Social & cultural anthropology

In the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, we are all too aware of the urgent health inequalities that plague our world. But these inequalities have always been urgent: modern medicine has a colonial and racist history. Here, in a searingly truthful account, Annabel Sowemimo unravels the colonial root...

Puluwat Atoll in Micronesia, with a population of only a few hundred proud seafaring people, can fulfill anyone's romantic daydream of the South Seas. Thomas Gladwin has written a beautiful and perceptive book which describes the complex navigational systems of the Puluwat natives, yet has done s...

A profound analysis of the Western world's ageing population, examining how the issue has been tackled in different countries. Contests taboos, and debates the handling of life's later decades. From former head of Downing Street Policy Unit under David Cameron. `An inspirational call to arms' DAI...

From the acclaimed science writer and author of 'Wayfinding', a journey into the world of superfans and an exploration of the psychology of fandom.

Mary Chamberlain's now classic work FENWOMEN was first published in 1975. It is a fascinating social and oral history of the lives of the women of Gislea, an isolated village in the Fens. The village women, from the very young to the very old, talk to Mary Chamberlain about their lives, which spr...

Jack Weatherford shows how Khan was the first ruler to grant religious freedom and how he instituted diplomatic immunity and outlawed torture. He demonstrates how Khan was responsible for uniting East and West, laying the foundations for the modern era of nation-states and global economic systems...

The son of Afghan parents, Osman Yousefzada was raised in post-industrial Birmingham. Osman's father was a carpenter, and his mother, to help make ends meet, took up sewing and became a seamstress. Women from Indian-East African, Israeli, Shia and Afghan communities came together in the Yousefzad...

The son of Afghan parents, Osman Yousefzada was raised in post-industrial Birmingham. Osman's father was a carpenter, and his mother, to help make ends meet, took up sewing and became a seamstress. Women from Indian-East African, Israeli, Shia and Afghan communities came together in the Yousefzad...

Eamon Dillon delves beneath the easy stereotypes to chart how modern traveller clans have survived and thrived in recent decades. Drawing on his extensive contacts with travellers themselves, he explores their uneasy relationship with wider society and their own fierce resistance to assimilation....

Strangers do it, friends do it, politicians do it and so do chimpanzees: in fact, the handshake is so deeply embedded in our history and culture that it might even be older than humanity itself. So let's shake on it, and join palaeoanthropologist Ella Al-Shamahi as she embarks on a voyage of disc...