Anthropology Book Forum (E-Journal)
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Shaylih Muehlmann, 2024, Call the Mothers: Searching for Mexico’s Disappeared in the War on Drugs, Oakland, California: University of California Press, 264 pp., ISBN 9780520314573
Full text linkThis compelling multi-sited ethnography begins with author’s account of meeting Leticia in Mexico City, whose young daughter, Ivonne, had been missing for two years. After undertaking a two-year long search with minimal assistance from state authorities, Leticia finally found her daughter buried in a communal grave. By recounting this encounter, the author captures the heart-wrenching paradox of a mother's sense of relief at finding her child dead - a devastating end to the limbo of not knowing. In five chapters, this book traces how the process of searching for disappeared family members transformed the lives of Leticia and other Mexican mothers who conducted marches, built support networks, acquired investigative skills, searched through morgues and deserts, and exposed the corruption and complicity of state officials in human rights abuses in Mexico. The core contribution of this work is a critical examination of maternal activism that unpacks its interaction with dominant gender norms, state indifference, and organized crime
The succeeders: How immigrant youth are transforming what it means to belong in America.
Full text linkThe Succeeders: How Immigrant Youth Are Transforming What It Means to Belong in America is an intriguing and insightful ethnographic study of a program called The Succeeders which supports Latino high school students in Nashville, Tennessee. Flores focuses on Latino students’ sense of belonging in high school and the support they receive to pursue higher education. The book is divided into three parts: Context of Belonging, Learning to Belong, and Unlearning to Belong. Flores provides an in-depth exploration of the students’ perspectives on Latinidad stereotypes and how their culture and individual experiences shape their sense of belonging in high school and their pursuit of higher education
Gods in the World: Placemaking and Healing in the Himalayas.
Full text linkBook review of JASSAL, AFTAB SINGH. 2024. Gods in the World: Placemaking and Healing in the Himalayas. Religion, Culture, and Public Life. New York: Columbia University Press. 244 pp., ISBN 978-0-231-21497-1 (paper). 
Hijras, Lovers, Brothers: Surviving Sex and Poverty in Rural India (2021): by Vaibhav Saria
No full textThis review critically examines Saria’s ethnographic exploration of hijra lives, offering a nuanced understanding of gender, sexuality, and agency. The book interrogates the male-female binary, presenting alternative frameworks such as asceticism and eroticism to understand hijra identity beyond conventional categorizations like the "third gender" or "transgender." It delves into economic realities, tracing the movement of money through hijra networks while challenging public-health discourses surrounding HIV prevention. The intersections of love, desire, and social class are explored through the lens of medieval Sufi-Hindavi romances, revealing how hijra relationships reshape conceptions of time, intimacy, and risk. The concluding chapter juxtaposes the imagined futures dictated by public health with the lived temporalities of hijras in Odisha. Through rich ethnographic detail, theoretical insight, and deeply personal narratives, Saria’s work emerges as a landmark contribution to queer anthropology, filling critical gaps in existing scholarship while offering an evocative, deeply human portrait of hijra lives
Being Everywhere and Dreaming about Possible Places: An Interview on Danya Fast’s The Best Place
Full text linkReview of:
Fast, D. (2023). The best place: Addiction, intervention, and living and dying young in Vancouver. Rutgers University Press
The Disabled Anthropologist (2025): Edited by Sumi Colligan and Anna Jaysane-Darr
No full textReview of:
COLLIGAN, SUMI, & ANNA, JAYSANE-DARR. (EDS.). (2025). The Disabled Anthropologist. New York, NY: Routledge. 240 pp., ISBN 9781032760278
Punching Back: Gender, Religion, and Belonging in Women-Only Kickboxing (2022): By Jasmijn Rana
No full textReview of:
JASMIJN RANA, 2022, Punching Back: Gender, Religion, and Belonging in Women-Only Kickboxing, New York: Berghahn Books, 180 pp., ISBN 978180073690