Category Archives: Anthropology

BAe Systems, Africom, and HTS

Akin writes about Human Terrain System: In 2007 we learnt, the US military engaged anthropologists and sociologists in a programme called the Human Terrain System (HTS) for Iraq and Afghanistan in the two preceding years; this studies the complexities of human beings and their societies trying to appreciate how these communities work, how they make decisions, how… Read More »

And the British Navy Saved the Natives from Themselves

I took the above picture at the British Museum. The text reads: When local communities fought, ghosts would help men defend themselves and defeat their enemies. In western Solomon Islands, powerful chiefs used to organise voyages to trade and to capture enemies’ heads. They traveled in great canoes, protected by figureheads and ancestral charms. So… Read More »