Arqueologia e história indígena na perspectiva dos Wai Wai: um povo Caribe das Guianas

Este trabalho, inicialmente, apresenta uma breve discussão sobre as novas arqueologias indígenas, seu método e sua relação com os conhecimentos tradicionais. Com base na história oral dos Wai Wai, um povo caribe das Guianas, apresentamos as aldeias antigas situadas ao longo do rio Kikwo e os lugares importantes e presentes na memória do povo wai wai. Consideramos que não somente os artefatos arqueológicos são marcadores das culturas indígenas, mas também as paisagens e os espíritos às quais estão associados. Neste artigo, de modo extensivo, recorremos aos relatos de um ancião, Poriciwi Wai Wai, que menciona festas celebradas nas aldeias antigas, os casamentos, as trocas de objetos e artefatos, as danças e o consumo de bebida fermentada. Por fim, descrevemos a saída repentina dos Wai Wai dessas antigas aldeias para a aldeia-missão Kanaxen no sul da Guiana e como os Wai Wai, ali convertidos pelos missionários cristãos, organizaram expedições para buscar os chamados povos isolados ou não vistos (enîhnî komo), que ainda permaneciam do lado do Brasil

EDUC 3410/ENVI 3410: The Natural Environment and Well-Being

Course Description The course introduces students to the benefits of natural environments on human health and well-being. Topics of study include the historical and cultural traditions of human’s connections to nature, theoretical frameworks and mechanisms of human/nature connections, implementation of interdisciplinary research agendas, as well as implications for education, diversity, health policy, and urban planning. A significant portion of the course will take place in the field, where students will explore local and regional parks, nature-based educational settings, and the practice of forest therapy. While most field work will take place during the 3-hour course time frame, there will be one full-day field trip

Mercury’s Shadow: The Pharmaceutical Sources of Hysteria

This essay reconsiders the nineteenth-century epidemic of hysteria in the context of common pharmaceutical practice. Examining the health records of industrial workers, Civil War soldiers, and such prominent figures as Abraham Lincoln, Louisa May Alcott, and Harriet Beecher Stowe, this essay argues that hysteria in its distinctive nineteenth-century manifestation was the result of mercury poisoning. Physicians throughout the nineteenth century commonly prescribed mercury treatments for everything from teething and diaper rash to dysentery and syphilis. Nineteenth-century Americans were habitually exposed to mercury, and yet physicians did not recognize the symptoms of chronic mercury poisoning, which included numbness and paralysis of hands and limbs, tremors, seizures, and difficulties speaking, seeing, and walking. The symptoms of mercury poisoning correspond directly with the symptoms of hysteria, and even Sigmund Freud’s famous case histories of hysteria attest to the presence of mercury in his patients’ medical backgrounds. It is no accident that hysteria disappeared in the early twentieth century, just as antibiotics and more effective treatments emerged, but hysteria’s legacies nonetheless endure in recent environmental catastrophes and episodes of pharmaceutical malpractice