Joanna Overing
My area of research is Amazonia. A major concern over the past several years has been directed toward understanding a set of issues on egalitarianism and individualism‚ among the indigenous peoples of Amazonia, which has led to a study of Amazonian knowledges. More particularly, my interest has been to spell out the explicit philosophy of power, modes of equality and materiality expressed by Piaroa (an indigenous people of the Venezuelan Amazon Territory) in cosmology, in shamanic exegesis, and in daily practice, discourse, and rhetoric. A second, but related, area of research has centred upon the problem
of translation in anthropological analysis. A third area of research has been within an anthropology of the everyday, with the emphasis being upon indigenous aesthetics, poetics and affective life. Important here is the interplay of the sensual and the intellectual in the creation of sociality. My overall theoretical concern has been to wed various related issues forthcoming from anthropology, philosophy, and linguistic theory, with recent research being upon sensory ways of knowing, and their relations to the genres of the grotesque and the sublime used in Piaroa narrations of myth. With this project, a major concern is to understand the sociological force of the ludic.
of translation in anthropological analysis. A third area of research has been within an anthropology of the everyday, with the emphasis being upon indigenous aesthetics, poetics and affective life. Important here is the interplay of the sensual and the intellectual in the creation of sociality. My overall theoretical concern has been to wed various related issues forthcoming from anthropology, philosophy, and linguistic theory, with recent research being upon sensory ways of knowing, and their relations to the genres of the grotesque and the sublime used in Piaroa narrations of myth. With this project, a major concern is to understand the sociological force of the ludic.
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Papers by Joanna Overing
Venezuelan Amazon Territory involve experiencing their
humour. The ludic was vital to their everyday life. These
were people who were lovers of slapstick and witty,
outrageous play on words. There was their punning, their
satire and irony, where the use of the apt and
mischievous trope was given especially high value. It was
through hilarity that I felt I actually understood my
Piaroa teachers. It was then that I felt at one with them.
what is the relation of Power to Polity and Society? –
How do these ideas of Polity and Power compare with
Western paradigms and expectations?
Venezuelan Amazon Territory involve experiencing their
humour. The ludic was vital to their everyday life. These
were people who were lovers of slapstick and witty,
outrageous play on words. There was their punning, their
satire and irony, where the use of the apt and
mischievous trope was given especially high value. It was
through hilarity that I felt I actually understood my
Piaroa teachers. It was then that I felt at one with them.
what is the relation of Power to Polity and Society? –
How do these ideas of Polity and Power compare with
Western paradigms and expectations?
Editors, Justin Shaffner and Huon Wardle
Foreword by Keith Hart
1“Introduction: Cosmopolitics as a Way of Thinking,” by Huon Wardle and Justin Shaffner
2 "Cosmopolitics and Common Sense," by Huon Wardle
3 "What Did Kant Mean by and Why Did He Adopt a Cosmopolitan Point of View in History?," by Thomas Sturm
4 "Can the Thing Speak?," by Martin Holbraad
5 "Devouring Objects of Study Food and Fieldwork," by Sidney W. Mintz
6 "Cosmetic Cosmologies in Japan Notes Towards a Superficial Investigation," by Philip Swift
7 "Why do the gods look like that? Material Embodiments of Shifting Meanings," by John McCreery
8 "How Knowledge Grows An Anthropological Anamorphosis," by Alberto Corsín Jiménez
9 “An Amazonian Question of Ironies and the Grotesque,” by Joanna Overing
10 "Lance Armstrong: The Reality Show (A Cultural Analysis)," by Lee Drummond
11 "Ritual Murder?," by Jean La Fontaine
12 "An Extreme Reading of Facebook," by Daniel Miller
13 "Friendship, Anthropology," by Liria de la Cruz and Paloma Gay y Blasco