Escolar Documentos
Profissional Documentos
Cultura Documentos
rationalism
THE ITERATION OF AN
ERA AFTER THE MODERN
L to R:
Rabinow
Dwyer
Castañeda
Reflexive ethnography solves a number of problems of
ethnographic authority and representation, but does not
lend itself to comparison or generalization...
• each case unique
• extreme particularization
• produces ‘insights’ rather than ‘conclusions’
• one such work incommensurable with another
such work
• does anthropology end and become a sort of
literature?
‘ANTHROPOLOGY AS CULTURAL CRITIQUE’
Comprehensive survey of
‘the postmodern turn’ in
Anthropology — probably
the most influential
theoretical work of the
1990s
Argue that Anthropology’s
heritage was critical — an
implicit reflexive critique of
the West by comparison to
‘other’ societies less
wealthy and more humane
Postmodernist Critique
anthropology’s foundationalist epistemology and
scientism is shown to be Western provincialism
Ethnographies distort reality at best and have political
implications
since ethnography is a form of writing, much of its self-
proclaimed objectivity and empirically grounded authority
would be better seen as rhetorical effects of the way the
ethnographic genre was constructed rather than as either
defensible claims or contestable givens.
With the corollary implication that if constructed, such
texts could be, should be, opened up for inspection, and
strategically de-and reconstructed.
DEVELOPMENT OF BREAKDOWN OF
SPECIALIZATIONS NATIONAL SCHOOLS
ECOLOGICAL ANTH.
NEO-EVOLUTIONISM Schools and
CULTURAL analytical theories
AMERICAN MATERIALISM
C&P in abeyance
CULTURAL
ANTHROPOLOGY ETHNOSCIENCE-CUM--
COGNITIVE
Main duality:
INTERPRETIVE
Political Economy
vs.
BRITISH NEO-STRUCTURALISM Interpretive &
SOCIAL (LEACH, GLUCKMAN,
ANTHROPOLOGY BARTH, BAILEY, Deconstructionist
STRATHERN)
approaches