anthropology

The Two Solitudes introduces a new socio anthropological distinction between two fundamentally different forms of human isolation: vertical solitude and horizontal solitude. Vertical solitude refers to the historically recognised isolation of leaders, commanders, visionaries, and elevated figures whose displacement from ordinary social experience occurs through hierarchy, responsibility, or power…

_Psycho-Cosmocide Studies, Kurumbi Wone Working Paper Series No.11, (2026)_. 2026This paper develops the Eight Atlases of Human Existence as a theoretical framework within the Psycho-Cosmocide paradigm — a decolonial philosophy concerned with the systematic destruction of indigenous cosmologies, consciousness, and existential architecture under colonial domination. The eight atlases — Physical/Ma…

Observed annually on May 25, Africa Day commemorates the founding of the Organization of African Unity in 1963, now the African Union . Established during a period marked by independence movements across the continent, the day recognizes not only political solidarity but also the cultural, social, and intellectual histories that continue to shape African societies today. Within architecture and u…

A collector's decision to illegally purchase a piece of porcelain at a New York hotel illustrates how inherent human traits can override legal and ethical caution.

_Journal of the Council for Research on Religion_ 7 (1):ii-xv. 2026This article argues that what we call “religious nationalism” is best understood as a mythic, juridical, and cartographic project that naturalizes domination. Drawing on Indigenous critiques of borders—summarized in the refrain “we didn’t cross the border, the border crossed us”—and on concepts such as the One Dish One Spoon wampu…

International audience

A 59,000-year-old tooth hints that Neanderthals may have treated infections with stone tools. Long before modern dentistry, Neanderthals may already have understood something crucial about pain: where it came from and how to relieve it. A 59,000-year-old tooth discovered in Siberia contains evidence that one of our extinct relatives may have deliberately drilled into an [...]

Editor in chief Nancy Shute introduces a new social sciences column that explores what it means to be human.

This paper offers an analysis of the UFO/UAP disclosure phenomenon. It argues that the alien question carries unusual cultural, psychological, political, and spiritual force because it is not only an empirical question about possible non-human craft. It is also a question about secrecy, institutional distrust, hidden authority, technological anxiety, spiritual hunger, and the human desire for an …

Although dual religiosity has received increasing scholarly attention, its implications for religious identity and practice among Catholics in contemporary Zambia remain insufficiently understood. This study examines the manifestation of dual religiosity among Bemba Catholics in Muchinga Province, Zambia, with particular attention to beliefs and practices shaped by African Indigenous Religion (AI…

This study explored the life, works, and legacy of Wenceslao “Bintao” Q. Vinzons in Philippine history using a qualitative historical research approach based on the Historiography Theory and the Local Hero Legacy Reconstruction Theory. The study sought to reconstruct and situate the significance of Vinzons as a regional hero whose contributions have been underrepresented in mainstream Philippine …

Citizen science coordinators are increasingly using digital technologies such as smartphones, web platforms and social media to engage participants and execute projects. However, this could bring unintended social consequences that may affect the sustainability of, and engagement in projects. These impacts are not yet well documented. Following the PRISMA framework, we performed a scoping review …

Abstract Often seen as fragile and peripheral to the geopolitics of Louis XV’s monarchy, France’s Atlantic empire exerted a powerful influence on the mid-eighteenth-century wars that ultimately decimated it. Beginning with the relative international peace and rapid integration of France’s colonial economy that characterized the 1730s and 1740s, this chapter follows the resurgence of imperial conf…

Abstract This chapter traces the relationship between France and sub-Saharan West Africa during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Emerging from the remnants of crusader colonialism, French commercial and diplomatic exchanges in Cape Verde, the Malagueta (or Pepper) Coast, and the Gulf of Guinea became vastly more significant than historians have previously realized. Before 1600, tens of thou…

Abstract This book reimagines the history of France’s first overseas empire, tracing its roots from medieval crusading ventures to the revolutionary upheavals of the late eighteenth century. Rejecting top-down narratives of imperial design, the book emphasizes the decentralized, contingent, and negotiated nature of French expansion. Across twelve chapters, it follows merchants, mariners, missiona…

Abstract The final chapter brings Paddington into the present, examining his role in contemporary debates about immigration, nationalism, and belonging in post-Brexit Britain. It analyzes how Paddington’s hybrid identity—simultaneously Peruvian, British, refugee, and citizen—has become newly charged amid hostile immigration policies and polarized public discourse. The chapter foregrounds represen…

Abstract This chapter examines the transformative half-century between the 1660s and the 1710s to uncover the nature of colonial power relations in the French Caribbean. It uses the records of a short-lived rebellion by enslaved and formerly enslaved people in Martinique. The uprising left a dense paper trail of interrogation transcripts, accounts by colonial officials, instructions from Versaill…

Abstract Chapter 4 addresses the boundary between dominant and subordinate groups under slavery, an institution rooted in a violent relationship toward people who occupy an alienated and dishonored social status. Unfree individuals are bound to persons, not to land or fiefdoms. Micro-segregation arises because barriers to escape and insubordination among enslaved people coincide with a parasitic …

Abstract This chapter explores the social, economic, and political relations that both constituted and circumscribed the emerging French empire of the early eighteenth century. Beginning in the era of John Law’s Mississippi Company (1716–1720), which sought to reorganize French finances and reorient the political loyalties of French subjects around paper currency backed by Louis XV’s monarchy, it…