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by Subject: Theory and Methodology

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• eBook available July 2012

  Anyone

  The Cosmopolitan Subject of Anthropology

  Rapport, N.

  The significance that people grant to their affiliations as members of nations, religions, classes, races, ethnicities and genders is evidence of the vital need for a cosmopolitan project that originates in the figure of Anyone – the universal and yet individual human being. Cosmopolitanism offers an alternative to multiculturalism, a different vision of identity, belonging, solidarity and justice, that avoids the seemingly intractable character of identity politics: it identifies samenesses of the human condition that underlie the surface differences of history, culture and society, nation, ethnicity, religion, class, race and gender. This book argues for the importance of cosmopolitanism as a theory of human being, as a methodology for social science and as a moral and political program.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available February 2018

  After Difference

  Queer Activism in Italy and Anthropological Theory

  Heywood, P.

  Queer activism and anthropology are both fundamentally concerned with the concept of difference. Yet they are so in fundamentally different ways. The Italian queer activists in this book value difference as something that must be produced, in opposition to the identity politics they find around them. Conversely, anthropologists find difference in the world around them, and seek to produce an identity between anthropological theory and the ethnographic material it elucidates. This book describes problems faced by an activist "politics of difference," and issues concerning the identity of anthropological reflection itself—connecting two conceptions of difference whilst simultaneously holding them apart.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Anthropology (General) Gender Studies and Sexuality

• eBook available July 2020

  After Society

  Anthropological Trajectories out of Oxford

  Pina-Cabral, J. & Bowman, G. (eds)

  In the early 1980s, when the contributors to this volume completed their graduate training at Oxford, the conditions of practice in anthropology were undergoing profound change. Professionally, the immediate postcolonial period was over and neoliberal reforms were marginalizing the social sciences. Analytically, the poststructuralist critique of the notion of ‘society’ challenged a discipline that dubbed itself as ‘social’. Here self-ethnography is used to portray the contributors’ anthropological trajectories, showing how analytical and academic engagements interacted creatively over time.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available March 2016

  The Anthropologist as Writer

  Genres and Contexts in the Twenty-First Century

  Wullf, H. (ed)

  Writing is crucial to anthropology, but which genres are anthropologists expected to master in the 21st century? This book explores how anthropological writing shapes the intellectual content of the discipline and academic careers. First, chapters identify the different writing genres and contexts anthropologists actually engage with. Second, this book argues for the usefulness and necessity of taking seriously the idea of writing as a craft and of writing across and within genres in new ways. Although academic writing is an anthropologist’s primary genre, they also write in many others, from drafting administrative texts and filing reports to composing ethnographically inspired journalism and fiction.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available January 2015

  Anthropology & Philosophy

  Dialogues on Trust and Hope

  Liisberg, S., Pedersen, E. O., Dalsgård, A. L. (eds)

  The present book is no ordinary anthology, but rather a workroom in which anthropologists and philosophers initiate a dialogue on trust and hope, two important topics for both fields of study. The book combines work between scholars from different universities in the U.S. and Denmark. Thus, besides bringing the two disciplines in dialogue, it also cuts across differences in national contexts and academic style. The interdisciplinary efforts of the contributors demonstrate how such a collaboration can result in new and challenging ways of thinking about trust and hope. Reading the dialogues may, therefore, also inspire others to work in the productive intersection between anthropology and philosophy.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology

• eBook available January 2021

  Anthropology and Ethnography are Not Equivalent

  Reorienting Anthropology for the Future

  Ahmad, I. (ed)

  In recent years, crucial questions have been raised about anthropology as a discipline, such as whether ethnography is central to the subject, and how imagination, reality and truth are joined in anthropological enterprises. These interventions have impacted anthropologists and scholars at large. This volume contributes to the debate about the interrelationships between ethnography and anthropology and takes it to a new plane. Six anthropologists with field experience in Egypt, Greece, India, Laos, Mauritius, Thailand and Switzerland critically discuss these propositions in order to renew anthropology for the future. The volume concludes with an Afterword from Tim Ingold.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available October 2014

  Anthropology and Nostalgia

  Angé, O. & Berliner, D. (eds)

  Nostalgia is intimately connected to the history of the social sciences in general and anthropology in particular, though finely grained ethnographies of nostalgia and loss are still scarce. Today, anthropologists have realized that nostalgia constitutes a fascinating object of study for exploring contemporary issues of the formation of identity in politics and history. Contributors to this volume consider the fabric of nostalgia in the fields of heritage and tourism, exile and diasporas, postcolonialism and postsocialism, business and economic exchange, social, ecological and religious movements, and nation building. They contribute to a better understanding of how individuals and groups commemorate their pasts, and how nostalgia plays a role in the process of remembering.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Heritage Studies Theory and Methodology

• eBook available November 2012

  Anthropology and Political Science

  A Convergent Approach

  Aronoff, M. J. & Kubik, J.

  What can anthropology and political science learn from each other? The authors argue that collaboration, particularly in the area of concepts and methodologies, is tremendously beneficial for both disciplines, though they also deal with some troubling aspects of the relationship. Focusing on the influence of anthropology on political science, the book examines the basic assumptions the practitioners of each discipline make about the nature of social and political reality, compares some of the key concepts each field employs, and provides an extensive review of the basic methods of research that “bridge” both disciplines: ethnography and case study. Through ethnography (participant observation), reliance on extended case studies, and the use of “anthropological” concepts and sensibilities, a greater understanding of some of the most challenging issues of the day can be gained. For example, political anthropology challenges the illusion of the “autonomy of the political” assumed by political science to characterize so-called modern societies. Several chapters include a cross-disciplinary analysis of key concepts and issues: political culture, political ritual, the politics of collective identity, democratization in divided societies, conflict resolution, civil society, and the politics of post-Communist transformations.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Political and Economic Anthropology

• eBook available May 2008

  Anthropology as Ethics

  Nondualism and the Conduct of Sacrifice

  Evens, T. M. S.

  Anthropology as Ethics is concerned with rethinking anthropology by rethinking the nature of reality. It develops the ontological implications of a defining thesis of the Manchester School: that all social orders exhibit basically conflicting underlying principles. Drawing especially on Continental social thought, including Wittgenstein, Merleau-Ponty, Levinas, Dumont, Bourdieu and others, and on pre-modern sources such as the Hebrew bible, the Nuer, the Dinka, and the Azande, the book mounts a radical study of the ontology of self and other in relation to dualism and nondualism. It demonstrates how the self-other dichotomy disguises fundamental ambiguity or nondualism, thus obscuring the essentially ethical, dilemmatic, and sacrificial nature of all social life. It also proposes a reason other than dualist, nihilist, and instrumental, one in which logic is seen as both inimical to and continuous with value. Without embracing absolutism, the book makes ambiguity and paradox the foundation of an ethical response to the pervasive anti-foundationalism of much postmodern thought.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available October 2014

  Anthropology Now and Next

  Essays in Honor of Ulf Hannerz

  Eriksen, T. H., Garsten, C. & Randeria, S. (eds)

  The scholarship of Ulf Hannerz is characterized by its extraordinary breadth and visionary nature. He has contributed to the understanding of urban life and transnational networks, and the role of media, paradoxes of identity and new forms of community, suggesting to see culture in terms of flows rather than as bounded entities. Contributions honor Hannerz’ legacy by addressing theoretical, epistemological, ethical and methodological challenges facing anthropological inquiry on topics from cultural diversity policies in Europe to transnational networks in Yemen, and from pottery and literature to multinational corporations.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology Cultural Studies (General)

• eBook available August 2009

  The Anthropology of Moralities

  Heintz, M. (Ed.)

  Anthropologists have been keenly aware of the tension between cultural relativism and absolute norms, and nowhere has this been more acute than with regards to moral values. Can we study the Other’s morality without applying our own normative judgments? How do social anthropologists keep both the distance required by science and the empathy required for the analysis of lived experiences? The plurality of moralities has not received an explicit and focused attention until recently, when accelerated globalization often resulted in the collision of different value systems. Observing, describing and assessing values cross-culturally, the authors propose various methodological approaches to the study of moralities, illustrated with rich ethnographic accounts, thus offering a valuable guide for students of anthropology, sociology and cultural studies and for professionals concerned with the empirical and cross-cultural study of values.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available October 2008

  An Anthropology of War

  Views from the Frontline

  Waterston, A. (ed)

  As we move deeper into the twenty-first century, power, lethal force, and injustice continue to explode violently into war, and the prospects for lasting peace look even bleaker. The horrors of modern warfare - the death, dehumanization, and destruction of social and material infrastructures - have done little to bring an end to armed conflict.

  In this volume, leading chroniclers of war provide thoughtful and powerful essays that reflect on their ethnographic work at the frontlines. The contributors recount not only what they have seen and heard in war zones but also what is being read, studied, analyzed and remembered in such diverse locations as Colombia and Guatemala, Israel and Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Haiti. In detailed reports from the field, they reflect on the important issue of “accountability” and offer explanations to discern causes, patterns, and practices of war. Through this unique lens, the contributors provide the insight and analysis needed for a deeper understanding of one of the greatest issues of our times.

  Contributors:
  Avram Bornstein, Paul E. Farmer, R. Brian Ferguson, Lesley Gill, Beatriz Manz, Carolyn Nordstrom, Stephen Reyna, Jose N. Vasquez

  Subjects: Peace and Conflict Studies Theory and Methodology

• eBook available May 2016

  Being and Becoming

  Embodiment and Experience among the Orang Rimba of Sumatra

  Elkholy, R.

  For the Orang Rimba of Sumatra – and tropical foragers in general – life in the forest engenders a kind of “connectedness” that is contingent not only on harmonious relations between people, but also between people and the non-human environment, including those supernatural agencies of the forest that people depend on for their spiritual and emotional wellbeing. Exploring this world, anthropologist Ramsey Elkholy treats embodied action and perception as the basis of shared experience and shows how various forms of embodied experience constitute the very foundations of human culture. In a unique methodological contribution, Elkholy adopts a set of body-centered approaches that reflect and capture the day-to-day, moment-to-moment ways in which people engage with the world. Being and Becoming is an important contribution to phenomenological anthropology, hunter-gatherer studies, and to Southeast Asian ethnography more generally.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology

• eBook available May 2010

  Beyond Writing Culture

  Current Intersections of Epistemologies and Representational Practices

  Zenker, O. & Kumoll, K. (eds)

  Two decades after the publication of Clifford and Marcus’ volume Writing Culture, this collection provides a fresh and diverse reassessment of the debates that this pioneering volume unleashed. At the same time, Beyond Writing Culture moves the debate on by embracing the more fundamental challenge as to how to conceptualise the intricate relationship between epistemology and representational practices rather than maintaining the original narrow focus on textual analysis. It thus offers a thought-provoking tapestry of new ideas relevant for scholars not only concerned with ‘the ethnographic Other’, but with representation in general.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available November 2019

  Bourdieu and Social Space

  Mobilities, Trajectories, Emplacements

  Reed-Danahay, D.

  French sociologist and anthropologist Pierre Bourdieu’s relevance for studies of spatiality and mobility has received less attention than other aspects of his work. Here, Deborah Reed-Danahay argues that the concept of social space, central to Bourdieu’s ideas, addresses the structured inequalities that prevail in spatial choices and practices. She provides an ethnographically informed interpretation of social space that demonstrates its potential for new directions in studies of mobility, immobility, and emplacement.  This book traces the links between habitus and social space across the span of Bourdieu’s writings, and places his work in dialogue with historical and contemporary approaches to mobility.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Mobility Studies Sociology

• eBook available December 2010

  Centralizing Fieldwork

  Critical Perspectives from Primatology, Biological and Social Anthropology

  MacClancy, J. & Fuentes, A. (eds)

  Fieldwork is a central method of research throughout anthropology, a much-valued, much-vaunted mode of generating information. But its nature and process have been seriously understudied in biological anthropology and primatology. This book is the first ever comparative investigation, across primatology, biological anthropology, and social anthropology, to look critically at this key research practice. It is also an innovative way to further the comparative project within a broadly conceived anthropology, because it does not focus on common theory but on a common method. The questions asked by contributors are: what in the pursuit of fieldwork is common to all three disciplines, what is unique to each, how much is contingent, how much necessary? Can we generate well-grounded cross-disciplinary generalizations about this mutual research method, and are there are any telling differences? Co-edited by a social anthropologist and a primatologist, the book includes a list of distinguished and well-established contributors from primatology and biological anthropology.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available October 2011

  The Challenge of Epistemology

  Anthropological Perspectives

  Toren, C. & Pina-Cabral, J. de (eds)

  Epistemology poses particular problems for anthropologists whose task it is to understand manifold ways of being human. Through their work, anthropologists often encounter people whose ideas concerning the nature and foundations of knowledge are at odds with their own. Going right to the heart of anthropological theory and method, this volume discusses issues that have vexed practicing anthropologists for a long time. The authors are by no means in agreement with one another as to where the answers might lie. Some are primarily concerned with the clarity and theoretical utility of analytical categories across disciplines; others are more inclined to push ethnographic analysis to its limits in an effort to demonstrate what kind of sense it can make. All are aware of the much-wanted differences that good ethnography can make in explaining the human sciences and philosophy. The contributors show a continued commitment to ethnography as a profoundly radical intellectual endeavor that goes to the very roots of inquiry into what it is to be human, and, to anthropology as a comparative project that should be central to any attempt to understand who we are.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available March 2020

  The Children of Gregoria

  Dogme Ethnography of a Mexican Family

  Kristensen, R. & Adeath Villamil, C.

  The Children of Gregoria portrays a struggling Mexico, told through the story of the Rosales family. The people entrenched in the violent communities that the Rosales belong to have been discussed, condemned, analyzed, joked about and cheered, but rarely have they been seriously listened to. This book highlights their voices and allows them to tell their own stories in an accessible, literary manner without prejudice, persecution or judgment.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology Media Studies

• eBook available January 2010

  Conceptualizing Iranian Anthropology

  Past and Present Perspectives

  Nadjmabadi, S. (ed)

  During recent years, attempts have been made to move beyond the Eurocentric perspective that characterized the social sciences, especially anthropology, for over 150 years. A debate on the “anthropology of anthropology” was needed, one that would consider other forms of knowledge, modalities of writing, and political and intellectual practices. This volume undertakes that challenge: it is the result of discussions held at the first organized encounter between Iranian, American, and European anthropologists since the Iranian Revolution of 1979. It is considered an important first step in overcoming the dichotomy between “peripheral anthropologies” versus “central anthropologies.” The contributors examine, from a critical perspective, the historical, cultural, and political field in which anthropological research emerged in Iran at the beginning of the twentieth century and in which it continues to develop today.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available December 2018

  Contemplating Historical Consciousness

  Notes from the Field

  Clark, A. & Peck, C. L. (eds)

  The last several decades have witnessed an explosion of new empirical research into representations of the past and the conditions of their production, prompting claims that we have entered a new era in which the past has become more “present” than ever before. Contemplating Historical Consciousness brings together leading historians, ethnographers, and other scholars who give illuminating reflections on the aims, methods, and conceptualization of their own research as well as the successes and failures they have encountered. This rich collective account provides valuable perspectives for current scholars while charting new avenues for future research.

  Subjects: History (General) Theory and Methodology

• eBook available August 2010

  Contemporary Religiosities

  Emergent Socialities and the Post-Nation-State

  Kapferer, B., Telle, K. & Eriksen, A. (Eds.)

  The last decade has seen an unexpected return of the religious, and with it the creation of new kinds of social forms alongside new fusions of political and religious realms that high modernity kept distinct. For a fuller understanding of what this means for society in the context of globalization, it is necessary to rethink the relationship between the religious and the secular; the contributors - all leading scholars in anthropology - do just that, some even arguing that secularization itself now takes a religious form. Combining theoretical reflection with vivid ethnographic explorations, this essential collection is designed to advance a critical understanding of social and personal religious experience in today's world.

  Subjects: Anthropology of Religion Theory and Methodology

• eBook available January 2018

  Contrarian Anthropology

  The Unwritten Rules of Academia

  Nader, L.

  Analyzing the workings of boundary maintenance in the areas of anthropology, energy, gender, and law, Nader contrasts dominant trends in academia with work that pushes the boundaries of acceptable methods and theories. Although the selections illustrate the history of one anthropologist’s work over half a century, the wider intent is to label a field as contrarian to reveal unwritten rules that sometimes hinder transformative thinking and to stimulate boundary crossing in others.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology Cultural Studies (General)

• eBook available July 2019

  Critique of Identity Thinking

  Jackson, M.

  Recent world-wide political developments have persuaded many people that we are again living in what Hannah Arendt called “dark times.” Jackson’s response to this age of uncertainty is to remind us how much experience falls outside the concepts and categories we habitually deploy in rendering life manageable and intelligible.  Drawing on such critical thinkers as Hannah Arendt, Theodor Adorno, Walter Benjamin, and Karl Jaspers, whose work was profoundly influenced by the catastrophes that overwhelmed the world in the middle of the last century, Jackson explores the transformative and redemptive power of marginalized voices in the contemporary conversation of humankind.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Cultural Studies (General)

• eBook available July 2009

  Culture and Rhetoric

  Strecker, I. & Tyler, S. (eds)

  While some scholars have said that there is no such thing as culture and have urged to abandon the concept altogether, the contributors to this volume overcome this impasse by understanding cultures and their representations for what they ultimately are – rhetorical constructs. These senior, international scholars explore the complex relationships between culture and rhetoric arguing that just as rhetoric is founded in culture, culture is founded in rhetoric. This intersection constitutes the central theme of the first part of the book, while the second is dedicated to the study of figuration as a common ground of rhetoric and anthropology. The book offers a compelling range of theoretical reflections, historical vistas, and empirical investigations, which aim to show how people talk themselves and others into particular modalities of thought and action, and how rhetoric and culture, in this way, are co-emergent. It thus turns a new page in the history of academic discourse by bringing two disciplines – anthropology and rhetoric – together in a way that has never been done before.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Cultural Studies (General)

• eBook available March 2010

  Culture Wars

  Context, Models and Anthropologists' Accounts

  James, D. Plaice, E. & Toren C. (eds)

  The relationship between anthropologists’ ethnographic investigations and the lived social worlds in which these originate is a fundamental issue for anthropology. Where some claim that only native voices may offer authentic accounts of culture and hence that ethnographers are only ever interpreters of it, others point out that anthropologists are, themselves, implanted within specific cultural contexts which generate particular kinds of theoretical discussions. The contributors to this volume reject the premise that ethnographer and informant occupy different and incommensurable “cultural worlds.” Instead they investigate the relationship between culture, context, and anthropologists’ models and accounts in new ways. In doing so, they offer fresh insights into this key area of anthropological research.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Cultural Studies (General)

• eBook available October 2015

  Culture, Catastrophe, and Rhetoric

  The Texture of Political Action

  Hariman, R. & Cintron, R. (eds)

  This volume explores political culture, especially the catastrophic elements of the global social order emerging in the twenty-first century. By emphasizing the texture of political action, the book theorizes how social context becomes evident on the surface of events and analyzes the performative dimensions of political experience. The attention to catastrophe allows for an understanding of how ordinary people contend with normal system operation once it is indistinguishable from system breakdown. Through an array of case studies, the book provides an account of change as it is experienced, negotiated, and resisted in specific settings that define a society’s capacity for political action.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Cultural Studies (General)

• eBook available June 2009

  Culture, Rhetoric and the Vicissitudes of Life

  Carrithers, M. (ed)

  Inspired by the Rhetoric Culture Project, this volume focuses on the use of imagery, narrative, and cultural schemes to deal with predicaments that arise during the course of life. The contributors explore how people muster their resources to understand and deal with emergencies such as illness, displacement, or genocide. In dealing with such circumstances, people can develop new rhetorical forms and, in the process, establish new cultural resources for succeeding generations. Several of the contributions show how rhetorical cultural forms can themselves create emergencies. The contributors bring expertise from a variety of disciplines, including anthropology and communications studies, underlining the volume’s wider relevance as a reflection on the human condition.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Cultural Studies (General)

• eBook available April 2018

  Cutting Cosmos

  Masculinity and Spectacular Events among the Bugkalot

  Mikkelsen, H. H.

  For the first time in over 30 years, a new ethnographic study emerges on the Bugkalot tribe, more widely known as the Ilongot of the northern Philippines. Exploring the notion of masculinity among the Bugkalot, Cutting Cosmos is not only an experimental, anthropological study of the paradoxes around which Bugkalot society revolves, but also a reflection on anthropological theory and writing. Focusing on the transgressive acts through which masculinity is performed, this book explores the idea of the cosmic cut, the ritual act that enables the Bugkalot man to momentarily hold still the chaotic flows of his world.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Gender Studies and Sexuality Sociology

• eBook available December 2012

  Debating Authenticity

  Concepts of Modernity in Anthropological Perspective

  Fillitz, T. & Saris, A. J. (ed)

  The longing for authenticity, on an individual or collective level, connects the search for external expressions to internal orientations. What is largely referred to as production of authenticity is a reformulation of cultural values and norms within the ongoing process of modernity, impacted by globalization and contemporary transnational cultural flows. This collection interrogates the notion of authenticity from an anthropological point of view and considers authenticity in terms of how meaning is produced in and through discourses about authenticity. Incorporating case studies from four continents, the topics reach from art and colonialism to exoticism-primitivism, film, ritual and wilderness. Some contributors emphasise the dichotomy between the academic use of the term and the one deployed in public spaces and political projects. All, however, consider authenticity as something that can only be understood ethnographically, and not as a simple characteristic or category used to distinguish some behaviors, experiences or material things from other less authentic versions.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available November 2009

  Deleuzian Intersections

  Science, Technology, Anthropology

  Jensen, C. B. & Rödje, K. (Eds.)

  Science and technology studies, cultural anthropology and cultural studies deal with the complex relations between material, symbolic, technical and political practices. In a Deleuzian approach these relations are seen as produced in heterogeneous assemblages, moving across distinctions such as the human and non-human or the material and ideal. This volume outlines a Deleuzian approach to analyzing science, culture and politics.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available March 2019

  Democracy's Paradox

  Populism and its Contemporary Crisis

  Kapferer, B. & Theodossopoulos, D. (eds)

  Does populism indicate a radical crisis in Western democratic political systems? Is it a revolt by those who feel they have too little voice in the affairs of state or are otherwise marginalized or oppressed? Or are populist movements part of the democratic process?

  Bringing together different anthropological experiences of current populist movements, this volume makes a timely contribution to these questions. Contrary to more conventional interpretations of populism as crisis, the authors instead recognize populism as integral to Western democratic systems. In doing so, the volume provides an important critique that exposes the exclusionary essentialisms spread by populist rhetoric while also directing attention to local views of political accountability and historical consciousness that are key to understanding this paradox of democracy.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology

• eBook available August 2012

  A Durkheimian Quest

  Solidarity and the Sacred

  Watts Miller, W.

  Durkheim, in his very role as a ‘founding father’ of a new social science, sociology, has become like a figure in an old religious painting, enshrouded in myth and encrusted in layers of thick, impenetrable varnish. This book undertakes detailed, up-to-date investigations of Durkheim’s work in an effort to restore its freshness and reveal it as originally created. These investigations explore his particular ideas, within an overall narrative of his initial problematic search for solidarity, how it became a quest for the sacred and how, at the end of his life, he embarked on a project for a new great work on ethics. A theme running through this is his concern with a modern world in crisis and his hope in social and moral reform. Accordingly, the book concludes with a set of essays on modern times and on a crisis that Durkheim thought would pass but which now seems here to stay.

  Subjects: Sociology Theory and Methodology

• eBook available June 2009

  Economic Persuasions

  Gudeman, S. (ed)

  As the transition from socialism to a market economy gathered speed in the early 1990s, many people proclaimed the final success of capitalism as a practice and neoliberal economics as its accompanying science. But with the uneven achievements of the “transition”—the deepening problems of “development,” persistent unemployment, the widening of the wealth gap, and expressions of resistance—the discipline of economics is no longer seen as a mirror of reality or as a unified science. How should we understand economics and, more broadly, the organization and disorganization of material life? In this book, international scholars from anthropology and economics adopt a rhetorical perspective in order to make sense of material life and the theories about it. Re-examining central problems in the two fields and using ethnographic and historical examples, they explore the intersections between these disciplines, contrast their methods and epistemologies, and show how a rhetorical approach offers a new mode of analysis while drawing on established contributions.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Political and Economic Anthropology

• eBook available May 2008

  Economy's Tension

  The Dialectics of Community and Market

  Gudeman, S.

  Why are we obsessed with calculating our selections? The author argues that competitive trade nurtures calculative reason, which provides the ground for most discourses on economy. But market descriptions of economy are incomplete. Drawing on a range of materials from small ethnographic contexts to global financial markets, the author shows that economy is dialectically made up of two value realms, termed mutuality and impersonal trade. One or the other may be dominant; however, market reason usually cascades into and debases the mutuality on which it depends. Using this cross-cultural model, the author explores mystifications of economic life, and explains how capital and derivatives can control an economy. The book offers a different conception of economic welfare, development, and freedom; it presents an approach for dealing with environmental devastation, and explains the growing inequalities of wealth within and between nations.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Political and Economic Anthropology

• eBook available May 2019

  Engaging Evil

  A Moral Anthropology

  Olsen, W. C. & Csordas, T. J. (eds)

  Anthropologists have expressed wariness about the concept of evil even in discussions of morality and ethics, in part because the concept carries its own cultural baggage and theological implications in Euro-American societies. Addressing the problem of evil as a distinctly human phenomenon and a category of ethnographic analysis, this volume shows the usefulness of engaging evil as a descriptor of empirical reality where concepts such as violence, criminality, and hatred fall short of capturing the darkest side of human existence.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Sociology Anthropology of Religion

• eBook available July 2013

  Ethics in the Field

  Contemporary Challenges

  MacClancy, J. & Fuentes, A. (eds)

  In recent years ever-increasing concerns about ethical dimensions of fieldwork practice have forced anthropologists and other social scientists to radically reconsider the nature, process, and outcomes of fieldwork: what should we be doing, how, for whom, and to what end? In this volume, practitioners from across anthropological disciplines—social and biological anthropology and primatology—come together to question and compare the ethical regulation of fieldwork, what is common to their practices, and what is distinctive to each discipline. Contributors probe a rich variety of contemporary questions: the new, unique problems raised by conducting fieldwork online and via email; the potential dangers of primatological fieldwork for locals, primates, the environment, and the fieldworkers themselves; the problems of studying the military; and the role of ethical clearance for anthropologists involved in international health programs. The distinctive aim of this book is to develop of a transdisciplinary anthropology at the methodological, not theoretical, level.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Applied Anthropology

• eBook available June 2017

  The Ethics of Knowledge Creation

  Transactions, Relations, and Persons

  Josephides, L. & Grønseth, A. S. (eds)

  Anthropology lies at the heart of the human sciences, tackling questions having to do with the foundations, ethics, and deployment of the knowledge crucial to human lives. The Ethics of Knowledge Creation focuses on how knowledge is relationally created, how local knowledge can be transmuted into ‘universal knowledge’, and how the transaction and consumption of knowledge also monitors its subsequent production. This volume examines the ethical implications of various kinds of relations that are created in the process of ‘transacting knowledge’ and investigates how these transactions are also situated according to broader contradictions or synergies between ethical, epistemological, and political concerns.

  Subjects: Applied Anthropology Theory and Methodology

• eBook available November 2009

  Ethnographic Practice in the Present

  Melhuus, M., Mitchell, J., & Wulff, H. (Eds.)

  In its assessment of the current "state of play" of ethnographic practice in social anthropology, this volume explores the challenges that changing social forms and changing understandings of "the field" pose to contemporary ethnographic methods. These challenges include the implications of the remarkable impact social anthropology is having on neighboring disciplines such as history, sociology, cultural studies, human geography and linguistics, as well as the potential ‘costs’ of this success for the discipline. Contributors also discuss how the ethnographic method is influenced by current institutional contexts and historical "traditions" across a range of settings. Here ethnography is featured less as a methodological "tool-box" or technique but rather as a subject on which to reflect.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available May 2010

  The Ethnographic Self as Resource

  Writing Memory and Experience into Ethnography

  Collins, P. & Gallinat, A. (eds)

  It is commonly acknowledged that anthropologists use personal experiences to inform their writing. However, it is often assumed that only fieldwork experiences are relevant and that the personal appears only in the form of self-reflexivity. This book takes a step beyond anthropology at home and auto-ethnography and shows how anthropologists can include their memories and experiences as ethnographic data in their writing. It discusses issues such as authenticity, translation and ethics in relation to the self, and offers a new perspective on doing ethnographic fieldwork.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available August 2017

  European Anthropologies

  Barrera-González, A., Heintz, M. & Horolets, A. (eds)

  In what ways did Europeans interact with the diversity of people they encountered on other continents in the context of colonial expansion, and with the peasant or ethnic ‘Other’ at home? How did anthropologists and ethnologists make sense of the mosaic of people and societies during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, when their disciplines were progressively being established in academia? By assessing the diversity of European intellectual histories within sociocultural anthropology, this volume aims to sketch its intellectual and institutional portrait. It will be a useful reading for the students of anthropology, ethnology, history and philosophy of science, research and science policy makers.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology Colonial History

• eBook available April 2018

  Experimental Collaborations

  Ethnography through Fieldwork Devices

  Estalella, A. & Sánchez Criado, T. (eds)

  In the accounts compiled in this book, ethnography occurs through processes of material and social interventions that turn the field into a site for epistemic collaboration. Through creative interventions that unfold what we term as “fieldwork devices”—such as coproduced books, the circulation of repurposed data, co-organized events, authorization protocols, relational frictions, and social rhythms—anthropologists engage with their counterparts in the field in the construction of joint anthropological problematizations. In these situations, the traditional tropes of the fieldwork encounter (i.e. immersion and distance) give way to a narrative of intervention, where the aesthetics of collaboration in the production of knowledge substitutes or intermingles with participant observation. Building on this, the book proposes the concept of “experimental collaborations” to describe and conceptualize this distinctive ethnographic modality.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology

• eBook available May 2007

  Explorations in Psychoanalytic Ethnography

  Mimica, J. (ed)

  Whereas most anthropological research is grounded in social, cultural and biological analysis of the human condition, this volume opens up a different approach: its concerns are the psychic depths of human cultural life-worlds as explored through psycho-analytic practice and/or the psychoanalytically framed ethnographic project. In fact, some contributors here argue that the anthropological interpretation of human existence is not sustainable without psychoanalysis; others take a less extreme radical stance but still maintain that the unconscious matrix of the human psyche and of the intersubjective (social) reality of any given cultural life-world is a vital domain of anthropological and sociological inquiry and understanding.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Sociology

• eBook available March 2018

  Heading for the Scene of the Crash

  The Cultural Analysis of America

  Drummond, L.

  American anthropologists have long advocated cultural anthropology as a tool for cultural critique, yet seldom has that approach been employed in discussions of major events and cultural productions that impact the lives of tens of millions of Americans. This collection of essays aims to refashion cultural analysis into a hard-edged tool for the study of American society and culture, addressing topics including the 9/11 terrorist attacks, abortion, sports doping, and the Jonestown massacre-suicides. Grounded in the thought of Friedrich Nietzsche, the essays advance an inquiry into the nature of culture in American society.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Cultural Studies (General)

• eBook available December 2008

  Hierarchy

  Persistence and Transformation in Social Formations

  Rio, K. & Smedal, O. H. (eds)

  Louis Dumont's concept of hierarchy continues to inspire social scientists. Using it as their starting point, the contributors to this volume introduce both fresh empirical material and new theoretical considerations. On the basis of diverse ethnographic contexts in Oceania, Asia, and the Middle East they challenge some current conceptions of hierarchical formations and reassess former debates - of post-colonial and neo-colonial agendas, ideas of "democratization" and "globalization," and expanding market economies - both with regard to new theoretical issues and the new world situation.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Sociology

• eBook available November 2007

  A History of Oxford Anthropology

  Rivière, P. (ed)

  Informative as well as entertaining, this volume offers many interesting facets of the first hundred years of anthropology at Oxford University.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology History (General)

• eBook available November 2007

  Holistic Anthropology

  Emergence and Convergence

  Parkin, D. & Ulijaszek, S. (eds)

  Given the broad reach of anthropology as the science of humankind, there are times when the subject fragments into specialisms and times when there is rapprochement. Rather than just seeing them as reactions to each other, it is perhaps better to say that both tendencies co-exist and that it is very much a matter of perspective as to which is dominant at any moment. The perspective adopted by the contributors to this volume is that some anthropologists have, over the last decade or so, been paying considerable attention to developments in the study of social and biological evolution and of material culture, and that this has brought social, material cultural and biological anthropologists closer to each other and closer to allied disciplines such as archaeology and psychology.

  A more eclectic anthropology once characteristic of an earlier age is thus re-emerging. The new holism does not result from the merging of sharply distinguished disciplines but from among anthropologists themselves who see social organization as fundamentally a problem of human ecology, and, from that, of material and mental creativity, human biology, and the co-evolution of society and culture. It is part of a wider interest beyond anthropology in the origins and rationale of human activities, claims and beliefs, and draws on inferential or speculative reasoning as well as ‘hard’ evidence. The book argues that, while usefully borrowing from other subjects, all such reasoning must be grounded in prolonged, intensive and linguistically-informed fieldwork and comparison.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Anthropology of Religion

• eBook available September 2008

  How Enemies Are Made

  Towards a Theory of Ethnic and Religious Conflict

  Schlee, G.

  In popular perception cultural differences or ethnic affiliation are factors that cause conflict or political fragmentation although this is not borne out by historical evidence. This book puts forward an alternative conflict theory. The author develops a decision theory which explains the conditions under which differing types of identification are preferred. Group identification is linked to competition for resources like water, territory, oil, political charges, or other advantages. Rivalry for resources can cause conflicts but it does not explain who takes whose side in a conflict situation. This book explores possibilities of reducing violent conflicts and ends with a case study, based on personal experience of the author, of conflict resolution.

  Subjects: Peace and Conflict Studies Theory and Methodology

• eBook available March 2010

  Human Nature as Capacity

  Transcending Discourse and Classification

  Rapport, N. (ed.)

  What is it to be human? What are our specifically human attributes, our capacities and liabilities? Such questions gave birth to anthropology as an Enlightenment science. This book argues that it is again appropriate to bring “the human” to the fore, to reclaim the singularity of the word as central to the anthropological endeavor, not on the basis of the substance of a human nature – “To be human is to act like this and react like this, to feel this and want this” – but in terms of species-wide capacities: capabilities for action and imagination, liabilities for suffering and cruelty. The contributors approach “the human” with an awareness of these complexities and particularities, rendering this volume unique in its ability to build on anthropology’s ethnographic expertise.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available May 2007

  Identity Matters

  Ethnic and Sectarian Conflict

  Peacock, J. M., Thornton, P. M., and Inman, P. B. (eds)

  In response to the attacks of September 11, 2001 and war in Afghanistan, the Fulbright New Century Scholars program brought together social scientists from around the world to study sectarian, ethnic, and cultural conflict within and across national borders. As one result of their year of intense discussion, this book examines the roots of collective violence — and the measures taken to avoid it — in Burma (Myanmar), China, Germany, Pakistan, Senegal, Singapore, Thailand, Tibet, Ukraine, Southeast Asia, and Western Europe.

  Case studies and theoretical essays introduce the basic principles necessary to identify and explain the symbols and practices each unique human group holds sacred or inalienable. The authors apply the methods of political science, social psychology, anthropology, journalism, and educational research. They build on the insights of Gordon Allport, Charles Taylor, and Max Weber to describe and analyze the patterns of behavior that social groups worldwide use to maintain their identities.

  Written to inform the general reader and communicate across disciplinary boundaries, this important and timely volume demonstrates ways of understanding, predicting and coping with ethnic and sectarian violence.

  Contributors: Badeng Nima, David Brown, Kwanchewan Buadaeng, Patrick B. Inman, Karina V. Korostelina, James L. Peacock, Thomas F. Pettigrew, Wee Teng Soh, Hamadou Tidiane Sy, Patricia M. Thornton, Mohammad Waseem.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Peace and Conflict Studies

• eBook available December 2017

  Indigeneity on the Move

  Varying Manifestations of a Contested Concept

  Gerharz, E., Uddin, N., & Chakkarath, P. (eds)

  “Indigeneity” has become a prominent yet contested concept in national and international politics, as well as within the social sciences. This edited volume draws from authors representing different disciplines and perspectives, exploring the dependence of indigeneity on varying sociopolitical contexts, actors, and discourses with the ultimate goal of investigating the concept’s scientific and political potential.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Anthropology (General)

• eBook available October 2007

  Learning Religion

  Anthropological Approaches

  Berliner, D. & Sarró, R. (eds)

  As we enter the 21st century, it becomes increasingly difficult to envisage a world detached from religion or an anthropology blind to its study. Yet, how people become religious is still poorly studied. This volume gathers some of the most distinguished scholars in the field to offer a new perspective for the study of religion, one that examines the works of transmission and innovation through the prism of learning. They argue that religious culture is socially and dynamically constructed by agents who are not mere passive recipients but engaged in active learning processes. Finding a middle way between the social and the cognitive, they see learning religions not as a mechanism of “downloading” but also as a social process with its relational dimension.

  Subjects: Anthropology of Religion Theory and Methodology Sociology

• eBook available June 2017

  Mary Douglas

  Understanding Social Thought and Conflict

  6, P. & Richards, P.

  Mary Douglas’s innovative explanations for styles of human thought and for the dynamics of institutional change have furnished a distinctive and powerful theory of how conflicts are managed, yet her work remains astonishingly poorly appreciated in social science disciplines. This volume introduces Douglas’s theories, and outlines the ways in which her work is of continuing importance for the future of the social sciences. Mary Douglas: Understanding Human Thought and Conflict shows how Douglas laid out the agenda for revitalizing social science by reworking Durkheim’s legacy for today, and reviews the growing body of research across the social sciences which has used, tested or developed her approach.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Sociology

• eBook available May 2017

  Methodologies of Mobility

  Ethnography and Experiment

  Elliot, A., Norum, R., & Salazar, N. B. (eds)

  Research into mobility is an exciting challenge for the social sciences that raises novel social, cultural, spatial and ethical questions. At the heart of these empirical and theoretical complexities lies the question of methodology: how can we best capture and understand a planet in flux? Methodologies of Mobility speaks beyond disciplinary boundaries to the methodological challenges and possibilities of engaging with a world on the move. With scholars continuing to face different forms and scales of mobility, this volume strategically traces innovative ways of designing, applying and reflecting on both established and cutting-edge methodologies of mobility.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Mobility Studies Theory and Methodology

• eBook available May 2017

  The Mirror of the Medieval

  An Anthropology of the Western Historical Imagination

  Fazioli, K. P.

  Since its invention by Renaissance humanists, the myth of the “Middle Ages” has held a uniquely important place in the Western historical imagination. Whether envisioned as an era of lost simplicity or a barbaric nightmare, the medieval past has always served as a mirror for modernity. This book gives an eye-opening account of the ways various political and intellectual projects—from nationalism to the discipline of anthropology—have appropriated the Middle Ages for their own ends. Deploying an interdisciplinary toolkit, author K. Patrick Fazioli grounds his analysis in contemporary struggles over power and identity in the Eastern Alps, while also considering the broader implications for scholarly research and public memory.

  Subjects: History: Medieval/Early Modern Theory and Methodology Archaeology

• eBook available October 2020

  Moebius Anthropology

  Essays on the Forming of Form

  Handelman, D., Shapiro, M. (ed), & Feldman, J. (ed)

  Don Handelman’s groundbreaking work in anthropology is showcased in this collection of his most powerful essays, edited by Matan Shapiro and Jackie Feldman. The book looks at the intellectual and spiritual roots of Handelman’s initiation into anthropology; his work on ritual and on “bureaucratic logic”; analyses of cosmology; and innovative essays on Anthropology and Deleuzian thinking. Handelman reconsiders his theory of the forming of form and how this relates to a new theory of the dynamics of time. This will be the definitive collection of articles by one of the most important anthropologists of the late 20th Century.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Anthropology of Religion

• eBook available April 2018

  Moral Anthropology

  A Critique

  Kapferer, B. & Gold, M. (eds)

  A development in anthropological theory, characterized as the 'moral turn', is gaining popularity and should be carefully considered. In examining the context, arguments, and discourse that surrounds this trend, this volume reconceptualizes the discipline of anthropology in a radical way. Contributions from anthropologists from around the world from different theoretical traditions and with expertise in a multiplicity of ethnographic areas makes this collection a provocative contribution to larger discussions not only in anthropology but the social sciences more broadly.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available May 2010

  Multicultural Dialogue

  Dilemmas, Paradoxes, Conflicts

  Gressgård, R.

  As cross-cultural migration increases democratic states face a particular challenge: how to grant equal rights and dignity to individuals while recognizing cultural distinctiveness. In response to the greater number of ethnic and religious minority groups, state policies seem to focus on managing cultural differences through planned pluralism. This book explores the dilemmas, paradoxes, and conflicts that emerge when differences are managed within this conceptual framework. After a critical investigation of the perceived logic of identity, indicative of Western nation-states and at the root of their pluralistic intentions, the author takes issue with both universalist notions of equality and cultural relativist notions of distinctiveness. However, without identity is it possible to participate in dialogue and form communities? Is there a way out of this impasse? The book argues in favor of communities based on nonidentitarian difference, developed and maintained through open and critical dialogue.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Sociology

• eBook available August 2019

  Multiple Nature-Cultures, Diverse Anthropologies

  Bruun Jensen, C. & Morita, A. (eds)

  Over time, the role of nature in anthropology has evolved from being a mere backdrop for social and cultural diversity to being viewed as an integral part of the ontological entanglement of human and nonhuman agents. This transformation of the role of nature offers important insight into the relationships between diverse anthropological traditions. By highlighting natural-cultural worlds alongside these traditions, Multiple Nature-Cultures, Diverse Anthropologies explores the potential for creating more sophisticated conjunctions of anthropological knowledge and practice.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology Cultural Studies (General)

• eBook available April 2019

  On the Geopragmatics of Anthropological Identification

  Chun, A.

  On the Geopragmatics of Anthropological Identification explores the discursive spaces of our speaking position, or what has routinely been referred to in the literature as the poetics and politics of writing culture. At issue here are its problematic underlying notions of cultural identity, authorial subjectivity and postcolonial critique. Contrary to the widespread assumption that cultural studies and the social sciences share a common discourse of culture and society, Allen Chun argues that 'modern' disciplinary practices and axioms have in fact produced inherently incompatible theories. Anthropology's ethical relativism has also created obstacles for a critical theory of culture and society.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Cultural Studies (General)

• eBook available March 2008

  Other People's Anthropologies

  Ethnographic Practice on the Margins

  Boškovic, A. (ed)

  Anthropological practice has been dominated by the so-called "great" traditions (Anglo-American, French, and German). However, processes of decolonization, along with critical interrogation of these dominant narratives, have led to greater visibility of what used to be seen as peripheral scholarship. With contributions from leading anthropologists and social scientists from different countries and anthropological traditions, this volume gives voice to scholars outside these "great" traditions. It shows the immense variety of methodologies, training, and approaches that scholars from these regions bring to anthropology and the social sciences in general, thus enriching the disciplines in important ways at an age marked by multiculturalism, globalization, and transnationalism.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available April 2016

  Our Common Denominator

  Human Universals Revisited

  Antweiler, C.

  Since the politicization of anthropology in the 1970s, most anthropologists have been reluctant to approach the topic of universals—that is, phenomena that occur regularly in all known human societies. In this volume, Christoph Antweiler reasserts the importance of these cross-cultural commonalities for anthropological research and for life and co-existence beyond the academy. The question presented here is how anthropology can help us approach humanity in its entirety, understanding the world less as a globe, with an emphasis on differences, but as a planet, from a vantage point open to commonalities.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available April 2011

  Policy Worlds

  Anthropology and the Analysis of Contemporary Power

  Shore, C., Wright S., & Però, D.

  There are few areas of society today that remain outside the ambit of policy processes, and likewise policy making has progressively reached into the structure and fabric of everyday life. An instrument of modern government, policy and its processes provide an analytical window into systems of governance themselves, opening up ways to study power and the construction of regimes of truth. This volume argues that policies are not simply coercive, constraining or confined to static texts; rather, they are productive, continually contested and able to create new social and semantic spaces and new sets of relations. Anthropologists do not stand outside or above systems of governance but are themselves subject to the rhetoric and rationalities of policy. The analyses of policy worlds presented by the contributors to this volume open up new possibilities for understanding systems of knowledge and power and the positioning of academics within them.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Applied Anthropology Sociology

• eBook available March 2008

  The Practice of War

  Production, Reproduction and Communication of Armed Violence

  Rao, A., Bollig, M. & Böck, M. (eds)

  The fact is that war comes in many guises and its effects continue to be felt long after peace is proclaimed. This challenges the anthropologists who write of war as participant observers. Participant observation inevitably deals with the here and now, with the highly specific. It is only over the long view that one can begin to see the commonalities that emerge from the different forms of conflict and can begin to generalize. [From the Introduction]

  More needs to be understood about the ways of war and its effects. What implications does war have for people, their lived-in communities and larger political systems; how do they cope and adjust in war situations and how do they deal with the changed world that they inhabit once peace is declared? Through a series of essays that move from looking at the nature of violence to the peace processes that follow it, this important book provides some answers to these questions. It also analyzes those new dimensions of social interaction, such as the internet, which now provide a bridge between local concerns and global networks and are fundamentally altering the practices of war.

  Subjects: Peace and Conflict Studies Theory and Methodology

• eBook available May 2017

  Redescribing Relations

  Strathernian Conversations on Ethnography, Knowledge and Politics

  Lebner, A. (ed)

  Marilyn Strathern is among the most creative and celebrated contemporary anthropologists, and her work draws interest from across the humanities and social sciences. Redescribing Relations brings some of Strathern’s most committed and renowned readers into conversation in her honour – especially on themes she has rarely engaged. The volume not only deepens our understanding of Strathern’s work, it also offers models of how to extend her relational insights to new terrains. With a comprehensive introduction, a complete list of Strathern's publications and a historic interview published in English for the first time, this is an invaluable resource for Strathern’s old and new interlocutors alike.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology Cultural Studies (General)

• eBook available March 2016

  Reflecting on Reflexivity

  The Human Condition as an Ontological Surprise

  Evens, T. M. S., Handelman, D. & Roberts, C. (eds)

  Humanness supposes innate and profound reflexivity. This volume approaches the concept of reflexivity on two different yet related analytical planes. Whether implicitly or explicitly, both planes of thought bear critically on reflexivity in relation to the nature of selfhood and the very idea of the autonomous individual, ethics, and humanness, science as such and social science, ontological dualism and fundamental ambiguity. On the one plane, a collection of original and innovative ethnographically based essays is offered, each of which is devoted to ways in which reflexivity plays a fundamental role in human social life and the study of it; on the other—anthropo-philosophical and developed in the volume’s Preface, Introduction, and Postscript—it is argued that reflexivity distinguishes—definitively, albeit relatively—the being and becoming of the human.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available April 2012

  The Scope of Anthropology

  Maurice Godelier’s Work in Context

  Dousset, L. & Tcherkézoff, S. (eds)

  Some of the most prominent social and cultural anthropologists have come together in this volume to discuss Maurice Godelier’s work. They explore and revisit some of the highly complex practices and structures social scientists encounter in their fieldwork. From the nature–culture debate to the fabrication of hereditary political systems, from transforming gender relations to the problems of the Christianization of indigenous peoples, these chapters demonstrate both the diversity of anthropological topics and the opportunity for constructive dialogue around shared methodological and theoretical models.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available September 2020

  Search After Method

  Sensing, Moving, and Imagining in Anthropological Fieldwork

  Laplante, J., Gandsman, A., & Scobie, W. (eds)

  Reigniting a tradition of learning from experience, Search After Method is a plea for livelier forms of anthropology. The anthropologists in the collection recount their experiences of working in the field, framed within a range of anthropological debates. The book thus provides accounts of lived experiences from both extensive and contemporary fieldwork as well as offering solutions for how to evolve the art of anthropological research beyond what is currently imagined.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available November 2017

  Selfhood and Recognition

  Melanesian and Western Accounts of Relationality

  Galuschek, A. C.

  The disciplines of philosophy and cultural anthropology have one thing in common: human behavior. Yet surprisingly, dialogue between the two fields has remained largely silent until now. Selfhood and Recognition combines philosophical and cultural anthropological accounts of the perception of individual action, exploring the processes through which a person recognizes the self and the other. Touching on humanity as porous, fractal, dividual, and relational, the author sheds new light on the nature of selfhood, recognition, relationality, and human life.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology

• eBook available December 2012

  Sociality

  New Directions

  Long, N. J. & Moore, H. L. (eds)

  The notion of 'sociality' is now widely used within the social sciences and humanities. However, what is meant by the term varies radically, and the contributors here, through compelling and wide ranging essays, identify the strengths and weaknesses of current definitions and their deployment in the social sciences. By developing their own rigorous and innovative theory of human sociality, they re-set the framework of the debate and open up new possibilities for conceptualizing other forms of sociality, such as that of animals or materials. Cases from Asia, Africa, the Americas and Europe explore the new directions of human sociality, illuminating how and why it is transformed when human beings engage with such major issues as economic downturn, climate change, new regimes of occupational and psychological therapy, technological innovations in robotics and the creation of new online, 'virtual' environments. This book is an invaluable resource, not only for research and teaching, but for anyone interested in the question of what makes us social.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available October 2019

  Sometime Kin

  Layers of Memory, Boundaries of Ethnography

  Wallman, S.

  In Sometime Kin, Sandra Wallman paints the portrait of an Alpine settlement – its history, economy and culture, and its unusual resistance to outsiders and modernization. Against this, her journal shows the villagers embracing her four small children and acting as participant observers in the two-way process of research. This project happened more than forty years ago and involved a uniquely large fieldwork family, but its insights have wider significance. The book argues that the intrusion of observation inevitably distorts the ordinary life observed, that the challenges of multi-vocality and “truth” are always with us, and that memory is the bedrock of every ethnographic enterprise.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Sociology

• eBook available April 2017

  Starry Nights

  Critical Structural Realism in Anthropology

  Reyna, S. P.

  Starry Nights: Critical Structural Realism in Anthropology offers nothing less than a reinventing of the discipline of anthropology. In these six essays – four published here for the first time – Stephen Reyna critiques the postmodern tenets of anthropology, while devising a new strategy for conducting research. Combative and clear, Starry Nights provides an important critique of mainstream anthropology as represented by Geertz and the postmodern legacy, and envisions a mode of anthropological research that addresses social, cultural and biological questions with techniques that are theoretically rigorous and practically useful.

  Subject: Theory and Methodology

• eBook available October 2008

  Suffering and Evil

  The Durkheimian Legacy

  Pickering, W. S. F. & Rosati, M. (eds)

  Until recently the subject of suffering and evil was neglected in the sociological world and was almost absent in Durkheimian studies as well. This book aims to fill the gap, with particular reference to the Durkheimian tradition, by exploring the different meanings that the concepts of evil and suffering have in Durkheim's works, together with the general role they play in his sociology. It also examines the meanings and roles of these concepts in relation to suffering and evil in the work of other authors within the group of the Année sociologique up until the beginning of World War II. Finally, the Durkheimian legacy in its wider aspects is assessed, with particular reference to the importance of the Durkheimian categories in understanding and conceptualizing contemporary forms of evil and suffering.

  Subjects: Sociology Theory and Methodology

• eBook available September 2008

  Taking Sides

  Ethics, Politics, and Fieldwork in Anthropology

  Armbruster, H. & Lærke, A. (eds)

  Concerns with research ethics have intensified over recent years, in large part as a symptom of "audit cultures" (M. Strathern) but also as a serious matter of engagement with the ethical complexities in contemporary research fields. This volume, written by a new generation of scholars engaged with contemporary global movements for social justice and peace, reflects their efforts in trying to integrate their scholarly pursuits with their understanding of social science, politics and ethics, and what political commitment means in practice and in fieldwork. This is a book of argument and analysis, written with passion, clarity and intellectual sophistication, which touches on issues of vital significance to social scientists and activists in general.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Sociology

• eBook available November 2015

  Time and the Field

  Dalsgaard, S. & Nielsen, M. (eds)

  In recent years, ethnographic fieldwork has been subjected to analytical scrutiny in anthropology. Ethnography remains anchored in tropes of spatiality with the association between field and fieldworker characterized by distances in space. With updates on the discussion of contemporary requirements to ethnographic research practice, Time and the Field rethinks the notion of the field in terms of time rather than space. Such an approach not only implies a particular attention to the methodology of studying local (social and ontological) imaginaries of time, but furthermore destabilitizes the relationship between fieldworker and fieldsite, allowing it to emerge as a dynamic and ever-shifting constellation.

  Subjects: Applied Anthropology Theory and Methodology Cultural Studies (General) Sociology

• eBook available June 2018

  Travelling with the Argonauts

  Informal Networks Seen without a Vertical Lens

  Irek, M.

  Drawing on rich ethnographic materials from longitudinal fieldwork on informal trading routes across Europe, Travelling with the Argonauts offers a new perspective in the research of the social space, reflecting on how best to investigate amorphous social phenomena, such as informal networks. Breaking with much current theory, the approach detailed here – the ‘Restricted Verticality Perspective’ – examines the horizontal dimension of social relations, and understands informality not as marginal or substandard, but as life itself, as the real experience of ordinary people.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology Mobility Studies

• eBook available December 2011

  War, Technology, Anthropology

  Stroeken, K. (ed)

  Technologies of the allied warfare in Iraq and Afghanistan, such as remote-controlled drones and night vision goggles, allow the user to “virtualize” human targets. This coincides with increased civilian casualties and a perpetuation of the very insecurity these technologies are meant to combat. This concise volume of research and reflections from different regions across Asia, the Middle East, Latin America, and Africa, observes how anthropology operates as a technology of war. It tackles recent theories of humans in society colluding with imperialist claims, including anthropologists who have become  involved professionally in warfare through their knowledge of “cultures,” renamed as “human terrain systems.” The chapters link varied yet crucial domains of inquiry: from battlefields technologies, military-driven scientific policy, and economic warfare, to martyrdom cosmology shifts, media coverage of “distant” wars, and the virtualizing techniques and “war porn” soundtracks of the gaming industry.

  Subjects: Peace and Conflict Studies Theory and Methodology

• eBook available December 2005

  Where Have All the Homeless Gone?

  The Making and Unmaking of a Crisis

  Marcus, A.

  For a decade, from 1983 to 1993, homelessness was a major concern in the United States. In 1994, this public concern suddenly disappeared, without any significant reduction in the number of people without proper housing. By examining the making and unmaking of a homeless crisis, this book explores how public understandings of what constitutes a social crisis are shaped.

  Drawing on five years of ethnographic research in New York City with African Americans and Latinos living in poverty, Where Have All the Homeless Gone? reveals that the homeless “crisis” was driven as much by political misrepresentations of poverty, race, and social difference, as the housing, unemployment, and healthcare problems that caused homelessness and continue to plague American cities.

  Subjects: Theory and Methodology Urban Studies Sociology

• eBook available June 2018

  Who are 'We'?

  Reimagining Alterity and Affinity in Anthropology

  Chua, L. & Mathur, N. (eds)

  Who do “we” anthropologists think “we” are? And how do forms and notions of collective disciplinary identity shape the way we think, write, and do anthropology? This volume explores how the anthropological “we” has been construed, transformed, and deployed across history and the global anthropological landscape. Drawing together both reflections and ethnographic case studies, it interrogates the critical—yet poorly studied—roles played by myriad anthropological “we” ss in generating and influencing anthropological theory, method, and analysis. In the process, new spaces are opened for reimagining who “we” are – and what “we,” and indeed anthropology, could become.

  Subjects: Anthropology (General) Theory and Methodology