Talk:Anthropology

Intro

Ah, yes, the all-important Intro. This intro is itself 228 words. So I offered a tentative start in it and suggested an outline. Input is more than welcomed, of course. Stephen Ewen 04:19, 27 February 2007 (CST)

Nice start. I'm worried, though, that your second paragraph gives the idea that Africans are physical, Haitians are cultural, Chamorro people are interesting only for their language and this all somehow gets applied in the U.S. Maybe it would be better to give examples for each subfield relating to a single group? Maybe I'm being overly careful.

Was it Geertz who described anthropology as an intellectual poaching license? I like that metaphor. --Joe Quick | Talk

It was Kluckhohn and Geertz quoted him, don't remember his point, however. I think the quote may be too nuanced for an intro, though. But Geertz is superbly rich. I give his "Notes on a Balinese Cockfight" to people newly interested in anthropology.

I think the idea of "covering the world" in some sense in the Intro is important to convey a sweeping sense of the scope and areas in which anthros work. We can think about changing the applied example to one from, say, development anthropology. I would like to include a Western example somewhere, however, to show that anthropology is not only done outside of the West among "those others". In the "Controversies" section, or perhaps better in "The Post-modern Challenge" section, one thing I am thinking is to include the core concern you are raising about "using" others. A fair bit of applied anthropology can be controversial, of course, e.g., the anthros right now in Iraq "helping" the military understand the on-ground situation, although the anthros themselves consider themselves doing a service to the Iraquis and maybe they are, all things considered in that the military is there. The "Controversies" section - I am wondering about things like that but am definitely thinking the Yanomami controversy and the AAA Code of Ethics in response. Everything is still of course tentative, however. Stephen Ewen 05:17, 27 February 2007 (CST)

That sounds good. Let's just flip the Chicago and Haiti examples. If there's one point we want to make by including the West, it is that we in the West aren't free from the "restraints" of culture after all. --Joe Quick | Talk