We are pleased to announce that the latest issue of Focaal – Journal of Global and Historical Anthropology has recently published and is available online at its new home, www.berghahnjournals.com/focaal.

This issue’s theme section, titled “Boredom after the global financial crisis: From privilege to precarity” and guest edited by Marguerite van den Berg and Bruce O’Neill,  investigates one way in which marginalization and precarization appears: boredom. Drawing on fieldwork from postsocialist Europe and postcolonial Africa, this thematic section explores the intersection of boredom and precarity in order to gain new insight into the workings of advanced capitalism. The editors’ introduction is available to all readers for free.

Focaal 78 also includes a regular articles section, which features articles on protest and daily life in poor South African neighborhoods; the discourse on originality in Albani’s art world;  transparency, debt, and the control of price in the Kathmandu land market; small-scale producers and the Plan Chontalpa in Tabasco, Mexico; and contrasting views from Chicago and Managua of why drug dealers still live with their moms. A book review article rounds out the issue.

Volume 2017, Issue 78
Boredom after the global financial crisis: From privelege to precarity

Guest Editors: Marguerite van den Berg and Bruce O’Neill

THEME SECTION

Introduction: Rethinking the class politics of boredom
Marguerite van den Berg and Bruce O’Neill

Joyful pessimism: Marginality, disengagement, and the doing of nothing
Martin Demant Frederiksen

The ethnographic negative: Capturing the impress of boredom and inactivity
Bruce O’Neill

Too much time: Changing conceptions of boredom, progress, and the future among young men in urban Ethiopia, 2003–2015
Daniel Mains

ARTICLES

“Because we are the only ones in the community!” Protest and daily life in poor South African neighborhoods
Jérôme Tournadre

“They don’t even know how to copy”: The discourse on originality in Albania’s art word
Sofia Kalo

Can a financial bubble burst if no one hears the pop? Transparency, debt, and the control of price in the Kathmandu land market
Andrew Haxby

Empowering or impoverishing through credit: Small-scale producers and the Plan Chontalpa in Tabasco, Mexico
Gisela Lanzas and Matthew Whittle

Why do drug dealers still live with their moms? Contrasting views from Chicago and Managua
Dennis Rodgers

REVIEW ARTICLE

Mediations on crises and time in Southeastern Europe
Jana Hrckova

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