As a weekend golfer who is also an anthropologist, I've been struck by how well Tiger Woods' recent travails fit into one of my profession's standby concepts: the "social drama."
According to this model, developed by the great Scottish anthropologist Victor Turner, every society undergoes crises that unfold in a culturally ritualized form. Turner identified four typical stages: breach, crisis, redressive action, and reintegration.
Even though Turner's scheme was based on his study of traditional African tribes, it applies surprisingly well to the world of the Internet and the 24/7 news cycle, including its celebrity scandals.
In the most recent example, Tiger Woods' alleged affairs breached our culture's conventions. Crisis followed: The headline-grabbing SUV crash, followed by allegations of his involvement with a cocktail waitress and other women, and then by another late-night ambulance visit to his home. Both the real life of Tiger Woods the man and the bland corporate profile of Tiger Woods the brand seemed to crumble almost overnight.
Then came the third stage, an attempt at redressive action. A Woods Web site posted a statement apologizing for "transgressions" and the harm done to his family.
And now we approach the potential fourth stage in this anthropological drama: reintegration, or repair of the breech that has opened between the star golfer and his fans.
It's a sequence we've seen before with other sinning superstars, such as Alex Rodriguez. A-Rod's confession of steroid use, followed months later by his strong performance in the postseason, seemed to lead many fans to embrace him with real affection for the first time.
However, as Turner and other anthropologists have noted, social dramas can also end not with the crisis resolved, but with a permanent schism.
It's already clear that Woods will not easily regain his place as one of the planet's most ubiquitous pitchmen and a cultural hero. Nowadays, redressive action seems to work only if one is willing to squirm and suffer a bit in front of the cameras. As much as it goes against the control-freak personality of the man who named his yacht "Privacy," Woods may have to face the ritual humiliation and penitence of a Barbara Walters interview or a teary news conference to refurbish his brand.
For now, Woods occupies the space we anthropologists call liminality - the wilderness between one status and another. He is no longer the role model whose triumphs on the golf course seemed to be matched by his rectitude and familial bliss off of it. But as he remains secluded from the public eye, neither do we know just what he will become, much less whether he will save the marriage apparently endangered by his caddish behavior.
During my research for a forthcoming book about golf's role in American society, I followed Woods around at the U.S. Open several years ago. A crowd of 30,000 kicked up dust while it trailed this man as if he were Gandhi or some other prophet.
Woods radiated charisma, but I also felt something icy and almost selfish about his capacity to shut out the world in pursuit of the low score. And I was struck by the nervousness within the gallery - the fear that Woods might direct his withering displeasure at someone who coughed or moved during his swing. Woods was like Apollo - a brilliant yet frightening god.
I understood then how important Woods' intense focus was to his success, and I hope today that he will continue to thrill us with his athletic genius. But the anthropologist side of me also hopes he will find a way to let us in a bit more.
The great golfer would not be lessened by stopping now and then to slap the hand of a little boy or smile to the crowd. As his aura of otherworldliness diminishes, in other words, perhaps he can find a way to replace it with something that will better integrate him into society. The rest of us mortals know he's human now, and I'm rooting for him - not only on the golf course, but in life.
By Orin Starn
Orin Starn is a professor of cultural anthropology at Duke. His blog, "Golf Politics," is at golfpolitics.blogspot.com.
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Showing posts with label duke university. Show all posts
Showing posts with label duke university. Show all posts
Thursday, January 07, 2010
Thursday, August 20, 2009
How Mercury Becomes Toxic In The Environment
TT Note: With the recent headlines of fish contaminated with mercury along many of the southeast coastlines, we thought you'd be interested in learning more about the way it happens in nature.
Naturally occurring organic matter in water and sediment appears to play a key role in helping microbes convert tiny particles of mercury in the environment into a form that is dangerous to most living creatures.
This finding is important, say Duke University environmental engineers, because it could change the way mercury in the environment is measured and therefore regulated. This particularly harmful form of the element, known as methylmercury, is a potent toxin for nerve cells. When ingested by organisms, it is not excreted and builds up in tissues or organs.
In a series of laboratory experiments, Amrika Deonarine, a graduate student in civil and environmental engineering at Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering, found that organic matter and chemical compounds containing sulfur – known as sulfides -- can readily bind to form mercury sulfide nanoparticles. Since they are more soluble than larger particles, these nanoparticles may be the precursors to a process known as methylation.
“When the organic material combines with the mercury, it prevents the particle from accumulating with other mercury particles and growing larger,” said Deonarine, who presented the results of her analysis at the summer annual scientific sessions of the American Chemical Society (ACS) in Washington, D.C.
“Since the mercury remains in a nanoparticle size, it can easily collect on the surface of microbes where any mercury that dissolves can be taken in by the microbes,” Deonarine said. “Without the organic matter, the mercury sulfide nanoparticles would grow too large and become insoluble, thus reducing the availability of mercury for microbial methylation.”
It is while inside the microbe that the mercury is converted into the harmful methylmercury form, the researchers said.
These reactions can only take place in cold water environments with little to no oxygen, such as the zone of sediment just below the bottom of a body of water. Other such anaerobic environments can also be found in waste water and sewage treatment systems, the researchers said.
“The exposure rate of mercury in the U.S. is quite high,” said Heileen Hsu-Kim, Duke assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering and senior member of the research team. “A recent epidemiological survey found that up 8 percent of women had mercury levels higher than national guidelines. Since humans are on top of the food chain, any mercury in our food accumulates in our body.”
Because fish and shellfish have a natural tendency to store methylmercury in their organs, they are the leading source of mercury ingestion for humans. Mercury is extremely toxic and can lead to kidney dysfunctions, neurological disorders and even death. In particular, fetuses exposed to methylmercury can suffer from these same disorders as well as impaired learning abilities.
There are many ways mercury gets into the environment, with the primary sources being the combustion of coal, the refining of such metals as gold and other non-ferrous metals, and in the gases released during volcanic eruptions. The air-borne mercury from these sources eventually lands on lakes or ponds and can remain in the water or sediments.
“These initial laboratory findings could have far-reaching implications,” Hsu-Kim said. “That these reactions can take places in anaerobic environments suggests that the old paradigm of testing for toxic metals in sediments may provide an incomplete picture of how much methylmercury is there.”
The researchers plan to continue their studies with other types of organic matter and for longer periods of time.
For her presentation and paper, Deonarime was one of six recipients of the C. Ellen Gonter Environmental Chemistry Award, given annually to graduate students.
The research was supported by the federally funded Center for the Environmental Implications of NanoTechnology (CEINT), which is based at Duke, and the ACS’s Petroleum Research fund.
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