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World Cultures eJournal

UC Irvine

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The World Cultures eJournal welcomes articles, data, and comparative research material dealing with any aspect of human behavior. Publication of any comparative database, regional or worldwide, will be considered. Submissions of programs and teaching materials are welcomed, as are communications on research, coding, sources, and other materials of interests to comparative researchers.

Articles

STDS91.COD: Grief and Mourning Codes

This file describes codes for variables v1918-v2000 of the SCCS data set. These codes are from the SCCS societies in Paul C. Rosenblatt, R. Patricia Walsh, and Douglas A. Jackson. Grief and Mourning in Cross-Cultural Perspective. New Haven: Human Relations Area Files Press. 1976.

  • 1 supplemental file

Kinship, Class, and Community

This review presents studies in various world regions. Each uses network analysis software designed explicitly for kinship studies with explicit network measures of cohesion. It presents evidence of fundamental differences in the forms of marital cohesion that show profoundly different effects over a wide range of social phenomena, regional scales, and diverse cultures. Social cohesion is the basis of mutuality, cooperation and well-being in human societies (Council of Europe, 2009). It includes the modes by which people are assimilated into societies, how groups hold power, stratify social relations, and manage the flow of resources. Kinship networks in the civil societies of nation-states, in contrast to smaller-scale societies, are far too rarely studied as a basis of social cohesion. Networks, the social tissues of our lives, are only partially visible to us; thus we fail to see how these are wrapped and embedded in larger networks. Thus the importance, as emphasized here, of an explicit science of social network analysis for kinship studies both at local and larger scales. The analyses of cohesive subsets show how constructions of social class, ethnicity, migration, inheritance, social movements, and other large- as well as small-scale social phenomena are implicated in kinship networks.

A Comparative Investigation of the Self Image and Identity of Sri Lankans

The current study explores self image and identity of Sri Lankans in different social and cultural settings. It focuses on the role of major social identities in two ethnic groups: Sinhalese (the majority) and Tamils (the minority). Participants consisted of four groups: Sri Lankan Sinhalese, Sri Lankan Tamils, Sinhalese in USA, and Tamils in Canada. Seven self statement tests, ratings of the importance of major social identities, and eight common identity items under seven social identities were used to examine self identification. Findings suggest that religious identity plays a significant role in Sinhalese, whereas ethnic identity is the most significant in Tamils. All these identity measures suggest that the role of each social identity is different when it associates with different social settings, depending on how individuals value their social identities in particular social contexts.