Doctoral Dissertation Research: Local Uses of Transnational Cultural Systems

Brandeis University, Waltham MA

Investigators

Abstract

The research supported by this award investigates the relationship between transnational cultural movements and local culture and social structure. The researcher will go beyond standard questions of cultural adaptation to ask if and how introduced foreign cultural practices might be repurposed to ends antithetical to the goals of the original introducers. This is an important question for policy makers working across cultures who seek to produce short term compliance, such as to facilitate disaster response, as well as for scientific understanding of long-term socio-cultural change. The research will be undertaken by Brandeis University doctoral student, Douglas Bafford, with the guidance of anthropologist Dr. Janet Mcintosh. The research is to be conducted in South Africa where religious forms and ideologies from the United States have been introduced and refashioned for local political purposes. This history makes this an ideal site for the project's overarching question: what happens when a particular set of philosophies, practices, and moral stances is applied in a starkly different cultural context? Data will be collected through extended participant observation, semi-structured interviews, social network mapping and analyses, and archival research. Findings from the research will contribute to scientific understanding of social holism and globalization. In addition, this project will train the student researcher in the methods required for a research and teaching career in anthropology. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.