Anthropological investigations of vitality

Life force as a dimension distinct from space and time

Datos Bibliográficos

ID2226587
AutoresB Singh (0000-0002-8877-3563, John Brown University, autor de correspondencia)
Año2018
Volumen8
Número3
Páginas550-565
Fecha de publicación2018-12-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaHau Journal of Ethnographic Theory (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 2049-1115 • E-ISSN: 2575-1433
EditorialUniversity of Chicago Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1086/701185
OpenAlexW2906282615
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas2
Referencias citadas11

In what ways do anthropologists study vitality? Located in a familiar anthropological predicament-a return to a once familiar place like a field site after a significant gap of time-this article argues that in ways ranging from the everyday question "How are you?" to the familiar research tool of the household survey, we are already implicated in the study of vitality. Rather than a precise definition of vitality, this article offers the idea of life force as a dimension, analogous to space and time that anthropologists and their interlocutors inhabit and investigate. Drawing on the ethnographic strangeness of mundane alterations over time and with help from the Henry James novel The sacred fount, this article offers three critical issues in the anthropology of life force: the desire to know and to measure life force; subsequent doubts about life force, including whether or not it exists at all; and vampirism and envy in transactions of life force

Dimension (graph theory · Geography · Linguistics · Pure mathematics · Theology · Vitality · Mathematics · Philosophy · Religious Tourism and Spaces