AN    INTERNATIONAL     JOURNAL     OF
CULTURAL  AND SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY

Volume 42, no. 1 (Winter 2003)

KINSHIP AND MARRIAGE AMONG THE OMAHA, 1886-1902

Bradley E. Ensor
University of Florida

"Omaha" kinship is a major model for patrilineal kinship and marital exchanges. However, some authors have suggested that kinship rules and unilineal descent are merely theoretical constructs of anthropologists or cultural ideals usually not followed in practice. Given the importance of "Omaha" kinship for theory, this article tests the normative rules for marriage against empirical data on actual marriage behavior among the late-nineteenth-century Omaha tribe of Nebraska using Bureau of Indian Affairs census rolls. The results confirm that the majority of Omaha did indeed follow the normative rules upon which the "Omaha" model is based. The implications for kinship studies is that descent theory and alliance models can still be considered valid approaches to societies prior to historic changes. (Omaha, Crow-Omaha exchange, patrilocal, patrilineal).

IRISH FARMING HOUSEHOLDS IN EASTERN CANADA: DOMESTIC PRODUCTION AND FAMILY SIZE

Edward J. Hedican
University of Guelph

Irish farming households in Eastern Canada during the postfamine period (1861-1871) are used as the basis for a theoretical discussion of domestic production and family size. The purpose here is to extend discussion of the Chayanov (1966) model of peasant economies, and offer modifications of this model based on empirical variations in Irish Canadian household composition, dependency ratios, and overall farm size. This article suggests that the topic of choice and the assumption of risk be made a more explicit part of the Chayanov analysis, since farmers' decisions regarding productive capacity are apt to be made on a more holistic view of a farm's assets, and not just on the basis of cultivated acreage per worker. (Irish Canadian households, domestic production, family composition, Chayanov model).

RITUAL, KNOWLEDGE, AND THE POLITICS OF IDENTITY IN ANDEAN FESTIVITIES

Rachel Corr
Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College Florida Atlantic University

As anthropologists criticize the essentialist descriptions of South American indigenous peoples as anachronistic guardians of ancient traditions, some indigenous peoples are promoting just such an image of themselves. In 1996, political authorities in Salasaca, Ecuador, changed the process for selecting festival sponsors from appointment by nuns to a competition in which festival sponsors were tested on their knowledge of local culture and history, particularly a knowledge of sacred geography. (Landscape, identity, tradition, festivals, Andes).

SEEKING NUMINOUS EXPERIENCES IN THE UNREMEMBERED PAST

Catherine M. Cameron
Cedar Crest College

John B. Gatewood
Lehigh University

While increasing numbers of people are visiting historical sites and museums, the reasons for those visits are not well understood. An exploratory survey concerning what Americans want from their visits to such sites discovered that many tourists are motivated by more than information- or pleasure-seeking. Some indicated a quest for a deeper experience at heritage sites and a desire to make a personal connection with the people and spirit of earlier times. This impulse, termed "numen-seeking," is a strong motivation for many who visit historical sites. (Heritage tourism, numen, visitor motivation, visitor experience).

WEEPING IN A TAIWANESE BUDDHIST CHARISMATIC MOVEMENT

C. Julia Huang
National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan

Emotion can be a locus of interpretation and a motor for religious commitment. This is illustrated with the thick description of uncontrolled weeping that recurred with the followers of a Buddhist charismatic movement in modern Taiwan. Ethnography of the ubiquity of weeping in this group suggests that emotion in religion expressed in tears is not limited to rituals or uncanny phenomena; and the devotees' and the leader's interpretation of weeping reveals the multivocality and the individual agency of the symbolic emotion. This emotion, expressed in weeping, is not a dialogue of culture but a construct of identity evoked by religious charisma. (Weeping, emotion, religion, charisma, Taiwan).