Anthropologists uncover past in race against time
By David Watson
While anthropology departments on campuses across the nation are either stagnant or declining, the department here is growing and has many plans for the future.
John Stephen Lansing, an assistant professor of anthropology, said this development is an outgrowth of feelings among the faculty. He said the department is small but ambitious.
Anthropology is the study of other cultures and societies. Most students commonly view it as digging in ruins or living with headhunters. While these are some aspects of anthropology, it has many facets for all types of people.
The anthropology department separated from the sociology department this year. This makes it one of the youngest departments on campus.
There are five full-time faculty members in the department, as well as several part-time teachers. They all bring their
own interests to the department, providing a variety of different learning experiences for students.
Lansing is one of two full-time faculty members hired this year. He views the work of anthropology as a race against time. Lansing believes it is the duty of anthropologists to make as complete a record of man as possible.
However, he said different and primitive cultuhes around the world are rapidly disappearing. Soon, it will no longer be possible, according to Lansing, to know what these people think, and this frustrates him.
Lansing believes the work of anthropology should be a high priority because the laws of different cultures won’t always exist, while the laws of mathematics and physics will.
He has done approximately three years of fieldwork in Bali, Indonesia. He studied the arts, wanting to know why there was such sophistication in the
peasant music and painting. The peasant art of other cultures is usually very simplistic, Lansing said, but in Bali it compared to the art of the imperial
courts.
Ira Abrams, the other new faculty member, said anthropology was a special way of seeing things. He said you learn about things you didn’t know you didn’t know.
“Our own lives are a small combination of total possibilities,” he said. “Anthropology exposes people to all the broad human possibilities.”
Anthropology helps a person see where he or his culture fits into the larger whole and helps us, he said, to see our own actions in the context of the rest of the world.
Abrams has done field work with the Maya in Central America. His main interest at the university is using film ethnography to capture the unique way a (continued on page 2)
Daily f§ Trojan
Volume LXXII, Number 47
University of Southern California
Los Angeles, Californio
Wednesday, November 30, 1977
Ford returns Thursday as guest lecturer for two days
By Gail Asayama
Staff Writrr
Former President Gerald R. Ford will visit the university again in completion of his tenure as a visiting professor. The former President visited a variety of classes from May 11 to 13 earlier this year.
Ford is scheduled to arrive by motorcade at 7:30 a.m. Thursday at Jefferson Boulevard and University Avenue. He will walk down University Avenue to Administration Building where he will breakfast with President John R. Hubbard.
Ford will lecture to eight classes in history, public affairs, international relations and business and four classes in politi-
cal science. Houston Flournoy, dean of the Center for Public Affairs and coordinator of the visit, said. "We solicited requests from the schools on campus concerning their interests in having him as a guest lecturer."
Flournoy said conflicting class times and the applicability of his unique background were taken into consideration in determining the classes Ford would attend.
He will speak on topics such as presidential politics, political opinion and behavior, the theory7 and practice of American democracy and international relations.
The format of the lectures will
Center to focus on career guidance of Row students
An experimental Career Resource Development Center specifically designed for use by students living on the Row is being formed with the help of the affiliate resource center on campus and the Greek Student Senate.
We plan to use the center as an outreach to various houses on the Row to assist students on what they're going to need to do in finding a job after graduation,” said Carl Herringer. director of the Career Resource Center.
Herringer said the main reason for the center will be to teach students how to write resumes, conduct themselves during interviews and clue themselves in to what the employer is looking for in an applicant.
"Most of the houses have already appointed a representative who will be available for counseling and assistance and we are hoping for bulletin board space in each participating house to post openings in various fields,’ Herringer said.
"There is a tremendous concern because many students don’t use the center on campus because many don’t know its function and others use it too late,” said Julie Lynch, assistant director of the Office of Residential Life.
"We plan to conduct three or four meetings to get the program started and in my opinion, it’s a great opportunity for women because in spite of what many say. I think there is a tremendous fear when new female grads enter the job market,” she said.
Herringer said the program will also be used as a model that will be evaluated at the National Peer Advocate Counseling Conference that will be held at the university next semester.
The representatives will be separated into several groups and will be instructed in counseling. Herringer said their resumes will be evaluated, weaknesses found and ideas as to what the employer is looking for offered
After instruction on resumes, the center hopes to conduct interview workshops and study techniques and plans to invite experienced graduates of the Row to speak to students, Herringer said.
The first of the meetings is tentatively scheduled for the first or second week of next month, but the final date depends on when the students can schedule it.
Lynch said she believed some of the rooms at the various houses could be converted into career resource outlets, where literature and information would be available.
170-unit apartment complex ready for arrival of senior-citizen tenants
Retired and disabled people older than 62 will begin moving into the Jessie L. Terry Manor apartment complex at the corner of Jefferson Boulevard and Vermont Avenue at the end of this week.
Robert Freeman, apartment manager, said when the contractor hands over the complex to the management on the first of the month, there will be about 25 people ready to move in. The management will then allow 10 people to move in each day until the 170 units are filled.
The official opening for the apartments isn’t until Jan. 22, 1978.
The complex is not set up as a nursing or convalescent home.
“The retired people coming here mostly want to have a community of their own. They have to be totally self-sufficient. They have to be able to get
around on their own,” Freeman said.
Social activities and programs for the residents are still being discussed.
"Maybe later we’ll get a social director and get volunteers to come in and entertain them (the, residents),” Freeman said.
An apartment board member thought outdoor recreation might include horseshoes, croquet and bicycling.
Of the 167 people scheduled to move in, there are a few couples, but most of the new tenants are
single.
“What will happen (at the manor) is hard to say. It depends on what the community and the management want to do,” said Tom Furushiro. senior city planner for the Los Angeles City Community Redevelopment Agency.
(continued on page 9)
be basically the same as his last visit. It will be up to the professors of the classes to specify the exact format and topic areas to be discussed. The lectures will probably be 20 minutes in length with questions from students in the remaining time.
This semester’s visit will be less hectic, said Nancy Chew, who is also coordinating the visit. “He will not be staying as long and he will not be attending as many classes,” Chew said. She said the former President had felt his last visit’s schedule was strenuous, so this schedule will allow for a greater leeway between classes.
In addition to the classes on Thursday, Ford will meet with the press at the University Hilton Hotel in the Grand Ballroom. He will also attend the Air Force ROTC annual dinner where he will speak on “The State of National Defense — Where We Are Now and Where We Are Going.” The black-tie affair will take place at Town and Gown.
On Friday, Ford will attend classes, one of which will be open to the press. This class will be on International Law. He will leave campus at 4 p.m.
The visit is sponsored by the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research in Washington, D.C., as well as the university. The institute is an (continued on page 8)
FULL BLOOM — One of nature's simpler complexities shows off its mature stage of beauty, a sight that often goes unnoticed in our urban midst. A flower knows few tomorrows, so it's best to enjoy it today. DT photo by Mark Kariya.