N Ro
Biographic Data
| ID | 3946 |
|---|---|
| NAME | N Ro |
| GIVEN NAMES | N |
| FAMILY NAME | Ro |
| SIGNATURE | RO N |
| AFFILIATIONS | Vanderbilt University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-3780-9044 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 27 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 177 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 27 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2002 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 6 |
Enacted ethnography: Stories, affect, and activism
Biologies and Beings: World-Making, Cognition, and the Making of Self
In this paper, I explore some of my previous and ongoing research at the intersection of folk biology and cognition, focusing on wider philosophical implications. Specifically, I intend to destabilize previous findings of my own research, interrogating them with data from my more recent work and a perspective of ontology, epistemology, and world-making. In doing so, I aim to inject folk biological data to the discussion of ontology and vice versa…
The intersection of violence and early Covid-19 policies in El Salvador
What can COVID do to me?" Doña Paz asked me one day while discussing the COVID alert the Salvadoran government had just declared. Her question wasn't so much about her lack of concern about her health (or that of her children) but rather spoke to the multiple day-to-day worries and dangers she navigated. For Doña Paz, COVID-19 was less of an immediate threat than the quest to survive and stay safe in El Cerro, an urban area of illegal squatters w…
Environmental Cognition
The study of environmental cognition combines culture‐specific and universal human folkbiological understandings with studies of environments, ecologies, and landscapes. Though harking back to early anthropological concerns over “cosmology” and “worldview,” environmental cognition has recently incorporated aspects of phenomenal anthropology and the “ontological turn.” The field thus combines questions from psychology, geography, philosophy, and a…
Ethnobiology and Cognition
For cognitive scientists, ethnobiology constitutes a domain that allows exploration of the developing mind in phylogenetic and ontogenetic terms. Anthropologists show particular concern with the development, maintenance, and change of ethnobiological knowledge and the resulting consequences for behavior. Research in this area relates work from the cognitive sciences with studies on institutions and behavior in relation to resource management and …
Ritual and Religion, Evolution of
Anthropological approaches to religion and ritual throughout the twentieth century comprise a wide array of perspectives and insights that can nevertheless be organized into two dimensions: groups versus individuals and functionalist versus intellectualist. In recent years, accounts of religion and ritual have emerged that are based on theories of biological evolution, in stark contrast to earlier approaches. Despite these new orientations, evolu…
Language ideology, space, and place-based identity formation among the Tzotzil Maya of Chiapas, Mexico
The fiction of nationalism: Newroz TV representations of Kurdish nationalism
Benedict Anderson’s seminal work on imagined communities has opened a multitude of explorations in how mass media construct and represent social identities in relation to nationalism. Depicting and at the same time creating social groups, media representations are permeated by questions of inclusion and exclusion. As a result, it is important to study media representations of social identities as strategic ideologies that debilitate or stabilize,…
Imagined or real: The intersection of tribalism and nationalism in the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG)
The Middle East is frequently looked upon from an angle of tribalism.1 This is specifically true for Kurdistan,2 with Kurdish people often regarded as the quintessential tribal society.3 While the
Expectations of Similarity and Cultural Difference in Conceptual Models of Illness: A Comparison of Medical Staff and Mexican Migrants
Cultural competency has increasingly become a central concept in medical education and practice, focusing on recognizing the variation in patients' health-related beliefs and practices in order to improve cross-cultural communication and health outcomes. While numerous anthropologists critique cultural competency concepts, approaches, and instruments, there is little research regarding the central question of how biomedical providers perceive the…
The Case of Curers, Noncurers, and Biomedical Experts in Pichátaro, Mexico: Resiliency in Folk-Medical Beliefs
We explore potential conceptual and cultural change in folk-medical models within a Mexican community that may have taken place over the past 30 years. Building on a study from the 1970s, we explore the effects a government-supported biomedical clinic had on the content and distribution of folk-medical concepts. Surprisingly, we find that despite a dramatic increase in access to biomedicine and a host of socioeconomic shifts opening access to new…
Maya Folk Botany and Knowledge Devolution: Modernization and Intra‐Community Variability in the Acquisition of Folkbotanical Knowledge
One potential source of folkbiological knowledge loss is changing patterns of interaction with the natural world stemming from “modernizing” material change. This article compares models of plant knowledge among age‐matched groups of children and adults in two communities of a municipality located in the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico. Use of the Cultural Consensus Model (CCM), analysis of residual agreement, and examination of model content show t…
Knowledge Organization, Categories, and Ad Hoc Groups: Folk Medical Models among Mexican Migrants in Nashville
In this article we bring together theory and methods from two different but related fields, anthropology—specifically medical anthropology—and the cognitive sciences—specifically research on categorization and reasoning. We explore folk medical models of Mexican migrants in the greater Nashville area. The combining thread is our exploration in conceptual organization (categorization) and reasoning. We not only integrate formal methods with ethnog…
Gendered Experiences of Migration and Conceptual Knowledge of Illness
Naming the Animals that Come to Mind: Effects of Culture and Experience on Category Fluency
This article considers the semantic structure of the animal category from a cross-cultural developmental perspective. Children and adults from three North American communities (urban majority culture, rural majority culture and rural Native American) were prompted to generate animal names, and the resulting lists were analyzed for their underlying dimensionality and for the typicality or salience of specific animal names. The semantic structure o…
Folkbiological reasoning from a cross-cultural developmental perspective: Early essentialist notions are shaped by cultural beliefs
In 2 experiments, the authors examined the evolution of folkbiological reasoning in children (4 to 10 years of age) and adults from 4 distinct communities (rural Native American, rural majority culture, and suburban and urban North American communities). Using an adoption paradigm, they examined participants' intuitions regarding the inheritance of properties and the mechanisms underlying the transmission of kindhood. Across all communities and a…
Epistemological Models and Culture Conflict: Menominee and Euro‐American Hunters in Wisconsin
We describe how Menominee Native Americans and Euro‐American hunters differ with respect to how they perceive and think about nature (here, specifically animals and plants of the forest) as well as the role of humans in it. We call these models epistemological frameworks—folk theories that allow individuals to make inferences in specific situations, guiding the acquisition and formation of new knowledge. Using an approach that combines ethnograph…
Why Folkbiology Matters: Resource Conflict Despite Shared Goals and Knowledge
Unconquered Lacandon Maya: Ethnohistory and Archaeology of Indigenous Change:Unconquered Lacandon Maya: Ethnohistory and Archaeology of Indigenous Change
Unconquered Lacandon Maya: Ethnohistory and Archaeology of Indigenous Change
Unconquered Lacandon Maya: Ethnohistory and Archaeology of Indigenous Change. Joel W. Palka. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2005. 319 pp
Triad Tasks, a Multipurpose Tool to Elicit Similarity Judgments: The Case of Tzotzil Maya Plant Taxonomy
The universality of multipurpose taxonomies has been widely established in folk biology. However, recent studies with nonprofessional fish experts in the United States as well as with tree experts in the Chicago area suggest that different goals can affect category organization of natural kinds. This article reports the results of a triad task study exploring specific aspects of the multipurpose plant taxonomy among the Tzotzil Maya of Zinacantán…
Ethnography and Experiments: Cultural Models and Expertise Effects Elicited with Experimental Research Techniques
This article reports the results of two independent studies dealing with saliency effects within the domain of folkbiological knowledge. In study 1, the authors present data from a free-listing task that explored tree-name generation among Tzotzil Maya of Zinacantán (Chiapas). Study 2 compares Menominee Native Americans with majority culture (nonprofessional) fish experts in central Wisconsin. The studies explore patterns of informant agreement a…
Evolution and devolution of knowledge: A Tale of Two Biologies
Anthropological enquiry suggests that all societies classify animals and plants in similar ways. Paradoxically, in the same cultures that have seen large advances in biological science, practical knowledge of nature has dramatically diminished. Here we describe historical, cross-cultural, and developmental research on the ways in which people ordinarily conceptualize organic nature (folk biology), concentrating on cognitive consequences associate…
Cognitive Aspects of Intergenerational Change: Mental Models, Cultural Change, and Environmental Behavior among the Lacandon Maya of Southern Mexico
The life of the Lacandon Maya of Mensäbäk (Chiapas, Mexico) has undergone tremendous changes in the last 30 years. These changes are manifested in a generational split in social relations, household location, and economic behavior. The changes affecting social life as well as decision-making processes are paralleled by changes in environmental cognition among the adult members of the community. Older individuals reveal a systematic awareness of t…
Thinking about biology. Modular constraints on categorization and reasoning in the everyday life of Americans, Maya, and scientists
Folkecology, Cultural Epidemiology, and the Spirit of the Commons: A Garden Experiment in the Maya Lowlands, 19912001
Using a variation on an experimental approach from biology, we distinguish the influence of sociocultural factors from that of economic, demographic, and ecological factors in environmental management and maintenance. This is important to issues of global environmental change, where there is little empirical research into cultural effects on deforestation and land use. Findings with three groups who live in the same rainforest habitat and manifes…
Evolution and devolution of knowledge: A Tale of Two Biologies
Anthropological enquiry suggests that all societies classify animals and plants in similar ways. Paradoxically, in the same cultures that have seen large advances in biological science, practical knowledge of nature has dramatically diminished. Here we describe historical, cross-cultural, and developmental research on the ways in which people ordinarily conceptualize organic nature (folk biology), concentrating on cognitive consequences associate…
Folkbiological reasoning from a cross-cultural developmental perspective: Early essentialist notions are shaped by cultural beliefs
In 2 experiments, the authors examined the evolution of folkbiological reasoning in children (4 to 10 years of age) and adults from 4 distinct communities (rural Native American, rural majority culture, and suburban and urban North American communities). Using an adoption paradigm, they examined participants' intuitions regarding the inheritance of properties and the mechanisms underlying the transmission of kindhood. Across all communities and a…
Epistemological Models and Culture Conflict: Menominee and Euro‐American Hunters in Wisconsin
We describe how Menominee Native Americans and Euro‐American hunters differ with respect to how they perceive and think about nature (here, specifically animals and plants of the forest) as well as the role of humans in it. We call these models epistemological frameworks—folk theories that allow individuals to make inferences in specific situations, guiding the acquisition and formation of new knowledge. Using an approach that combines ethnograph…
Ethnography and Experiments: Cultural Models and Expertise Effects Elicited with Experimental Research Techniques
This article reports the results of two independent studies dealing with saliency effects within the domain of folkbiological knowledge. In study 1, the authors present data from a free-listing task that explored tree-name generation among Tzotzil Maya of Zinacantán (Chiapas). Study 2 compares Menominee Native Americans with majority culture (nonprofessional) fish experts in central Wisconsin. The studies explore patterns of informant agreement a…
Triad Tasks, a Multipurpose Tool to Elicit Similarity Judgments: The Case of Tzotzil Maya Plant Taxonomy
The universality of multipurpose taxonomies has been widely established in folk biology. However, recent studies with nonprofessional fish experts in the United States as well as with tree experts in the Chicago area suggest that different goals can affect category organization of natural kinds. This article reports the results of a triad task study exploring specific aspects of the multipurpose plant taxonomy among the Tzotzil Maya of Zinacantán…
Knowledge Organization, Categories, and Ad Hoc Groups: Folk Medical Models among Mexican Migrants in Nashville
In this article we bring together theory and methods from two different but related fields, anthropology—specifically medical anthropology—and the cognitive sciences—specifically research on categorization and reasoning. We explore folk medical models of Mexican migrants in the greater Nashville area. The combining thread is our exploration in conceptual organization (categorization) and reasoning. We not only integrate formal methods with ethnog…
Why Folkbiology Matters: Resource Conflict Despite Shared Goals and Knowledge
The fiction of nationalism: Newroz TV representations of Kurdish nationalism
Benedict Anderson’s seminal work on imagined communities has opened a multitude of explorations in how mass media construct and represent social identities in relation to nationalism. Depicting and at the same time creating social groups, media representations are permeated by questions of inclusion and exclusion. As a result, it is important to study media representations of social identities as strategic ideologies that debilitate or stabilize,…
Thinking about biology. Modular constraints on categorization and reasoning in the everyday life of Americans, Maya, and scientists
The Case of Curers, Noncurers, and Biomedical Experts in Pichátaro, Mexico: Resiliency in Folk-Medical Beliefs
We explore potential conceptual and cultural change in folk-medical models within a Mexican community that may have taken place over the past 30 years. Building on a study from the 1970s, we explore the effects a government-supported biomedical clinic had on the content and distribution of folk-medical concepts. Surprisingly, we find that despite a dramatic increase in access to biomedicine and a host of socioeconomic shifts opening access to new…
Maya Folk Botany and Knowledge Devolution: Modernization and Intra‐Community Variability in the Acquisition of Folkbotanical Knowledge
One potential source of folkbiological knowledge loss is changing patterns of interaction with the natural world stemming from “modernizing” material change. This article compares models of plant knowledge among age‐matched groups of children and adults in two communities of a municipality located in the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico. Use of the Cultural Consensus Model (CCM), analysis of residual agreement, and examination of model content show t…
Naming the Animals that Come to Mind: Effects of Culture and Experience on Category Fluency
This article considers the semantic structure of the animal category from a cross-cultural developmental perspective. Children and adults from three North American communities (urban majority culture, rural majority culture and rural Native American) were prompted to generate animal names, and the resulting lists were analyzed for their underlying dimensionality and for the typicality or salience of specific animal names. The semantic structure o…
The intersection of violence and early Covid-19 policies in El Salvador
What can COVID do to me?" Doña Paz asked me one day while discussing the COVID alert the Salvadoran government had just declared. Her question wasn't so much about her lack of concern about her health (or that of her children) but rather spoke to the multiple day-to-day worries and dangers she navigated. For Doña Paz, COVID-19 was less of an immediate threat than the quest to survive and stay safe in El Cerro, an urban area of illegal squatters w…
Imagined or real: The intersection of tribalism and nationalism in the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG)
The Middle East is frequently looked upon from an angle of tribalism.1 This is specifically true for Kurdistan,2 with Kurdish people often regarded as the quintessential tribal society.3 While the
Unconquered Lacandon Maya: Ethnohistory and Archaeology of Indigenous Change
Unconquered Lacandon Maya: Ethnohistory and Archaeology of Indigenous Change. Joel W. Palka. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2005. 319 pp
Cognitive Aspects of Intergenerational Change: Mental Models, Cultural Change, and Environmental Behavior among the Lacandon Maya of Southern Mexico
The life of the Lacandon Maya of Mensäbäk (Chiapas, Mexico) has undergone tremendous changes in the last 30 years. These changes are manifested in a generational split in social relations, household location, and economic behavior. The changes affecting social life as well as decision-making processes are paralleled by changes in environmental cognition among the adult members of the community. Older individuals reveal a systematic awareness of t…
Thinking about biology. Modular constraints on categorization and reasoning in the everyday life of Americans, Maya, and scientists
Anthropology, Passion and Purpose
Folkecology, Cultural Epidemiology, and the Spirit of the Commons: A Garden Experiment in the Maya Lowlands, 19912001
Using a variation on an experimental approach from biology, we distinguish the influence of sociocultural factors from that of economic, demographic, and ecological factors in environmental management and maintenance. This is important to issues of global environmental change, where there is little empirical research into cultural effects on deforestation and land use. Findings with three groups who live in the same rainforest habitat and manifes…
Evolution and devolution of knowledge: A Tale of Two Biologies
Anthropological enquiry suggests that all societies classify animals and plants in similar ways. Paradoxically, in the same cultures that have seen large advances in biological science, practical knowledge of nature has dramatically diminished. Here we describe historical, cross-cultural, and developmental research on the ways in which people ordinarily conceptualize organic nature (folk biology), concentrating on cognitive consequences associate…
Triad Tasks, a Multipurpose Tool to Elicit Similarity Judgments: The Case of Tzotzil Maya Plant Taxonomy
The universality of multipurpose taxonomies has been widely established in folk biology. However, recent studies with nonprofessional fish experts in the United States as well as with tree experts in the Chicago area suggest that different goals can affect category organization of natural kinds. This article reports the results of a triad task study exploring specific aspects of the multipurpose plant taxonomy among the Tzotzil Maya of Zinacantán…
Ethnography and Experiments: Cultural Models and Expertise Effects Elicited with Experimental Research Techniques
This article reports the results of two independent studies dealing with saliency effects within the domain of folkbiological knowledge. In study 1, the authors present data from a free-listing task that explored tree-name generation among Tzotzil Maya of Zinacantán (Chiapas). Study 2 compares Menominee Native Americans with majority culture (nonprofessional) fish experts in central Wisconsin. The studies explore patterns of informant agreement a…
Unconquered Lacandon Maya: Ethnohistory and Archaeology of Indigenous Change:Unconquered Lacandon Maya: Ethnohistory and Archaeology of Indigenous Change
Unconquered Lacandon Maya: Ethnohistory and Archaeology of Indigenous Change
Unconquered Lacandon Maya: Ethnohistory and Archaeology of Indigenous Change. Joel W. Palka. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2005. 319 pp
Folkbiological reasoning from a cross-cultural developmental perspective: Early essentialist notions are shaped by cultural beliefs
In 2 experiments, the authors examined the evolution of folkbiological reasoning in children (4 to 10 years of age) and adults from 4 distinct communities (rural Native American, rural majority culture, and suburban and urban North American communities). Using an adoption paradigm, they examined participants' intuitions regarding the inheritance of properties and the mechanisms underlying the transmission of kindhood. Across all communities and a…
Epistemological Models and Culture Conflict: Menominee and Euro‐American Hunters in Wisconsin
We describe how Menominee Native Americans and Euro‐American hunters differ with respect to how they perceive and think about nature (here, specifically animals and plants of the forest) as well as the role of humans in it. We call these models epistemological frameworks—folk theories that allow individuals to make inferences in specific situations, guiding the acquisition and formation of new knowledge. Using an approach that combines ethnograph…
Why Folkbiology Matters: Resource Conflict Despite Shared Goals and Knowledge
Gendered Experiences of Migration and Conceptual Knowledge of Illness
Naming the Animals that Come to Mind: Effects of Culture and Experience on Category Fluency
This article considers the semantic structure of the animal category from a cross-cultural developmental perspective. Children and adults from three North American communities (urban majority culture, rural majority culture and rural Native American) were prompted to generate animal names, and the resulting lists were analyzed for their underlying dimensionality and for the typicality or salience of specific animal names. The semantic structure o…
Maya Folk Botany and Knowledge Devolution: Modernization and Intra‐Community Variability in the Acquisition of Folkbotanical Knowledge
One potential source of folkbiological knowledge loss is changing patterns of interaction with the natural world stemming from “modernizing” material change. This article compares models of plant knowledge among age‐matched groups of children and adults in two communities of a municipality located in the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico. Use of the Cultural Consensus Model (CCM), analysis of residual agreement, and examination of model content show t…
Knowledge Organization, Categories, and Ad Hoc Groups: Folk Medical Models among Mexican Migrants in Nashville
In this article we bring together theory and methods from two different but related fields, anthropology—specifically medical anthropology—and the cognitive sciences—specifically research on categorization and reasoning. We explore folk medical models of Mexican migrants in the greater Nashville area. The combining thread is our exploration in conceptual organization (categorization) and reasoning. We not only integrate formal methods with ethnog…
Expectations of Similarity and Cultural Difference in Conceptual Models of Illness: A Comparison of Medical Staff and Mexican Migrants
Cultural competency has increasingly become a central concept in medical education and practice, focusing on recognizing the variation in patients' health-related beliefs and practices in order to improve cross-cultural communication and health outcomes. While numerous anthropologists critique cultural competency concepts, approaches, and instruments, there is little research regarding the central question of how biomedical providers perceive the…
The Case of Curers, Noncurers, and Biomedical Experts in Pichátaro, Mexico: Resiliency in Folk-Medical Beliefs
We explore potential conceptual and cultural change in folk-medical models within a Mexican community that may have taken place over the past 30 years. Building on a study from the 1970s, we explore the effects a government-supported biomedical clinic had on the content and distribution of folk-medical concepts. Surprisingly, we find that despite a dramatic increase in access to biomedicine and a host of socioeconomic shifts opening access to new…
The fiction of nationalism: Newroz TV representations of Kurdish nationalism
Benedict Anderson’s seminal work on imagined communities has opened a multitude of explorations in how mass media construct and represent social identities in relation to nationalism. Depicting and at the same time creating social groups, media representations are permeated by questions of inclusion and exclusion. As a result, it is important to study media representations of social identities as strategic ideologies that debilitate or stabilize,…
Imagined or real: The intersection of tribalism and nationalism in the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG)
The Middle East is frequently looked upon from an angle of tribalism.1 This is specifically true for Kurdistan,2 with Kurdish people often regarded as the quintessential tribal society.3 While the
Language ideology, space, and place-based identity formation among the Tzotzil Maya of Chiapas, Mexico
Environmental Cognition
The study of environmental cognition combines culture‐specific and universal human folkbiological understandings with studies of environments, ecologies, and landscapes. Though harking back to early anthropological concerns over “cosmology” and “worldview,” environmental cognition has recently incorporated aspects of phenomenal anthropology and the “ontological turn.” The field thus combines questions from psychology, geography, philosophy, and a…
Ethnobiology and Cognition
For cognitive scientists, ethnobiology constitutes a domain that allows exploration of the developing mind in phylogenetic and ontogenetic terms. Anthropologists show particular concern with the development, maintenance, and change of ethnobiological knowledge and the resulting consequences for behavior. Research in this area relates work from the cognitive sciences with studies on institutions and behavior in relation to resource management and …
Ritual and Religion, Evolution of
Anthropological approaches to religion and ritual throughout the twentieth century comprise a wide array of perspectives and insights that can nevertheless be organized into two dimensions: groups versus individuals and functionalist versus intellectualist. In recent years, accounts of religion and ritual have emerged that are based on theories of biological evolution, in stark contrast to earlier approaches. Despite these new orientations, evolu…
The intersection of violence and early Covid-19 policies in El Salvador
What can COVID do to me?" Doña Paz asked me one day while discussing the COVID alert the Salvadoran government had just declared. Her question wasn't so much about her lack of concern about her health (or that of her children) but rather spoke to the multiple day-to-day worries and dangers she navigated. For Doña Paz, COVID-19 was less of an immediate threat than the quest to survive and stay safe in El Cerro, an urban area of illegal squatters w…
Sociology (24 works) · Psychology (17 works) · Anthropology (15 works) · Epistemology (13 works) · Categorization, perception, and language (11 works) · Biology (10 works) · Cognition (10 works) · Ecology (9 works) · Geography (9 works) · Philosophy (9 works)