Laura Nader
Encyclopedia
Laura Nader is an American anthropologist.
She has been a Professor of Anthropology
at the University of California, Berkeley
since 1960. (She was the first woman to receive a tenure
-track position in the department.) She received a BA in Latin American Studies from Wells College
in Aurora, NY in 1952. She received her Ph.D.
in Anthropology
from Radcliffe College
(the women’s counterpart which joined Harvard in 1999) in 1961 under the mentorship of Clyde Kluckhohn
. Her education included fieldwork in a Zapotec village in Oaxaca
, Mexico
, which nurtured her interest in law as it exists in various societies. This interest that began with her family, which stressed the importance of law and justice.
Her father Nathra owned a restaurant/store in Connecticut
, which served as a place for many political discussions. Her mother, Rose
, was a schoolteacher who had a strong interest in justice and would express her views in letters to the press. Her older deceased brother, Shafeek
; her older sister, Claire
and her younger brother, Ralph
have all served in public interest careers. Gamal Nkrumah
(2005) profiled Dr. Nader in the weekly online news out of Egypt and commented on her loyalties to her father who emigrated from Lebanon for political reasons, “Nader is very much her father's daughter. And it was her elder brother who first suggested she read anthropology at university."
of law
and dispute resolution
, conflict, comparative family organization, the anthropology of professional mindsets and ethnology of the Middle East
, Mexico, Latin America
and the contemporary United States
. She was involved in conferences in the 1960s, determining the direction the study of law in society as a part of society and not insulated and isolated from other human institutions, should take as it developed. Nader edited and published essays from these conferences as well as authoring several books on the anthropology of law, establishing herself as one of the most influential figures in the development of the field.
Some of her work focuses on conflict resolution
in the Zapotec village she studied. Nader notes that people confront each other face to face on a personal scale. Judges strive to find solutions that are balanced rather than placing one hundred percent of the blame on one party. Nader believes this reflects the society, their economic system
, hierarchal structure
and any other institution or variable. In contrast, she finds that in the United States, conflict often escalates to polarized blame and violence. The group of people a person may need to confront may be large and impersonal and much more powerful than themselves. She concludes that the kinds of cases people bring to court, reflect areas of stress in the social structure of a community.
However, Nader has written extensively about "harmony ideology," the ideology centered around the belief that the existence of conflict is necessarily a bad or dysfunctional thing and that a healthy society is one that achieves harmony between people and minimizes conflict and confrontation. She has argued in her book Harmony Ideology that harmony ideology has been spread amongst colonized peoples around the world by missionaries prior to (and facilitating) their military colonization and that the Zapotec used it in a "counter-hegemonic" way by maintaining the appearance of harmony (while in practice engaging in a great deal of litigation) in order to prevent the Mexican government from interfering with their relative autonomy. Nader has also argued that harmony ideology has been an important basis for unsubstantiated ideas that have developed in the United States since the 1960s about a "litigation explosion" and for the development of Alternative Dispute Resolution
(ADR) as a method for removing so-called "garbage cases" (for instance, the then newly appearing civil rights cases of the 1960s) from the courtroom into an arena that emphasizes harmony, compromise and the language of therapy over talk of injustice.
While Nader's career began with a strong interest in law and forms of social control, over time she became more interested in questions of cultural control and "controlling processes" (also the title of an immensely popular undergraduate course she teaches), a concept described further in her 1997 article, "Controlling Processes: Tracing the Dynamic Components of Power."
One of Nader's best known contributions was in writing the at the time highly controversial "Up the Anthropologist--Perspectives Gained From Studying Up" in 1969, which was "one of the first calls to anthropologists to think more about the 'study of the colonizers rather than the colonized, the culture of power rather than the culture of the powerless, the culture of affluence rather than the culture of poverty
.'" This call led many anthropologists to begin to "study up," although many misinterpreted Nader's call and did not simultaneously study "down" and "sideways." Nader's works for the field of anthropology and discipline have led her to be described as "the embodied moral conscience of post-Boas
ian American anthropology."
Nader has coined the term "trustanoia" to describe the antonym of paranoia and the state of Americans' feeling of trust of others. She contends that people in the United States trust that there is always someone there to take care of them, and that everyone (including legislators and politicians) acts in their interest.
She has been a Professor of Anthropology
Anthropology
Anthropology is the study of humanity. It has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. The term "anthropology" is from the Greek anthrōpos , "man", understood to mean mankind or humanity, and -logia , "discourse" or "study", and was first used in 1501 by German...
at the University of California, Berkeley
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley , is a teaching and research university established in 1868 and located in Berkeley, California, USA...
since 1960. (She was the first woman to receive a tenure
Tenure
Tenure commonly refers to life tenure in a job and specifically to a senior academic's contractual right not to have his or her position terminated without just cause.-19th century:...
-track position in the department.) She received a BA in Latin American Studies from Wells College
Wells College
Wells College is a private coeducational liberal arts college located in Aurora, Cayuga County, New York, on the eastern shore of Cayuga Lake. Initially an all-women's institution, Wells became a co-ed college in Fall 2005....
in Aurora, NY in 1952. She received her Ph.D.
Ph.D.
A Ph.D. is a Doctor of Philosophy, an academic degree.Ph.D. may also refer to:* Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*Piled Higher and Deeper, a web comic strip*PhD: Phantasy Degree, a Korean comic series* PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
in Anthropology
Anthropology
Anthropology is the study of humanity. It has origins in the humanities, the natural sciences, and the social sciences. The term "anthropology" is from the Greek anthrōpos , "man", understood to mean mankind or humanity, and -logia , "discourse" or "study", and was first used in 1501 by German...
from Radcliffe College
Radcliffe College
Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and was the coordinate college for Harvard University. It was also one of the Seven Sisters colleges. Radcliffe College conferred joint Harvard-Radcliffe diplomas beginning in 1963 and a formal merger agreement with...
(the women’s counterpart which joined Harvard in 1999) in 1961 under the mentorship of Clyde Kluckhohn
Clyde Kluckhohn
Clyde Kluckhohn , was an American anthropologist and social theorist, best known for his long-term ethnographic work among the Navajo and his contributions to the development of theory of culture within American anthropology.-Early life and education:...
. Her education included fieldwork in a Zapotec village in Oaxaca
Oaxaca
Oaxaca , , officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Oaxaca is one of the 31 states which, along with the Federal District, comprise the 32 federative entities of Mexico. It is divided into 571 municipalities; of which 418 are governed by the system of customs and traditions...
, Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
, which nurtured her interest in law as it exists in various societies. This interest that began with her family, which stressed the importance of law and justice.
Her father Nathra owned a restaurant/store in Connecticut
Connecticut
Connecticut is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and the state of New York to the west and the south .Connecticut is named for the Connecticut River, the major U.S. river that approximately...
, which served as a place for many political discussions. Her mother, Rose
Rose Nader
Rose Nader was the mother of U.S. activist, consumer advocate, and frequent third-party candidate, Ralph Nader and community advocate Shafeek Nader. She was a well-known activist in her hometown of Winsted, Connecticut.Rose Bouziane was born in Zahlé, Lebanon, to a sheep broker and a teacher...
, was a schoolteacher who had a strong interest in justice and would express her views in letters to the press. Her older deceased brother, Shafeek
Shafeek Nader
Shafeek Nader was the first son of Rose Nader, and older brother of Ralph Nader, Laura Nader and Claire Nader. He was a community advocate and the principal founder of Northwestern Connecticut Community College. After his death in 1986, The Shafeek Nader Trust for the Community Interest was...
; her older sister, Claire
Claire Nader
Claire Nader is a social scientist and a sister of Ralph, Laura, and Shafeek Nader.She holds a Ph.D. in political science.During the 1960s she worked with Alvin Weinberg at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, where she conducted civil defense research related to the potential societal aftereffects of a...
and her younger brother, Ralph
Ralph Nader
Ralph Nader is an American political activist, as well as an author, lecturer, and attorney. Areas of particular concern to Nader include consumer protection, humanitarianism, environmentalism, and democratic government....
have all served in public interest careers. Gamal Nkrumah
Gamal Nkrumah
Gamal Gorkeh Nkrumah is a Ghanaian journalist, a Pan-Africanist and an editor of Al Ahram Weekly newspaper. He is the eldest son of the first president of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah, and his Egyptian wife Fathia Nkrumah....
(2005) profiled Dr. Nader in the weekly online news out of Egypt and commented on her loyalties to her father who emigrated from Lebanon for political reasons, “Nader is very much her father's daughter. And it was her elder brother who first suggested she read anthropology at university."
Research
Nader’s areas of interest include comparative ethnographyEthnography
Ethnography is a qualitative method aimed to learn and understand cultural phenomena which reflect the knowledge and system of meanings guiding the life of a cultural group...
of law
Law
Law is a system of rules and guidelines which are enforced through social institutions to govern behavior, wherever possible. It shapes politics, economics and society in numerous ways and serves as a social mediator of relations between people. Contract law regulates everything from buying a bus...
and dispute resolution
Dispute resolution
Dispute resolution is the process of resolving disputes between parties.-Methods:Methods of dispute resolution include:* lawsuits * arbitration* collaborative law* mediation* conciliation* many types of negotiation* facilitation...
, conflict, comparative family organization, the anthropology of professional mindsets and ethnology of the Middle East
Middle East
The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...
, Mexico, Latin America
Latin America
Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...
and the contemporary United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. She was involved in conferences in the 1960s, determining the direction the study of law in society as a part of society and not insulated and isolated from other human institutions, should take as it developed. Nader edited and published essays from these conferences as well as authoring several books on the anthropology of law, establishing herself as one of the most influential figures in the development of the field.
Some of her work focuses on conflict resolution
Conflict resolution
Conflict resolution is conceptualized as the methods and processes involved in facilitating the peaceful ending of some social conflict. Often, committed group members attempt to resolve group conflicts by actively communicating information about their conflicting motives or ideologies to the rest...
in the Zapotec village she studied. Nader notes that people confront each other face to face on a personal scale. Judges strive to find solutions that are balanced rather than placing one hundred percent of the blame on one party. Nader believes this reflects the society, their economic system
Economic system
An economic system is the combination of the various agencies, entities that provide the economic structure that defines the social community. These agencies are joined by lines of trade and exchange along which goods, money etc. are continuously flowing. An example of such a system for a closed...
, hierarchal structure
Hierarchy
A hierarchy is an arrangement of items in which the items are represented as being "above," "below," or "at the same level as" one another...
and any other institution or variable. In contrast, she finds that in the United States, conflict often escalates to polarized blame and violence. The group of people a person may need to confront may be large and impersonal and much more powerful than themselves. She concludes that the kinds of cases people bring to court, reflect areas of stress in the social structure of a community.
However, Nader has written extensively about "harmony ideology," the ideology centered around the belief that the existence of conflict is necessarily a bad or dysfunctional thing and that a healthy society is one that achieves harmony between people and minimizes conflict and confrontation. She has argued in her book Harmony Ideology that harmony ideology has been spread amongst colonized peoples around the world by missionaries prior to (and facilitating) their military colonization and that the Zapotec used it in a "counter-hegemonic" way by maintaining the appearance of harmony (while in practice engaging in a great deal of litigation) in order to prevent the Mexican government from interfering with their relative autonomy. Nader has also argued that harmony ideology has been an important basis for unsubstantiated ideas that have developed in the United States since the 1960s about a "litigation explosion" and for the development of Alternative Dispute Resolution
Alternative dispute resolution
Alternative Dispute Resolution includes dispute resolution processes and techniques that act as a means for disagreeing parties to come to an agreement short of litigation. ADR basically is an alternative to a formal court hearing or litigation...
(ADR) as a method for removing so-called "garbage cases" (for instance, the then newly appearing civil rights cases of the 1960s) from the courtroom into an arena that emphasizes harmony, compromise and the language of therapy over talk of injustice.
While Nader's career began with a strong interest in law and forms of social control, over time she became more interested in questions of cultural control and "controlling processes" (also the title of an immensely popular undergraduate course she teaches), a concept described further in her 1997 article, "Controlling Processes: Tracing the Dynamic Components of Power."
One of Nader's best known contributions was in writing the at the time highly controversial "Up the Anthropologist--Perspectives Gained From Studying Up" in 1969, which was "one of the first calls to anthropologists to think more about the 'study of the colonizers rather than the colonized, the culture of power rather than the culture of the powerless, the culture of affluence rather than the culture of poverty
Culture of poverty
The culture of poverty is a social theory that expands on the cycle of poverty. Proponents of this theory argue that the poor are not simply lacking resources, but also have a unique value system...
.'" This call led many anthropologists to begin to "study up," although many misinterpreted Nader's call and did not simultaneously study "down" and "sideways." Nader's works for the field of anthropology and discipline have led her to be described as "the embodied moral conscience of post-Boas
Franz Boas
Franz Boas was a German-American anthropologist and a pioneer of modern anthropology who has been called the "Father of American Anthropology" and "the Father of Modern Anthropology." Like many such pioneers, he trained in other disciplines; he received his doctorate in physics, and did...
ian American anthropology."
Nader has coined the term "trustanoia" to describe the antonym of paranoia and the state of Americans' feeling of trust of others. She contends that people in the United States trust that there is always someone there to take care of them, and that everyone (including legislators and politicians) acts in their interest.
Awards
- Morgan Spanish Prize, Wells CollegeWells CollegeWells College is a private coeducational liberal arts college located in Aurora, Cayuga County, New York, on the eastern shore of Cayuga Lake. Initially an all-women's institution, Wells became a co-ed college in Fall 2005....
http://sun3.lib.uci.edu/racyberlib/Quest/interview-laura_nader.html - Wells College Alumnae Award, Wells College
- Radcliffe College Alumnae Award
- Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences
- Harry KalvenHarry KalvenHarry Kalven, Jr. was an American jurist, regarded as one of the preeminent legal scholars of the 20th century. He was the Harry A. Bigelow Professor of Law at the University of Chicago Law School. Kalven coauthored, with Charles O...
Prize (1995), Law and Society AssociationLaw and Society AssociationThe Law and Society Association is an association founded in 1964. Its members come from many fields and countries and are interested in "the place of law in social, political, economic and cultural life". The association publishes the academic journal Law & Society Review.The LSA's executive...
http://www.lawandsociety.org/prizes/kalven_prize.htm - American Anthropological Association, Distinguished Lecture Award (2000), American Anthropological AssociationAmerican Anthropological AssociationThe American Anthropological Association is a professional organization of scholars and practitioners in the field of anthropology. With 11,000 members, the Arlington, Virginia based association includes archaeologists, cultural anthropologists, biological anthropologists, linguistic...
http://www.aaanet.org/committees/awards/awards.htm#lecture - Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Books and Articles (over 280 publications)
}}. Reprinted in 1996 , 2002 and 2005 . Reprinted in 2005 ISBN 0520231635. Printed in 2008 ISBN 9781405178945.External links
- Laura Nader's biosketch at UC-Berkeley
- The Drift to War; Laura Nader, Interviewed by John M. Whiteley
- Q and A: A Conversation with Laura Nader
- Laura Nader: Speaking out. When silence is part of the problem (Al-Ahram Weekly)
- Laura Nader: What's Good About Conflict? (Anthropology News)
- Laura Nader keynote address at American University Fifth Annual Public Anthropology Conference