Read: Scheper-Hughes, Death without Weeping, Prologue, Introduction, Chapters 2-3, 6-9

1. In the introduction, Scheper-Hughes writes, "Anthropologists (myself included) have tended to understand morality as always contingent on, and embedded within, specific cultural assumptions about human life. But there is another, an existential philosophical position that posits the inverse by suggesting that the ethical is always prior to culture because the ethical presupposes all sense and meaning and therefore makes culture possible" (22-3). How does Scheper-Hughes navigate these different positions throughout the book? What seems to you to be the key lesson about ethics and morality that she wishes us to take from the book? What specific examples support your interpretation?

2. What are the details of Scheper-Hughes's position as a Peace Corps volunteer in the 1960s and 20 years later, as an anthropologist? What kinds of ethical and methodological dilemmas does she face in studying poverty and hunger?

3. What roles does Scheper-Hughes suggest history, politics, and social structure play in the circumstances of hunger and thirst in Bom Jesus?

4. What role does reciprocity play in sociocultural life and in the material aspects of survival in the Alto? What limitations does it pose?

5. How do mothers respond to the deaths of their infants? What is Scheper-Hughes's position on maternal instinct? Are you persuaded by her arguments?

6. What does Scheper-Hughes mean by the social production of indifference to infant death? What factors are involved?

7. What does Scheper-Hughes mean by a political economy of emotions? What factors shape this kind of economy?

Journal Entry: No journal entry due this week. First 4-6 page essay is due on Thursday, February 22 by 5pm.

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