I just wanted to call everyone's attention to Prof. Marcus's article in the latest Cultural Anthropology (23:1, pp. 1-14) for those who haven't read it already. It ties in well, actually, with the comment thread on the George Stocking post. It is a conversation between Marcus and Marcelo Pisarro, the editor of the Argentine journal Potlach, from February 2006 wherein they discuss the "rupture" in anthropology in the wake of Writing Culture's publication in 1986. There is some fascinating background about the minds behind the so-called rupture, as a reaction by graduate students in the 1970s to the introduction of Foucault, Barthes, Habermas, and Althusser, among others into the discourse of the social sciences. Marcus explains how the Writing Culture critique was a critique of form in anthropology, especially in relation to what constitutes fieldwork, with the traditional four-field approach to anthropology waning in favor of an interdisciplinary approach based on developments in the humanities, especially in literary theory.
Ethnographic methods were central to this critique, especially the idea of ethnography becoming collaborative, rather than a sort of apprenticeship. As Marcus puts it, "As fieldwork has become multisited and mobile in nature, subjects are more 'counterpart' than 'other.'" (pg. 7). The debate that began over the Writing Culture critique gets us back to the question of whether anthropology should be thought of and practiced as its own discipline with a specific set of almost canonical methods, or whether a more interdisciplinary approach is possible, and indeed more appropriate for the type of social research being done today. What I've heard called the "solipsistic turn" in anthropology in the 1980s, that is, the "overuse" of reflexivity on the part of the researcher so much so that the stated subject of research is at times lost, drew a lot of criticism and continues to today. Marcus believes that the question of how to do ethnography is the most important question that we should be discussing today. In particular, he cites the interdisciplinary work between anthropology and technoscience (which naturally excited me on a personal level) as a possible site for the development of new ethnographies.
Marcus argues that while new theoretical sources are appearing in the anthropology curriculum, the pedagogical approach to fieldwork has not been as amenable to change. Even though he says that it is "a progressive, healthy, and productive stance to think of anthropology in long decline," he also admits that "interdisciplinarity seems visionary compared to disciplinary perspective, but most interdisciplinary perspectives have turned out the be just as myopic." (pg. 11) Clearly, there is still work to be done and the debate, even after 22 years, is still not over.
At least, that's my reading of it. If you have a membership with AAA, you can access it through AnthroSource. Also, here's a link to the Center for Ethnography at UC-Irvine.
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4 comments:
I can see why Janny corrected me over our breakfast with Marcus. (Sorry, Janny, but I don't think I'll ever let that go.) I also noticed that interdisciplinarity isn't just the trend for many departments throughout the nation, but the goal. However, I'm not sure if I want to agree with Marcus's notion of anthropology in "long decline." Why do we think of interdisciplinarity as mutually exclusive with anthropology's four-field tradition? Is it even possible to be strictly anthropological anymore?
That's the question; I think there is little doubt nowadays that the influence of the humanities in anthropology has been beneficial, and vice versa. The problem is "backsliding" into a situation where anthropology is done with none of the methodological rigor that is required of a true social science (emphasis on that last part). Perhaps anthropology is facing an identity crisis more than being in "long decline." I for one welcome new approaches to doing ethnography, but we have to take them with a grain of salt. If we embrace the "new" simply because it is new and en vouge without being critical of it, then are we really doing ourselves justice as social scientists?
I couldn't have put it more eloquently. =P
Thanks for passing this on, tsf. It's a great article, and I think you hit the nail on the head with that note on the need for rigor.
What becomes tricky for me is how a discipline involved (at least in part) in questioning the basis of say social scientific rigor can hope to present itself as rigorous. I don't think that problem is a fatal one for anthropology: there's clearly a point where you can stop questioning and actually stake a position that you're willing to support (on the role of race in medical activity, the dangers of mining activity, the effects of government policy on psychological welfare, etc).
That said, Marcus's most interesting diagnosis here is the need to replace the "sometimes grotesque expression of a liberal moral conscience or witnessing (with a too-easy tendency to denounce or express outrage)" which has become the sole common point across much anthropology with some other "collective intellectual center of gravity". It's a tricky proposition, but precisely because I often agree with those witnessings it's important to me to find a way of expressing that seems more credible to those who disagree with me.
Can anyone recommend another Marcus article on collaboration? I'm interested to see how he thinks this stuff through.
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