Anthropology Newsletter 7 February 1980

Litigation, Sexism, Jo (continued from p 2) courses in loreign languages uslng Soclal science materials, wlth. of course. added funds allocated lor this purpose. Lectures. discussions and writing asslgn- ments can be conducted In foreign languages to train students In the nonllctlon use of these languages. The second solution. which Is less satisfactory. is to provide the lradltional language teachers wlth massive auxiliary materials wlth Soclal Sclence contents. The auxiliary materlals wlll be mostly films and audio tapes spoken In foreign languages prepared by social scientlsts. In both cases. we need social scientists fluent In loreign languages. As you know, multilingual anthropologists are scarce. We must produce a new generation of an- thropologists with foreign language fluency.

There are and will be many other problems. We must get serious about our own reorlentation and reorganlza. tion.

Magoroh Maruyama Southern Illinois University

Problems of the Future There are two areas that have remalned relatively

qulet until recent tlmes. The Increasing numbers of law suits IIled by Amerlcan tndlan groups (and others) against the government, and the large financial and ter. rltorlal awards that have resulted. have attracted the at. tentlon of the publlc as well as'legal profession. As we have seen in the health industry. where there Is money. there Is litlgation. These take the form 01 two legal en- titles-contract (treaty) cialms and malpractlce actlons.

In recent tlmes large sums of money and land have been awarded various Indian groups based on treaty vlolatlons (by whites) In the past years. Many tribal counclls are now acqulrlng a substantlal amount of wealth from Iltlgatlon. These assets are an attractive targat lor families and communltles who wish to reverse treaty vlolation sults based on damages (personallprop. srty InJury) that rssultml from treaty violatlons by hkiorlc trlbes and other lndlan groups. It Is well known that most treatles of the past were vlolated (and often stlll are) to varlous .degrees by both sldes. Until now, descendents of settlers who were kllled In lndlan raids, or communltles that were destroyed during Indian u,p rlslnge, found no proflt In eulng financlally' poor ' Amerlcan natlwe groups. Recent court declslons have In many .o.uo chaw@ ihili sltuatbn. Btg award tribal groups are now a.ptme target. In trtals of thle nature. the h1storlanlanthropoI~lsUarcheol~ist wlll syrely bs called upon as a pald expert wltness.

MaIpractIce, the improper practlce 01 one's profes- slon. Is a second area of future anlhropologlcal Illlga- tlon. Poor research or fleld survey work In which damages can be clalmed Is now practical. In recent years (especially In the Southwest) government anthro- poloplstslarcheologlsts have often reported a develop. ment area clear of archeological sites when In fact im. portant sites abound. The result Is the destruction 01 Im portant altes due to Ignorance or poiitical pressure. These lndlvlduals and the government departments (unlversltieslfellow consultants) are open for'malpractice SultS from not Only indivlduals and Indian groups, but the public at large. AS In medical professions, there need not be a good reason for the sult. Because of the enormous cost of defending malpractice actions. ar- cheologists. good or bad, may have to choose between expensive trials or an expensive out.of-court settle. ment-wln or lose. It may be time for contract (and other) archeologists to carry malpractice Insurance for such an eventuality. By "going bare" one can endanger hislher own personal assets and future earnings.

There is another growing problem in archeology that must be remedied. The dlfficulty Involves the speed at which a site is excavated and the Increasing reluctance of deveioperlcontractors to report inadvertently dls. cavered sltes. Many constructlon companles have un. PleaSantiy found that the reporting of an archeological Site. and the delay Involved wit6 its "scientific" excava. tion. can cosl thousands 01 dollars in delays. Many com- panies will avoid reporting sltes and bulldoze them over ralher than lace delay and added costs. Archeology must develop a rapid and lhorough technique 01 "salvage" excavation which allows a minimal construc. lion delay (no more than 1 day). With a maximum of good Scientific data being derived from the site. I f this is not done. increasing numbers of sites wlll "disappear" f o r e v e r .

E J Neiburger Andent Research

Bridging "The Great Divide" Last Year officlais from the Society lorAmerican Ar.

cheology and from the Archaeological Institute of America decided that their two organlzations had grown too far apart during the past few decades. In order to facllltate exchange of Information. methods and

Ib-Seekers, and the Infant Formula Controversy theories, an exchange of speakers was set up. Three AIA represenlatlves presented papers at the SAA meetings last Aprll in Vancouver. and three SAA representatlves (Jim Judge, Dennls Stanford. and I) presented papers at the AIA centennial meetings in Boston at the end of December.

The purpose of thls letter. In addition to thanklng the officials of the two organlzations for their elforts, is to say that the attempt to increase communlcatlon be. tween the two organizations Is a very Important one. As Colln Renfrew remarked, these are the lirst steps toward bridglng "The Great Dlvide" that has separated the organizations. I believe AiA archeologists can learn much from American archeologists. particularly in terms of research design, sampling and theory. And. at the meetings. I learned that we Americanists have much to learn from our Old World colleagues. There is much to emulate in thelr standards 01 description. Illustration and field techniques. There are many topics that have been researched, largely independently. by Old World and New World archeologlsts. A single example 01 this Is the role of the lndlvidual craftsman or artisan in prehlatory. Uslng somewhat dlfferent methods than New World archeologlsts, AIA archeologists have gen- erated a conslderable Illeralure on identifylng indivld. uals and defining their role In art and society.

In concluslon, I hope that thls kind of intercommuni- cation between the two dlsclpllnes continues. The baslcally humanisllc approaches 01 the classlcists are not lnherenlly antlthetlcal to soclal ScIence approaches of Americanists. Both approaches, both organlzatlons. and the field of archeology as a whole, wlll be Improved i f similar programs are contlnued in future years.

Payson D Sheels Universlty 0 1 Colorado, Boulder

Sexism in Your Own Backyard? No one can deny the galns made for women In an.

thropolopy by the Committee on the Status of Women In Anthropology and the Flnal Report of the Ad HOc Corm mittee to Implement the 1972 Resolullon on Falr Prac. tlces In Employment of Women. But one has to questlon the commitment of the American Anthropologlcal [Assoclation] as a whole to the struggle for women's rlghts when, at tha recent 78th Annual Meetlng In Cln. clnnatl, Ohlo. a plenary 8~8slon entltled "The Orlgln of Man: Facts and Ideas" was held. Perhapa A M has been so busy lwklng afar lor dlscrlmlnatlon agalnat women in anthmpdo(ly3hat It h.8 forgotten to ldak at homo, a serlous overslght slnce any sexlsm dlsplayed by the Assoclatlon can lunctlon to relnforce and valldate sex- Ism wlthln anthropology departments. I feel It Is t h e for the Associatlon to examlne Its own wsslble dlscrlmlna-

~~~~ ~ ~ ~ ~~ ~

tion against women and to take actlons to correct such dlscrlmlnatlon.

Krlsll Oege Mlchlgan Stale Universlty

The Suffering Job-Seeker Is anyone else appalled by the growing practice of

departments to request letters of relerence along with lnitlal applicatlons for employment? About a third of the Job advertisements In the December newsletter asked for letters; many also asked for other documentation. in. cluding coples of publlcations, unspeclfled "supportlng material" and, in one case, "evidence of teaching ablli. ty." Almost as disturbing is the willingness of appoint. ments committees lo consider unso11cited letters of reference, which has created pressures on appllcants to collect letters themselves lest they be at a disadvantage against more aggressive compelltors. It Is now quite common for job-hunters l o present their referees wlth 1191s of 10 or 15 departments to whlch they are applylng. Others relrain from applying for jobs they judge (some- times incorrectly) to be "long shots" rather than ask for letters.

All jobhunters suffer needlessly from this situation, and the prolession sullers most 01 all. Letters of reler- ence represent expenditures 0 1 time and resources. which someone must pay for and which must come oul of other aclivities. (The expense applicanls must bear to assemble and mail supporting malerials should be too obvlous to need mentioning.) The recrultment process inevitably suflers. since production4ine letters can hard. ly be USeIul to potential employers, while the long, ostensibly personal letter from a name professor ex. tolling Ihia yeEr'8 genlus can load to ooetly mIstak88. (It takes a series of such letters about different geniuses before one learns to disregard that professor's recom. mendations.)

This problem affects senior appointments as well as those of new PhDs. Columbia Unlversity recently invited applications "from established scholars of natlonal reputation," asking for "supporting documents" and let. ters of reference in addition to a vita. Particularly in view of the fact that the ad first appeared i n the December newsletter but gave a deadllne 0 1 January 1, one wonders about the effectiveness, il not the honesty, of thls recrultment effort.

Along wlth the escalation in the quantlty 01 documen- tation sollclted, there has been an escalatlan in the Ian. guage of praise. I was recently shocked to learn that my assessment 01 an advanced graduate student as"above average" (rather than "truly outstanding." for example) was Interpreted as devastatlngly negatlve. Mlnd you, I had stated that the cornparlson populatlon was other students at the same level-namely, the hlghly selected group who had successlully survlved doctoral training. Evidently, many of our colleagues have adapted to the inllatlon of superlatlves and have become skilled In In- terpreting the artful euphemism, but this penalizes the candidate whose referee naively thlnks that his words will be understood for what they say. If we cannot agree to use language accurately, would it not be simpler to eliminate relerence letters entlrely?

The solution to the situation is for hiring departments to adhere to the mlnlmal standards of courtesy of a two- stage recrultment process. The advertisement of a posi. tlon might well ask for a statement 0 1 Interests or a Sam. ple publication. but It is unfalr to invite extensive dossiers. An appllcation Should certainly Include the names of referees, but requests for letters should be made only after an initial screening of candidates, and unsollclted letters should be set aside untll after thls first-stage review. Requests for letters properly come from the prospective employer, not the applicant. Under these circumstances. the referee owes both the em. ptoyer and the candidate a thoughtlul. honest assess. ment. whlch takes into considerallon the requlrements of the particular wsltlon.

Surely, It Is In everyone's interest to ensure that Ihe dillicultles of the present job markel do not take un. necessary tolls In people's time, money and dlgnity.

Sydel Sllverman Graduate Center. CUNY

Infant Formula Controversy The most recent lesua of Sclence has an edltorlal

whlch begins "All really great 118s are half true." Thls is the way I felt about the report from a recent letter wrlter In our newsletter wncernlng the Infant formula Issue (Dec 1979 AN, p 9). There Is no data that Is sclentiflcally valid and worth Its welght that proves In any way that "powdered mllk, Infant formula Infllcts 'bottle baby dlsease' on one mlllion Inlants every year." There Is no such dlsease as "bottle baby" dlsease. The une of ten

'tnlllldn (not one mllllon) Inhnte Is now aamlttedly a "symbolic number" eccordlng to Its author. DlCk Jellflfe.

In fact, Barbara Underwood recently stated In a report 01 the MIT revlew of the Illeralure: "In summary. whlle avallable data for health 01 lnlants tend to substantlate that there 1s no more benellclel substance than breast mllk from a healthy mother, there are lew other generat- Izatlons that can be made wlth certalnty or without qualillcatlon."

Thls very polltlcal Issue Is lull 01 dlstonlons. We an. thropologists, 0 1 all groups. should be very careful. For instance, nowhere Is there an analysia of what was In the food of ten mllllon bables in Thlrd World countrles. no less ten thousand. Certalnly it wasn't expensive for. mula. The mllk compenies are not charltable organlza- tlons. It Is unllkeiy that withdrawlng mllk in any form from any market wlll make women either reestablish breast-feeding or lorce them to breast4eed safely and excluslveiy beyond three or four months when the quan- tity of milk is reported to threshold (Whitehead and Rowland 1978; Waterlow and Thomson 1979).

Let me cite a case where over.zealouS. well-meaning persons have put women in a catch.22 situatlon In Papua. New Guinea i t is against the law to sell bottles without a prescrlption. In response there are unsub. stanfiated clalms that it has caused a major Increase in breast-feeding. suggesting that the mothers were bottle feeding qulte arbltrariiy and apart from all socioeco. nomic factors. In contrast are reports from a fellow an. thropologist telling 0 1 a black market in infant feeding bottles.

In fact. this legislation has been described as a racisl act Since those molhers who can get prescripticns and buy bottles are more atfluent and those who cannot lend to be the poorest and "aborlginal."

Recently discussion about the use and misuse of Social science has alerted us not to go overboard just because something f i ts our biases. In our rush to do the right thing lor the people that we care about, we some. limes move too qulckly.

In our eagerness to demonstrate our political aware. ness. we might sacrifice the very people we want to help. Calm review of this particular issue is in order.

Dana Raphael Human Lactation Center

1979 Observations on the Adequacy of Breast-

1978 Factors Influencing Lectation Performance

Waterlow, J C, and A M Thomson

Feeding. The Lancet. Aug 4. Whitehead. R G. and M G M Rowland

in Rural Gambian Mothers. The Lancet, Jul 22.