rural Tamil Nadu: Balancing costs and quality of care Lakshmi Ramachandar and Pertti J Pelto Chapter 7: Abortion in Vietna…
Community Street Theatre as a Tool for Interventions on Alcohol Use and Other Behaviors Related to HIV Risks
Medical Abortion in Rural Tamil Nadu, South India
The medical abortion drugs mifepristone and misoprostol are now widely available in rural Tamil Nadu, India, and the practice of abortion is being transformed. This paper reports on current attitudes and practices concerning medical abortion among qualified abortion providers in a rural area of Tamil Nadu. Interviews were carried out with a purposive sample of 40 doctors, 15 informants at chemist shops, 10 village health nurses and 23 women who h…
Abortion Providers and Safety of Abortion
This paper reports on a community-based study in 2001—02 in a rural district of Tamil Nadu, India, among 97 women who had had recent abortions, to examine their decision-making processes, the types of facility they attended and the extent of post-abortion complications they experienced. The 36 facilities they attended, both government and private, were ranked by 18 village health nurses, acting as key informants, as regards safety and quality of …
Coping with a Nutrient Deficiency
Cultural explanations and management strategies for specific signs and symptoms of vitamin A deficiency are explored in a Hausa-speaking community in northern Niger. Their interpretations of the etiology of nightblindness in young children and pregnant women focus on food-related causes, in which "lack of good food" is central. In parallel with the significance of food in the etiology of nightblindness, the recommended treatments are home food re…
Beliefs concerning sexual health problems and treatment seeking among men in an Indian slum community
This study explores the sexual health problems and treatment-seeking behaviour of men in a Mumbai slum population. Men consider wet dreams, masturbation, early ejaculation, sexual weakness, and other semen-related issues as serious sexual health problems. Suppression of sexual desire was one of the major causes perceived by men for wet dreams, whereas masturbation was seen as the major cause for perceived early ejaculation and distortion in the s…
Building Social Sciences and Health Research
This paper describes main features of a program of technical assistance in South Asia (primarily India) designed to help comm -unity health researchers develop more effective data gathering and analysis in applied studies of reproductive health issues. The program was funded by the Ford Foundation (India) and organized under a grant to Johns Hopkins University. Recipients of the technical assistance have been mainly small nongovernmental organiza…
Exploring explanatory models of women's reproductive health in rural Bangladesh
This study illustrates the use of systematic elicitation techniques for cultural domain analysis, including free listing, pile sorting and severity ratings to identify salient illness categories and perceptions of illness severity among rural Bangladeshi women. The complementary strategies of in-depth interviewing and collecting of case studies were also employed for delineating explanatory models. Illnesses in the domain of women's reproductive …
The Role of Village Health Nurses in Mediating Abortions in Rural Tamil Nadu, India
This paper reports on qualitative research on abortion services in the Coimbatore district of Tamil Nadu in south India, and the role of government village health nurses (VHNs) in assisting women to obtain abortions. The aim of the research, carried out in 1997, was to document the process married women go through to obtain abortions in both the public and private sectors, particularly women in rural areas, and why they preferred private clinics.…
A study of male sexual health problems in a Mumbai slum population
Conducted in a Mumbai slum population, this study examines the vocabulary men use to describe sexual health problems, cultural views about categorization, and the views of local health practitioners. Structured qualitative methods including free-listing, pile sorting and ratings were used. In addition to sexually transmitted infections, men are equally or more concerned about the quality and quantity of semen and 'impotence', which includes erect…
Women's health priorities
Qualitative research was conducted in rural Bangladesh to identify salient illness categories and perceptions of illness severity among women. Data were gathered using the techniques of free listing, pile sorting, and severity ratings. In-depth interviews were also employed for collecting examples of illness episodes and delineating explanatory models. Women's reproductive tract illnesses were among the more salient and serious health problems fo…
Studying Knowledge, Culture, and Behavior in Applied Medical Anthropology
In this article we argue that the concept of knowledge, as utilized by public health professionals, is best regarded as cultural belief as defined in anthropology. The implications of this position are explored, particularly as it relates to the development of a decision-making approach to the understanding and analysis of health care behavior. The methodological challenges posed by the new theoretical perspective that has emerged from the emphas…
Qualitative data-gathering for reproductive health research
GOfer vs. ZyIndex
Intra-Cultural Diversity
Recent anthropological research includes a growing number of studies which focus directly on issues of intra-cultural and intra-community diversity, rather than simply recording passing mention of "deviations" from norms or cultural patterns that are presumed to be standardized. Studies of behavioral and cognitive diversity are essential for understanding differential processes of social change, as well as other theoretical problems. We suggest t…
Studying Knowledge, Culture, and Behavior in Applied Medical Anthropology
In this article we argue that the concept of knowledge, as utilized by public health professionals, is best regarded as cultural belief as defined in anthropology. The implications of this position are explored, particularly as it relates to the development of a decision-making approach to the understanding and analysis of health care behavior. The methodological challenges posed by the new theoretical perspective that has emerged from the emphas…
The Construction of Primary Data in Cultural Anthropology
Small but Healthy? An Anthropological Perspective
Diet and Delocalization
Gretel H. Pelto, Pertti J. Pelto, Diet and Delocalization: Dietary Changes since 1750, The Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Vol. 14, No. 2, Hunger and History: The Impact of Changing Food Production and Consumption Patterns on Society (Autumn, 1983), pp. 507-528
Micro and Macro Levels of Analysis in Anthropology
The Personal Approach in Cultural Anthropological Research [and Comments and Reply]
The personal approach in cultural anthropology, self-consciously and deliberately undertaken, perceives value in the unique combination of interests, personal values, theoretical orientation, imagination, sensitivity, and other idiosyncratic qualities embodied in a particular competent investigator or team of investigators. Because of the uniqueness of the factors through which the personal approach yields knowledge, the approach is not easily ta…
Climate and Behavior
Relatively neglected in the growing number of human ecological studies is the consideration of direct environmental effects on the behavioral and psychological adaptations of individuals. This paper presents some tentative cross-cultural and cross-national evidence relating one environmental variable--climate--to both behavioral and psychocultural processes. Some support for the hypothesis that the amount of emotional expression or "level of arou…
What Is So New About Mixed Methods
In this article, I dispute claims that mixed methods research emerged only recently in the social sciences. I argue that some anthropologists and sociologists (and others) have used mixed methods in fieldwork for at least 80 years, and there are studies from early in the 20th century that clearly fall within the definition of "mixed methods." I explore some of the history of the mixing of qualitative and quantitative data in earlier ethnographic …
The Role of Village Health Nurses in Mediating Abortions in Rural Tamil Nadu, India
This paper reports on qualitative research on abortion services in the Coimbatore district of Tamil Nadu in south India, and the role of government village health nurses (VHNs) in assisting women to obtain abortions. The aim of the research, carried out in 1997, was to document the process married women go through to obtain abortions in both the public and private sectors, particularly women in rural areas, and why they preferred private clinics.…
Developing applied medical anthropology in third world countries
Abortion Providers and Safety of Abortion
This paper reports on a community-based study in 2001—02 in a rural district of Tamil Nadu, India, among 97 women who had had recent abortions, to examine their decision-making processes, the types of facility they attended and the extent of post-abortion complications they experienced. The 36 facilities they attended, both government and private, were ranked by 18 village health nurses, acting as key informants, as regards safety and quality of …
A methodology for building culture and gender norms into intervention
Medical Abortion in Rural Tamil Nadu, South India
The medical abortion drugs mifepristone and misoprostol are now widely available in rural Tamil Nadu, India, and the practice of abortion is being transformed. This paper reports on current attitudes and practices concerning medical abortion among qualified abortion providers in a rural area of Tamil Nadu. Interviews were carried out with a purposive sample of 40 doctors, 15 informants at chemist shops, 10 village health nurses and 23 women who h…
Family health culture, ethnicity, and asthma
Chaney and Ruiz Revilla
Cognitive Aspects of American Kin Terms
Community mobilisation programme for female sex workers in coastal Andhra Pradesh, India
BACKGROUND: This paper describes the process of setting up community-based organisations (CBOs) of sex workers during the 5-year community mobilisation initiative of the Swagati project, an HIV prevention programme in nine coastal districts of Andhra Pradesh. METHOD: The Swagati project facilitated the formation of 11 CBOs through partnerships with local non-governmental organisations and meetings with groups of sex workers. Activities included p…
Skolt Sami ethnicity and cultural revival
Coping with a Nutrient Deficiency
Cultural explanations and management strategies for specific signs and symptoms of vitamin A deficiency are explored in a Hausa-speaking community in northern Niger. Their interpretations of the etiology of nightblindness in young children and pregnant women focus on food-related causes, in which "lack of good food" is central. In parallel with the significance of food in the etiology of nightblindness, the recommended treatments are home food re…
Women's health priorities
Qualitative research was conducted in rural Bangladesh to identify salient illness categories and perceptions of illness severity among women. Data were gathered using the techniques of free listing, pile sorting, and severity ratings. In-depth interviews were also employed for collecting examples of illness episodes and delineating explanatory models. Women's reproductive tract illnesses were among the more salient and serious health problems fo…
Anthropological Research
Therapy for an ailing subdiscipline
Robert A. LeVine. Culture, Behavior, and Personality: An Introduction to the Comparative Study of Psychosocial Adaptation. Chicago: Aldine, 1973. xiv + 319 pp. Tables, references, and index. $12.50
Matrilateral Asymmetry in the American Kinship System
The Twilight Zone of Poverty
In his presidetial address to the 63rd annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association, l Leslie White commented, know, or understand, very little about our own culture . . .With regard to the United States . . . we need to understand its gross anatomy. We need to identify and ascertain the functions of its major component parts. He urged anthropologists to study the complex social phenomena of the United States and other modern nation…
General and Ethnology
General and Ethnology
Ethnology
Cognitive Aspects of American Kin Terms
Coast Lapp Society II
The Twilight Zone of Poverty
In his presidetial address to the 63rd annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association, l Leslie White commented, know, or understand, very little about our own culture . . .With regard to the United States . . . we need to understand its gross anatomy. We need to identify and ascertain the functions of its major component parts. He urged anthropologists to study the complex social phenomena of the United States and other modern nation…
Matrilateral Asymmetry in the American Kinship System
Chaney and Ruiz Revilla
Folklore
The Relationship of Child Rearing Practices to Societal "Tightness" and "Looseness
Climate and Behavior
Relatively neglected in the growing number of human ecological studies is the consideration of direct environmental effects on the behavioral and psychological adaptations of individuals. This paper presents some tentative cross-cultural and cross-national evidence relating one environmental variable--climate--to both behavioral and psychocultural processes. Some support for the hypothesis that the amount of emotional expression or "level of arou…
Anthropological research. The structure of inquiry
Therapy for an ailing subdiscipline
Robert A. LeVine. Culture, Behavior, and Personality: An Introduction to the Comparative Study of Psychosocial Adaptation. Chicago: Aldine, 1973. xiv + 319 pp. Tables, references, and index. $12.50
Technology and Social Change
Intra-Cultural Diversity
Recent anthropological research includes a growing number of studies which focus directly on issues of intra-cultural and intra-community diversity, rather than simply recording passing mention of "deviations" from norms or cultural patterns that are presumed to be standardized. Studies of behavioral and cognitive diversity are essential for understanding differential processes of social change, as well as other theoretical problems. We suggest t…
"Comments on Paredes' "New Uses for Old Ethnography
The Personal Approach in Cultural Anthropological Research [and Comments and Reply]
The personal approach in cultural anthropology, self-consciously and deliberately undertaken, perceives value in the unique combination of interests, personal values, theoretical orientation, imagination, sensitivity, and other idiosyncratic qualities embodied in a particular competent investigator or team of investigators. Because of the uniqueness of the factors through which the personal approach yields knowledge, the approach is not easily ta…
The Snowmobile Revolution
General, Applied, and Theoretical
Anthropological Research
This text is a comprehensive introduction to research methods in social and cultural anthropology. The Peltos focus their discussion on the essential elements of preparing and analyzing the supporting evidence from which generalizations about human nature are derived. The specific elements of anthropological research - such as interviewing informants, observing ceremonial behaviour, and designing surveys - are all covered, but the primary aim is …
Frankenstein's problem
Langdon Winner. Autonomous Technology, Technics‐out‐of‐control as a Theme in Political Thought. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1977. x + 384 pp. Notes and index. $17.50
Anthropological Research
Skolt Sami ethnicity and cultural revival
A note from the editors
The Cultural Dimension of the Human Adventure
Sociology (44 works) · Anthropology (23 works) · Computer Science (22 works) · Psychology (21 works) · Medicine (19 works) · Political science (14 works) · Geography (12 works) · History (11 works) · Anthropology: Ethics, History, Culture (10 works) · Citation (9 works)