The Quest for Anthropological Relevance

Borgesian Maps and Epistemological Pitfalls

Datos Bibliográficos

ID2279474
AutoresMatti Bunzl (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, autor de correspondencia)
Año2008
Volumen110
Número1
Páginas53-60
Fecha de publicación2008-03-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaAmerican Anthropologist (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0002-7294 • E-ISSN: 1548-1433
EditorialWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/j.1548-1433.2008.00008.x
OpenAlexW2104089603
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas35
Referencias citadas19

In this essay, I critique the currently dominant mode of American sociocultural anthropology. Through a historical reading of canonical texts from the 1970s to the 1990s, I trace some of contemporary anthropology's limitations and probe their implications for the possibility of a publicly engaged discipline. I focus my critique on the demand for ever-increasing complexity, identifying it as an implicit form of positivism that renders the results of anthropological inquiries increasingly irrelevant to the big questions of the day. Epistemologically speaking, contemporary anthropology is thus not radical enough. In conclusion, I mobilize the Weberian-Boasian tradition as the most viable alternative to sociocultural anthropology's status quo

Applied anthropology · Epistemology · Focus (optics · Linguistics · Political science · Positivism · Reading (process · Relevance · Relevance (law · Sociocultural anthropology · Sociocultural evolution · Sociology · Status quo · TRACE (psycholinguistics) · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Anthropology · Culinary Culture and Tourism · Geographies of human-animal interactions · Law · Philosophy