In this Book

  • Anthropologies of Unemployment: New Perspectives on Work and Its Absence
  • Book
  • edited by Jong Bum Kwon and Carrie M. Lane
  • 2016
  • Published by: Cornell University Press
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Anthropologies of Unemployment offers accessible, theoretically innovative, and ethnographically rich examinations of unemployment in rural and urban regions across North and South America, Europe, Africa, and Asia. The diversity of case studies demonstrates that unemployment is a pressing global phenomenon that sheds light on the uneven consequences of free-market ideologies and policies. Economic, social, and cultural marginalization is common in the lives of the unemployed, but their experience and interpretation are shaped by local and national cultural particularities. In exploring those differences, the contributors to this volume employ recent theoretical innovations and engage with some of the more salient topics in contemporary anthropology, such as globalization, migration, youth cultures, bureaucracy, class, gender, and race.

Taken together, the chapters reveal that there is something new about unemployment today. It is not a temporary occurrence, but a chronic condition. In adjusting to persistent, longstanding unemployment, people and groups create new understandings of unemployment as well as of work and employment; they improvise new forms of sociality, morality, and personhood. Ethnographic studies such as those found in Anthropologies of Unemployment are crucial if we are to understand the broader forms, meanings, and significance of pervasive economic insecurity and discover the emergence of new social and cultural possibilities.

Anthropologies of Unemployment offers accessible, theoretically innovative, and ethnographically rich examinations of unemployment in rural and urban regions across North and South America, Europe, Africa, and Asia. The diversity of case studies demonstrates that unemployment is a pressing global phenomenon that sheds light on the uneven consequences of free-market ideologies and policies. Economic, social, and cultural marginalization is common in the lives of the unemployed, but their experience and interpretation are shaped by local and national cultural particularities. In exploring those differences, the contributors to this volume employ recent theoretical innovations and engage with some of the more salient topics in contemporary anthropology, such as globalization, migration, youth cultures, bureaucracy, class, gender, and race.Taken together, the chapters reveal that there is something new about unemployment today. It is not a temporary occurrence, but a chronic condition. In adjusting to persistent, longstanding unemployment, people and groups create new understandings of unemployment as well as of work and employment; they improvise new forms of sociality, morality, and personhood. Ethnographic studies such as those found in Anthropologies of Unemployment are crucial if we are to understand the broader forms, meanings, and significance of pervasive economic insecurity and discover the emergence of new social and cultural possibilities.Contributors
Josh Fisher, High Point University
David Karjanen, University of Minnesota
Ann E. Kingsolver, University of Kentucky
Jong Bum Kwon, Webster University
Carrie M. Lane, California State University, Fullerton
Caitrin Lynch, Olin College
Daniel Mains, University of Oklahoma
John P. Murphy, Gettysburg College
Mariano D. Perelman, University of Buenos Aires
Frances Abrahamer Rothstein, Montclair State University
Claudia Strauss, Pitzer College

Table of Contents

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  1. Cover
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  1. Title Page, Copyright, Dedication
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  1. Contents
  2. pp. vii-viii
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  1. Acknowledgments
  2. pp. ix-x
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  1. Introduction
  2. Jong Bum Kwon, Carrie M. Lane
  3. pp. 1-17
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  1. 1. The Limits of Liminality: Anthropological Approaches to Unemployment in the United States
  2. Carrie M. Lane
  3. pp. 18-33
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  1. 2. The Limits to Quantitative Thinking: Engaging Economics on the Unemployed
  2. David Karjanen
  3. pp. 34-52
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  1. 3. Occupation
  2. Jong Bum Kwon
  3. pp. 53-70
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  1. 4. The Rise of the Precariat? Unemployment and Social Identity in a French Outer City
  2. John P. Murphy
  3. pp. 71-96
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  1. 5. Contesting Unemployment: The Case of the Cirujas in Buenos Aires
  2. Mariano D. Perelman
  3. pp. 97-117
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  1. 6. Zones of In/Visibility: Commodification of Rural Unemployment in South Carolina
  2. Ann E. Kingsolver
  3. pp. 118-134
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  1. 7. Youth Unemployment, Progress, and Shame in Urban Ethiopia
  2. Daniel Mains
  3. pp. 135-154
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  1. 8. Labor on the Move: Kinship, Social Networks, and Precarious Work among Mexican Migrants
  2. Frances Abrahamer Rothstein
  3. pp. 155-170
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  1. 9. Positive Thinking about Being Out of Work in Southern California after the Great Recession
  2. Claudia Strauss
  3. pp. 171-190
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  1. 10. The Unemployed Cooperative: Community Responses to Joblessness in Nicaragua
  2. Josh Fisher
  3. pp. 191-211
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  1. Epilogue: Rethinking the Value of Work and Unemployment
  2. Caitlin Lynch, Daniel Mains
  3. pp. 212-228
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  1. Notes
  2. pp. 229-240
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  1. Bibliography
  2. pp. 241-264
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  1. Notes on Contributors
  2. pp. 265-268
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  1. Index
  2. pp. 269-276
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