Why Anthropology Matters matters

There are probably two sorts of academics: those who stand by everything they write, and those who wish they could. Being one of the latter, this exercise in collective remembering brings up long-repressed anxieties. Did we really give our seminar that title? Did anthropology need all those acronyms? Did we do enough to change SOAS? But it also highlights quite what was achieved, with a little money and a lot of determination A few things stand out. Like most anthropology students, we cared for our discipline. We wanted to open up new spaces, not just to support each other, but also to talk about what the increasing influence of cultural studies, literary theory, and postcolonialism might mean for anthropology. Our efforts were partial, fragmented, unfinished. Perhaps, anticipating Danny Dorling (2019), we wanted to create a kinder anthropology. We mobilised an ethic of care and solidarity as postgraduate anthropologists. We did what we could and then, gradually, we moved on. Several of the second cohort launched Anthropology Matters and made it into an invaluable intellectual space. A few of us found our way into academic posts and up the disciplinary hierarchy. Others jumped field or left the academy altogether. They were unwilling, or unable, to tolerate serial precarity and enforced mobility

Sociology · Anthropology · Anthropology: Ethics, History, Culture

• The Tyranny of Structurelessness

  Jo Freeman•Women's studies quarterly•2013

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