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So I’ve put my second badger pelt in the tumble drier just to see what happens. Will it dry nicely? Help with breaking? Will it rip? Loose hair?

Looks okay after 10min. Nice and soft. Switched it to a setting without heat so I dont heat damage the fur.

hate doesn’t just happen. war doesn’t just happen. And we are definitely not “right” enough to kill or bring pain to anyone… // Hina Syeda

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bl7-9QZgea_/

creativelibra: Is the feeling of love really just a chemical reaction in your head?

The real difference between us and chimpanzees is the mysterious glue that enables millions of humans to cooperate effectively. This mysterious glue is made of stories, not genes. We cooperate effectively with strangers because we believe in things like gods, nations, money and human rights. Yet none of these things exists outside the stories that people invent and tell one another. There are no gods in the universe, no nations, no money and no human rights—except in the common imagination of human beings.

Yuval Noah Harari (via mesogeios)

hi! this is very random, but i found your tumblr just now and decided just to go for it and ask you a question about studying anthropology. I am kinda new to the whole subject, but I am interested in social studies, linguistics and the whole process called evolution. I know that the subject is so so so much more, but perhaps you would like to tell me how did you know that it was THE THING you wanted to pursue and maybe what qualities should an anthropologist have?

Hi!! You’re not random at all. It’s always good to ask questions, and I’m happy to answer any that I can! (: 

So, I think I need to start by saying that people can choose anthropology for SOOOOO many different reasons, because there are really endless things you can do with this subject (your interests are right on point though!). Personally, I originally was drawn to it because of forensic anthropology, and my love for bones, dead things, and solving mysteries. When I decided to study anthropology to go into forensics, my reason for doing so was because it was the one thing I’d studied that really…lit me up inside. Like, it felt like my neurons were firing at a million miles an hour whenever I was learning something about biological anthropology or forensics. As it turns out, I get that same feeling when studying cultural anthropology too. I ended up switching gears from forensic anthro to cultural anthropology because it is very important to me that what I do help people, and make a difference in the world. I felt like the best way to do that while still getting that ~crazy neuron party~ feeling was to study cultural anthropology and help people through my research. So…I guess the short answer to your question is that I knew it was THE THING because of how it made me feel, the way it woke up this intense curiosity in me. No other subject makes me want to devour it the way anthropology does, and I am a very curious person, so that’s saying something. It also is the perfect subject for a curious person, because you can have a bunch of different interests and somehow they all fall under the field of anthropology, so you aren’t limited by much. 

As far as the qualities, it definitely depends on the subfield, but here are a couple I feel might be most important overall:

have an interest in studying SOMETHING about humans. anthropology is literally the study of humans so that’s number one. 

be open-minded. part of studying anthropology is learning to see the world in a completely new way, and you have to be able to get out of your own head and away from your own biases to do that.

enjoy studying other cultures. no matter what you end up doing with anthropology, you’re going to need to value and enjoy learning about other people/cultures in order to be an anthropologist.

be ready for graduate school. i’m not saying you HAVE to go to grad school to be an anthropologist, but…to do most things in anthropology you’ll at least need a Master’s.

enjoy traveling. this depends on your subfield for sure, but a lot of anthropologists spend months or years at a time living in other cultures, or at dig sites, etc. because we are all about understanding things first hand.

I’m sure there are more, but those 5 seem like a good start. I hope this was helpful, and I definitely encourage you to keep looking into the field more! Don’t worry about exactly what you would want to do with it, just try to get an understanding of what anthropology is overall. If you’re in college, take a couple introductory courses that can also satisfy your gen eds. And I’m happy to answer any other questions you might have!

Yo!!!!!!

Super blue blood moon rises behind Parthenon, in Athens January 2018

The Languages of Iran

Just by looking at this map of Iran’s spoken languages, you can tell it has a long history of immigrations, migrations, and conquests. Pretty neat!

Dig into an Incredible Compendium of Objects Excavated from the Bottom of Amsterdam’s Amstel River