Eric Kline Silverman
Biographic Data
| ID | 3616809 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Eric Kline Silverman |
| GIVEN NAMES | Eric Kline |
| FAMILY NAME | Silverman |
| SIGNATURE | SILVERMAN E K |
| AFFILIATIONS | Wheelock College |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 25 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 67 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 25 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1993 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2023 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
God wastes nothing: A consensual qualitative study of coping among Catholic individuals with cancer diagnoses
While religious meaning-making has been extensively studied, emic religious coping remains largely unexplored. This consensual qualitative research study explored Catholic cancer survivors' ( N = 22) descriptions of drawing on their religious framework throughout their cancer journeys. Findings revealed distinctive Catholic resources such as the power of blessings, drawing comfort from the saints and sacraments, and "offering up" suffering as a f…
The Sepik River, Papua New Guinea: Nourishing Tradition and Modern Catastrophe
although, it brings so much to the people, they know it can never be trusted and they will never laugh at it. It is there for their use but also for their veneration. Too many of them have been sucked under by its temperamental currents and its grisly executioners, the crocodiles; too many of their dwellings and gardens have been ruined by its raging flood; too many canoes and boats have floundered on its submerged logs for men to regard it light…
Totemism, tourism, and trucks. The changing meanings of paint and colors in a Sepik River society
Iatmul art from the middle Sepik River in Papua New Guinea is well-known worldwide, but little understood. This article therefore offers an ethnographically-grounded, long-term study of the changing meanings of artistic paint and colors as used and seen by the Eastern Iatmul people of Tambunum village, whom I have studied since the late-1980s. I analyze how colors and paint evoke the landscape in terms of mythic history, totemism, the aesthetic v…
Island Rivers: Fresh Water and Place in Oceania
Anthropologists have written a great deal about the coastal adaptations and seafaring traditions of Pacific Islanders, but have had much less to say about the significance of rivers for Pacific island culture, livelihood and identity. The authors of this collection seek to fill that gap in the ethnographic record by drawing attention to the deep historical attachments of
From Totemic Space to Cyberspace: Transformations in Sepik River and Aboriginal Australian Myth, Knowledge, and Art
The Waters of Mendangumeli: A Masculine Psychoanalytic Interpretation of a New Guinea Flood Myth-and Women's Laughter
This article corroborates Alan Dundes's psychoanalytic interpretation of flood myths as expressing male envy of female fertility and birth. My data consist of two deluge tales collected in a Sepik River society in Papua New Guinea in the 1980s and 1994. But I do more than simply test Dundes's thesis. I also show that it is possible and, indeed, imperative to embed psychoanalytic analyses of oral tales in the local cultural context. I also update,…
Commentary: Modernism, J ews, and F razer
The outstanding papers in this collection raise important points for not only a fuller understanding of the contemporary Pacific, but also for issues of identity and belonging much further afield. Specifically, I propose that we can approach these papers from a J ewish Studies perspective gazing upon M elanesia, but also from a M elanesianist perspective surveying the broad field of J ewish Studies. For in many respects, the case studies ask us t…
FromCannibal Toursto cargo cult: On the aftermath of tourism in the Sepik River, Papua New Guinea
This article challenges the moral parable of the film Cannibal Tours by drawing on long-term ethnographic research in a Iatmul-speaking village along the Sepik River, Papua New Guinea-one of the very communities featured in the film. In this article, first, I argue that Cannibal Tours silences indigenous agency and thus contributes to the very symbolic violence the film-maker aims to critique. Second, I interpret Sepik River tourist art not as me…
Virtual Voyages: Cinema and Travel edited by Jeffrey Ruoff
Race and Religion among the Chosen Peoples of Crown Heights (review)
Skull Art in Papua New Guinea by Sabine Jell-Bahlsen
Humors and substances: Ideas of the body in New Guinea - By Pamela J. Stewart & Andrew Strathern
Anthropology and Circumcision
This chapter reviews the anthropology of male and female circumcision over the past century. After surveying classic sociocultural and psychodynamic interpretations of male circumcision, I shift to the biblical and Jewish rite, focusing on gender symbolism and counter-hegemonic practice within European-Christian society. The chapter then reviews the relationship between male circumcision in sub-Saharan Africa and reduced rates of HIV. Next, I add…
High art as tourist art, tourist art as high art: Comparing the New Guinea Sculpture Garden at Stanford University and Sepik River tourist art
This paper compares two contemporary aesthetic expressions: tourist art from the Sepik River in Papua New Guinea and the New Guinea Sculpture Garden at Stanford University. Both aesthetic expressions undermine the conventional categories that classify art. Sepik River tourist art is motivated not by the drive to lend individual, subjective experience a material expression but by monetary desire. The New Guinea Sculpture Garden was expressly creat…
Pacific Islands
Masculinity, Motherhood, and Mockery: Psychoanalyzing Culture and the Iatmul Naven Rite in New Guinea
Time, Anthropology of
Masculinity, motherhood, and mockery: Psychoanalyzing culture and the Iatmul Naven rite in New Guinea
Scent and psyche: Andamanese cosmology and psychodynamic perspectives on sepik ritual
Juillerat, Bernard, ed. Shooting the Sun: Ritual and Meaning in West Sepik. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992. x+310 pp. including glossary, references, and index. $35.00 cloth. Pandya, Vishvajit. Above the Forest: A Study of Andamanese Ethnoanemology, Cosmology, and the Power of Ritual. Delhi, India: Oxford University Press, 1993. xxxii + 319 pp. including glossary, bibliography, and index. $24.00 cloth
From Totemic Space to Cyberspace: Transformations in Sepik River and Aboriginal Australian Myth, Knowledge, and Art
Emplaced Myth: Space, Narrative, and Knowledge in Aboriginal Australia and Papua New Guinea
Politics, Gender, and Time in Melanesia and Aboriginal Australia
This article interprets the symbolism and politics of Iatmul (Sepik River, Papua New Guinea). Social life is structured by different forms of (e.g., totemism, myth, Omaha terminologies, ritual). Furthermore, mythic history is a mode of ritual politics. Finally, Iatmul symbolizes paradoxes of gender. The article concludes by comparing the temporality and gender of Melanesian cosmology with the Aboriginal dreamtime. (Time, politics, gender, Iatmul,…
The Gender of the Cosmos: Totemism, Society and Embodiment in the Sepik River
This article contributes to recent research on the foundations of society in Melanesia, both in terms of local representation and actual social practice, as well as body imagery and gender. I have three interrelated objectives. First, I present new data on the symbolism and politics of Eastern Iatmul cosmology and totemism (Sepik River, Papua New Guinea). Second, I engage Harrison's distinction between magical and material, or realist and nominal…
History as pastiche, process, and postmodern encounter: Recent historical ethnographies in Melanesian studies
Carrier, A.H. and J.G. Carrier. Structure and Process in a Melanesian Society: Ponam's Progress in the Twentieth Century. New York: Harwood Academic Press, 1991. xxii + 261 pp. including appendices, glossary, bibliography, and index. $28.00 cloth. Gewertz, Deborah B. and Frederick K. Errington. Twisted Histories, Altered Contexts: Representing the Chambri in a World System. Cambridge University Press, 1991. xiv + 264 pp. including notes, referenc…
Sepik Heritage: Tradition and Change in Papua New Guinea
Anthropology and Circumcision
This chapter reviews the anthropology of male and female circumcision over the past century. After surveying classic sociocultural and psychodynamic interpretations of male circumcision, I shift to the biblical and Jewish rite, focusing on gender symbolism and counter-hegemonic practice within European-Christian society. The chapter then reviews the relationship between male circumcision in sub-Saharan Africa and reduced rates of HIV. Next, I add…
Politics, Gender, and Time in Melanesia and Aboriginal Australia
This article interprets the symbolism and politics of Iatmul (Sepik River, Papua New Guinea). Social life is structured by different forms of (e.g., totemism, myth, Omaha terminologies, ritual). Furthermore, mythic history is a mode of ritual politics. Finally, Iatmul symbolizes paradoxes of gender. The article concludes by comparing the temporality and gender of Melanesian cosmology with the Aboriginal dreamtime. (Time, politics, gender, Iatmul,…
Island Rivers: Fresh Water and Place in Oceania
Anthropologists have written a great deal about the coastal adaptations and seafaring traditions of Pacific Islanders, but have had much less to say about the significance of rivers for Pacific island culture, livelihood and identity. The authors of this collection seek to fill that gap in the ethnographic record by drawing attention to the deep historical attachments of
FromCannibal Toursto cargo cult: On the aftermath of tourism in the Sepik River, Papua New Guinea
This article challenges the moral parable of the film Cannibal Tours by drawing on long-term ethnographic research in a Iatmul-speaking village along the Sepik River, Papua New Guinea-one of the very communities featured in the film. In this article, first, I argue that Cannibal Tours silences indigenous agency and thus contributes to the very symbolic violence the film-maker aims to critique. Second, I interpret Sepik River tourist art not as me…
The Waters of Mendangumeli: A Masculine Psychoanalytic Interpretation of a New Guinea Flood Myth-and Women's Laughter
This article corroborates Alan Dundes's psychoanalytic interpretation of flood myths as expressing male envy of female fertility and birth. My data consist of two deluge tales collected in a Sepik River society in Papua New Guinea in the 1980s and 1994. But I do more than simply test Dundes's thesis. I also show that it is possible and, indeed, imperative to embed psychoanalytic analyses of oral tales in the local cultural context. I also update,…
God wastes nothing: A consensual qualitative study of coping among Catholic individuals with cancer diagnoses
While religious meaning-making has been extensively studied, emic religious coping remains largely unexplored. This consensual qualitative research study explored Catholic cancer survivors' ( N = 22) descriptions of drawing on their religious framework throughout their cancer journeys. Findings revealed distinctive Catholic resources such as the power of blessings, drawing comfort from the saints and sacraments, and "offering up" suffering as a f…
High art as tourist art, tourist art as high art: Comparing the New Guinea Sculpture Garden at Stanford University and Sepik River tourist art
This paper compares two contemporary aesthetic expressions: tourist art from the Sepik River in Papua New Guinea and the New Guinea Sculpture Garden at Stanford University. Both aesthetic expressions undermine the conventional categories that classify art. Sepik River tourist art is motivated not by the drive to lend individual, subjective experience a material expression but by monetary desire. The New Guinea Sculpture Garden was expressly creat…
Commentary: Modernism, J ews, and F razer
The outstanding papers in this collection raise important points for not only a fuller understanding of the contemporary Pacific, but also for issues of identity and belonging much further afield. Specifically, I propose that we can approach these papers from a J ewish Studies perspective gazing upon M elanesia, but also from a M elanesianist perspective surveying the broad field of J ewish Studies. For in many respects, the case studies ask us t…
Scent and psyche: Andamanese cosmology and psychodynamic perspectives on sepik ritual
Juillerat, Bernard, ed. Shooting the Sun: Ritual and Meaning in West Sepik. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992. x+310 pp. including glossary, references, and index. $35.00 cloth. Pandya, Vishvajit. Above the Forest: A Study of Andamanese Ethnoanemology, Cosmology, and the Power of Ritual. Delhi, India: Oxford University Press, 1993. xxxii + 319 pp. including glossary, bibliography, and index. $24.00 cloth
Sepik Heritage: Tradition and Change in Papua New Guinea
History as pastiche, process, and postmodern encounter: Recent historical ethnographies in Melanesian studies
Carrier, A.H. and J.G. Carrier. Structure and Process in a Melanesian Society: Ponam's Progress in the Twentieth Century. New York: Harwood Academic Press, 1991. xxii + 261 pp. including appendices, glossary, bibliography, and index. $28.00 cloth. Gewertz, Deborah B. and Frederick K. Errington. Twisted Histories, Altered Contexts: Representing the Chambri in a World System. Cambridge University Press, 1991. xiv + 264 pp. including notes, referenc…
The Gender of the Cosmos: Totemism, Society and Embodiment in the Sepik River
This article contributes to recent research on the foundations of society in Melanesia, both in terms of local representation and actual social practice, as well as body imagery and gender. I have three interrelated objectives. First, I present new data on the symbolism and politics of Eastern Iatmul cosmology and totemism (Sepik River, Papua New Guinea). Second, I engage Harrison's distinction between magical and material, or realist and nominal…
Politics, Gender, and Time in Melanesia and Aboriginal Australia
This article interprets the symbolism and politics of Iatmul (Sepik River, Papua New Guinea). Social life is structured by different forms of (e.g., totemism, myth, Omaha terminologies, ritual). Furthermore, mythic history is a mode of ritual politics. Finally, Iatmul symbolizes paradoxes of gender. The article concludes by comparing the temporality and gender of Melanesian cosmology with the Aboriginal dreamtime. (Time, politics, gender, Iatmul,…
From Totemic Space to Cyberspace: Transformations in Sepik River and Aboriginal Australian Myth, Knowledge, and Art
Emplaced Myth: Space, Narrative, and Knowledge in Aboriginal Australia and Papua New Guinea
Masculinity, Motherhood, and Mockery: Psychoanalyzing Culture and the Iatmul Naven Rite in New Guinea
Time, Anthropology of
Masculinity, motherhood, and mockery: Psychoanalyzing culture and the Iatmul Naven rite in New Guinea
Scent and psyche: Andamanese cosmology and psychodynamic perspectives on sepik ritual
Juillerat, Bernard, ed. Shooting the Sun: Ritual and Meaning in West Sepik. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992. x+310 pp. including glossary, references, and index. $35.00 cloth. Pandya, Vishvajit. Above the Forest: A Study of Andamanese Ethnoanemology, Cosmology, and the Power of Ritual. Delhi, India: Oxford University Press, 1993. xxxii + 319 pp. including glossary, bibliography, and index. $24.00 cloth
High art as tourist art, tourist art as high art: Comparing the New Guinea Sculpture Garden at Stanford University and Sepik River tourist art
This paper compares two contemporary aesthetic expressions: tourist art from the Sepik River in Papua New Guinea and the New Guinea Sculpture Garden at Stanford University. Both aesthetic expressions undermine the conventional categories that classify art. Sepik River tourist art is motivated not by the drive to lend individual, subjective experience a material expression but by monetary desire. The New Guinea Sculpture Garden was expressly creat…
Pacific Islands
Anthropology and Circumcision
This chapter reviews the anthropology of male and female circumcision over the past century. After surveying classic sociocultural and psychodynamic interpretations of male circumcision, I shift to the biblical and Jewish rite, focusing on gender symbolism and counter-hegemonic practice within European-Christian society. The chapter then reviews the relationship between male circumcision in sub-Saharan Africa and reduced rates of HIV. Next, I add…
Humors and substances: Ideas of the body in New Guinea - By Pamela J. Stewart & Andrew Strathern
Race and Religion among the Chosen Peoples of Crown Heights (review)
Skull Art in Papua New Guinea by Sabine Jell-Bahlsen
Virtual Voyages: Cinema and Travel edited by Jeffrey Ruoff
FromCannibal Toursto cargo cult: On the aftermath of tourism in the Sepik River, Papua New Guinea
This article challenges the moral parable of the film Cannibal Tours by drawing on long-term ethnographic research in a Iatmul-speaking village along the Sepik River, Papua New Guinea-one of the very communities featured in the film. In this article, first, I argue that Cannibal Tours silences indigenous agency and thus contributes to the very symbolic violence the film-maker aims to critique. Second, I interpret Sepik River tourist art not as me…
Commentary: Modernism, J ews, and F razer
The outstanding papers in this collection raise important points for not only a fuller understanding of the contemporary Pacific, but also for issues of identity and belonging much further afield. Specifically, I propose that we can approach these papers from a J ewish Studies perspective gazing upon M elanesia, but also from a M elanesianist perspective surveying the broad field of J ewish Studies. For in many respects, the case studies ask us t…
The Waters of Mendangumeli: A Masculine Psychoanalytic Interpretation of a New Guinea Flood Myth-and Women's Laughter
This article corroborates Alan Dundes's psychoanalytic interpretation of flood myths as expressing male envy of female fertility and birth. My data consist of two deluge tales collected in a Sepik River society in Papua New Guinea in the 1980s and 1994. But I do more than simply test Dundes's thesis. I also show that it is possible and, indeed, imperative to embed psychoanalytic analyses of oral tales in the local cultural context. I also update,…
From Totemic Space to Cyberspace: Transformations in Sepik River and Aboriginal Australian Myth, Knowledge, and Art
The Sepik River, Papua New Guinea: Nourishing Tradition and Modern Catastrophe
although, it brings so much to the people, they know it can never be trusted and they will never laugh at it. It is there for their use but also for their veneration. Too many of them have been sucked under by its temperamental currents and its grisly executioners, the crocodiles; too many of their dwellings and gardens have been ruined by its raging flood; too many canoes and boats have floundered on its submerged logs for men to regard it light…
Totemism, tourism, and trucks. The changing meanings of paint and colors in a Sepik River society
Iatmul art from the middle Sepik River in Papua New Guinea is well-known worldwide, but little understood. This article therefore offers an ethnographically-grounded, long-term study of the changing meanings of artistic paint and colors as used and seen by the Eastern Iatmul people of Tambunum village, whom I have studied since the late-1980s. I analyze how colors and paint evoke the landscape in terms of mythic history, totemism, the aesthetic v…
Island Rivers: Fresh Water and Place in Oceania
Anthropologists have written a great deal about the coastal adaptations and seafaring traditions of Pacific Islanders, but have had much less to say about the significance of rivers for Pacific island culture, livelihood and identity. The authors of this collection seek to fill that gap in the ethnographic record by drawing attention to the deep historical attachments of
God wastes nothing: A consensual qualitative study of coping among Catholic individuals with cancer diagnoses
While religious meaning-making has been extensively studied, emic religious coping remains largely unexplored. This consensual qualitative research study explored Catholic cancer survivors' ( N = 22) descriptions of drawing on their religious framework throughout their cancer journeys. Findings revealed distinctive Catholic resources such as the power of blessings, drawing comfort from the saints and sacraments, and "offering up" suffering as a f…
Sociology (15 works) · History (13 works) · Anthropology (11 works) · Ethnology (10 works) · History (8 works) · New guinea (8 works) · Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies (8 works) · Anthropological Studies and Insights (7 works) · Archaeology (7 works) · Art history (7 works)