Disputed Questions: The Debates...Part 2
The first series of debates fell short of the objective due to the fact that I didn’t clearly define procedures on how we should go about conducting it. I would like, therefore, to make another attempt at setting up this series. The process for selecting debaters is rather cumbersome, so I will ask for volunteers that are willing to take up or oppose a given issue. I would like to adopt the following:
Debating Procedures:
1. Debate starts with the reading of the operative question and the selection of participants;
2. This will be followed by a brief period for points of clarification;
3. Debate is set to a minimum of 2 rounds but can be extended upward to four if requested by either participant;
4. Although there is no specific length to statements or rebuttal, we ask that debate be as concise and to the point as possible;
5. Following completion of the rounds, the operative question will be opened to discussion from the membership;
6. Participants may be asked if they are open to points of information following their respective rounds; and
7. Points of inquiry from the membership (to the participant) can only be made following the complete series of rounds.
8. After a period of one week, we will move to the next operative question.
We ask that all participants refrain from any sort of deliberately obstructive comments. Also, I would like to thank all the participants and those who thought this might be a worthwhile exercise.
Operative Question:
A challenge that commonly appears in Western anthropological critique is the dichotomy that exists between the celebrated place of academic theory and the practical involvements and experience derived from fieldwork. QUES: Is this a major source of the problems and confusions in contemporary anthropology?
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Joel M. Wright on
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Hey! Where'd my link run off to?!
http://www.anthropologymatters.com/index.php?journal=anth_matters&a...
There...
Keith, that was actually an attempt at rhetorical sarcasm.
Another professor once mentioned how important food is. He pointed out that it's incredibly rude most the world over to decline: "Tell me all your most personal secrets," he said, "but I won't eat that!" It was an off-hand comment, really; but he was pointing to the (in)delicacy of asking people to spill their private lives to us.
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Permalink Reply by Keith Hart on
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Joel M. Wright said:Keith, that was actually an attempt at rhetorical sarcasm.
There are two types of culture where the inmates will do anything to avoid a certain kind of error:
Type A error: telling someone something they know already
Type B error: not telling someone something they don't know already
I grew up avoiding the second and spent most of my life in circles that avoid the first. A corollary is never tell jokes to strangers because they are likely to get it wrong. Sorry for jumping in when not needed.
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Permalink Reply by Neil Turner on
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To M. Izabel and Nikos,
In reference to your comments, are these points of clarification? Please advise.
tchau...
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Dear M Izabel,
Keith suggested that the operative question be modified to:
The practice of dividing themselves between the academy and the field is still a major source of contemporary anthropologists' problems. Discuss for and against.
Also, Joel has already responded to that question. I think that your reframing of the question presents a relevant viewpoint. I would, however, suggest that you wait until the "points of information" phase to suggest this reframing and debate the significance of your view. What do you think?
tchau...
M Izabel said:Neil,
Sorry, I do not mean to change the sense and structure of your questioning. I just think that it will be clearer, more focused, and somewhat profound if the question is: "Should theory (framework) dictate practice (fieldwork) or the other way around?" or something like that.
It's just a suggestion. You can ignore it if it does not make sense.
:)
M
Neil Turner said:To M. Izabel and Nikos,
In reference to your comments, are these points of clarification? Please advise.
tchau...
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Permalink Reply by Philip Swift on -
The practice of dividing themselves between the academy and the field is still a major source of contemporary anthropologists' problems. Discuss for and against.
If one sticks to the terms of the motion as re-framed by Keith, then I'd be interested to see what a defence of it might look like.
As it stands, I'm inclined to argue against it, in so far as the problem of the relation between the field and the academy is, in an important sense, what defines the project of anthropology as such. To be sure, the motion speaks of divisions and dichotomies rather than relations, but it seems to me that the 'problem' is productive and affirmative, rather than troublesome or divisive. However, everything depends on how one does the 'dividing', or on which way the relation is understood to run.
J.G. Frazer, for example, had a very clear idea of the division and the relation. In his own anthropological manifesto from 1921, he advocated a strict division between 'observers' in the field and 'theorists' in the university (no prizes for guessing on which side of the divide Frazer saw himself). The job of the observers is to go out and gather 'facts' which the theorists then examine in order to produce 'ideas'. In this set-up, ethnography on the periphery just generates data for the academic centre, in charge of determining both the problems and the solutions.
A very different notion conceives of the relation in reverse. Here, the field generates problems that scandalize academic solutions by putting them in question. This way of phrasing it is Viveiros de Castro's, but the notion is old. In 1800, Degerando foresaw that, 'while philosophers [spend] time in vain disputes in their schools about the nature of humanity' the anthropologist could actually be out there, learning from people about how they are.
Of course, there are some who think that anthropology should be moved out of the academy altogether, in which case, we would need a different vision of what anthropology might be. Perhaps anthropology can't do without the field, but maybe it could do without the academy. But that line of argument would require a different motion.
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Thanks to Joel and Phillip for getting us started. The first round has been completed and the debate is now open to "points of information" from the membership. A second round of debates will commence shortly. Thanks to all.
tchau...
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To my mind, the question posed, then modified by Keith Hart, does not necessarily imply a strict segregation, neither between those who conduct fieldwork and those who theorize nor between academic anthropology and non-academic anthropology.
Let it be noted that there are anthropologists who do work outside of academia, though admittedly their roots are likely to be in academic training. Corporate anthropology and military anthropology are two such avenues, as would be applied anthropology practiced in government and NGO settings.
Rather than setting up a dichotomy between two discrete segments, I point to the hidden challenge that typically receives less scrutiny. Theory can be had in abundance. Theory is easily debated, modified and applied; but fieldwork presents a set of challenges, both methodological and ethical, that are more difficult to approach.
Methodologically, we are presented with the challenges of collecting information on/from people: in a sense, to monitor them through speech-in-action observation and to scrutinize them through questions and interviews. There will always be boundaries to how far people will permit this activity to go. Also, as I have stated previously, “informants” and “interlocutors” will invariably bring their own agendas to the table. At a Brownsville, Florida revival, I even had a stranger whisper in my ear that, “These are new pages in the Bible,” as I was conducting speech-in-action observation. That comment left me with an odd feeling; and personal experience I think is likely an important and subsumed part of the ethnographic experience.
So, there seems to be a polyphony at play in our ethnographic projects, which might be more “official” and important only in terms of our own definitions of the situation (to borrow a term from sociology).
Ethically, we face a number of challenges, especially when we connect our observations of behaviors (note: not the behaviors themselves, but rather our observations of them) to systems of meaning (theory) that may wholly constitute non-issues to the actors themselves. Whether or not observed actors are critical or reflective of their practices, beliefs and attitudes, issues of latent functions, binary oppositions, base and superstructure or techniques of the self/body are likely to primarily fulfill the needs of the anthropologist and the academy. As a result, the confluence of ethnographic information and academically organized theory will likely drive a depiction of behaviors that are barely recognizable to the actors considered in the first place.
My point is not to suggest that the transaction of theory and fieldwork should cause us to abandon the current environment of anthropological projects. However, perhaps there is a growing need to move beyond scientism, and beyond a simple turn to reflexivity, in order to fully flesh out the next manifestation of disciplinary anthropology. Greater recognition to the challenges, both methodological and ethical, should, and likely will, be advanced.
Philip Swift said:The practice of dividing themselves between the academy and the field is still a major source of contemporary anthropologists' problems. Discuss for and against.
If one sticks to the terms of the motion as re-framed by Keith, then I'd be interested to see what a defence of it might look like.
As it stands, I'm inclined to argue against it, in so far as the problem of the relation between the field and the academy is, in an important sense, what defines the project of anthropology as such. To be sure, the motion speaks of divisions and dichotomies rather than relations, but it seems to me that the 'problem' is productive and affirmative, rather than troublesome or divisive. However, everything depends on how one does the 'dividing', or on which way the relation is understood to run.
J.G. Frazer, for example, had a very clear idea of the division and the relation. In his own anthropological manifesto from 1921, he advocated a strict division between 'observers' in the field and 'theorists' in the university (no prizes for guessing on which side of the divide Frazer saw himself). The job of the observers is to go out and gather 'facts' which the theorists then examine in order to produce 'ideas'. In this set-up, ethnography on the periphery just generates data for the academic centre, in charge of determining both the problems and the solutions.
A very different notion conceives of the relation in reverse. Here, the field generates problems that scandalize academic solutions by putting them in question. This way of phrasing it is Viveiros de Castro's, but the notion is old. In 1800, Degerando foresaw that, 'while philosophers [spend] time in vain disputes in their schools about the nature of humanity' the anthropologist could actually be out there, learning from people about how they are.
Of course, there are some who think that anthropology should be moved out of the academy altogether, in which case, we would need a different vision of what anthropology might be. Perhaps anthropology can't do without the field, but maybe it could do without the academy. But that line of argument would require a different motion.
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1) Where should the theorizing of culture be done, in the field or in the academe?
Theory should not be placed outside of anything; let’s not dichotomize. Rather, there should be a greater awareness of the connections between fieldwork and theory. The two interpenetrate: without theory, one will have a hard time asking research questions to be explored in the first place; systematic inquiry (ethnography) relies on a core set of questions, which I believe will always imply some perspective (theoretical orientation). So, the separation of the field and the academe is spurious and leads to sticky ethical problems.
2) Which should come first, theory or practice?
As above, theory and practice cannot be so easily separable. In abstraction they can be, but in reality, we will have to rely on a set of background assumptions as to what is important and central to our ethnographic endeavors.
3) Can anthropology exist without the field or the academe?
Being before essence! In practical terms, you will have something else without these two components.
4) Can culture be analyzed by theory (framework) or practice (fieldwork) alone?
Fieldwork alone will result in inference, which can be powerful in and of itself. However, theory helps us to drive a preferred set of assertions based off of the observation driven research. Also, highlighting theoretical perspective can act as a kind of disclosure of intent, which is vital to an open and honest anthropology.
Also, if someone asks "How do you know?" the ethnographer can say, "I was there from date X to date Y, and I spoke to Z number of people on the issue." That's powerful. Again, however, research design has a tendency to be driven by perspective (theoretical orientation). Not acknowledging that there is a perspective at play seems a little disingenuous.
5) What is the role of anthropology, to theorize about people or to study people?
Perhaps theorizing is part of the studying. I'd pose a question to you, though: what does it mean to study a person or group of people?
One last note: one can theorize rather abstractly, or one can theorize in a specific, grounded fashion (grounded theory). I'm compelled by the later, though it seems to me that the former is somewhat unavoidable if you study anthropology, even at an introductory level.
I'll bow out for the sake of commentary now. At least, Phillip Swift should have a chance at rebuttal before I comment more!
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The question of theory and practice can easily be assimilated to the academy/field pair;but what I also had in mind are the changing social conditions of academic work. Anthropology has become a species of writing, with academics spending most of their time producing articles, chapters and conference papers, not in fieldwork. How much time do they spend in the field after the PhD? Second, as Joel points out, a lot of anthropology takes place outside the academy these days.Third, the division between fieldwork in exotic places and writing up back home involved a huge social and physical separation between anthropologists and their subjects.No longer. Fourth, the internet makes it possible to bring the field to the academy and vice versa. Fifth, ethnogaphy can be a permanent occupation that you do wherever you are. But, apart from all this, I am still interested in whether the "anthropology" that informs ethnographic fieldwork is any longer theorised adequately. So lots to chew on and I look forward to the particular angles the debaters bring forward.
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Permalink Reply by John McCreery on
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Philip Swift writes,
If one sticks to the terms of the motion as re-framed by Keith, then I'd be interested to see what a defence of it might look like.
Then, while inclined to reject the motion as re-framed by Keith, he writes what could be taken as a strong defense of it. The “it,” however, is ambiguous. The rejection applies to one reading, the defense to another.
Keith wrote,
The practice of dividing themselves between the academy and the field is still a major source of contemporary anthropologists' problems.
On reading suggests that anthropology is in trouble and the sources of the trouble lie in the division between the academy and the field. The other takes “problems” to mean the questions in which anthropologists are interested. It encourages us to see the movement back and forth between the academy and the field as an intellectually vital process, in which ideas developed through academic debate and reflection are tested against the messy realities of the field, which, by challenging our assumptions, lead us to new ideas. This is the view that I support.
Given this perspective, I find much to agree with in Joel Wright’s statement that,
To my mind, the question posed, then modified by Keith Hart, does not necessarily imply a strict segregation, neither between those who conduct fieldwork and those who theorize nor between academic anthropology and non-academic anthropology.
That said, it seems to me that neither Philip or Joel has addressed anthropologically the issues that Keith Hart raises,
Anthropology has become a species of writing, with academics spending most of their time producing articles, chapters and conference papers, not in fieldwork. How much time do they spend in the field after the PhD? Second, as Joel points out, a lot of anthropology takes place outside the academy these days.Third, the division between fieldwork in exotic places and writing up back home involved a huge social and physical separation between anthropologists and their subjects.No longer. Fourth, the internet makes it possible to bring the field to the academy and vice versa. Fifth, ethnogaphy can be a permanent occupation that you do wherever you are. But, apart from all this, I am still interested in whether the "anthropology" that informs ethnographic fieldwork is any longer theorised adequately.
These are not philosophical issues. What Keith points to, in what is to me a properly anthropological fashion, are the current material conditions under which anthropology is practiced: A publish or perish job market in which writing must take priority over additional time in the field; the practice of anthropology in corporate, military or other applied settings where different kinds of time pressures make the traditional model of one or more years in the field, followed by periodic returns for further research untenable; the aircraft, the Internet, the diasporas, the rise of native anthropologies in developing countries, all of which have reduced the social and physical separation between the academy and the field that anthropologists once took for granted; the new possibilities for anthropological interactions made possible by the Internet; the growing number of anthropologists who, like myself, find other ways to make a living but, for that very reason, find themselves in positions where prolonged experience, relationships and rapport create new opportunities for ethnographic inquiry, together with new conditions under which to pursue it. How well our theories reflect or inform these new, now 21st century, conditions is not, one suspects, a problem whose solutions will take the form of positions taken with respect to conventional binaries.
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Permalink Reply by Philip Swift on
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Joel makes some excellent points and I have to say that I agree with most of them.
I mentioned Frazer because he was someone who absolutely exemplified the divide between the academy and the field (famously, when asked by William James whether he had ever met a native, Frazer’s response was ‘heaven forbid!’). Indeed, Frazer not only exemplified the divide, he wanted to institutionalize it. He tried to sell this idea in 1921. One year later, Malinowski published Argonauts of the Western Pacific, and Frazer’s idea, already old, was forced into retirement; it was his last (golden) bow. (Frazer’s preface to Argonauts, praising Malinowski’s flesh and blood studies of natives, as opposed to the flat characterizations of previous accounts, was simultaneously an unwitting obituary of his own anthropological vision.)
My point is that the problem of the divide between the field and the academy is relative to the definition of the divide itself. Frazer wanted to keep theory apart from data, to seal off the field from the academy, so that he could sit theorizing in Cambridge, awaiting ethnographic reports from observers gathering facts in faraway places. But this idea of the divide didn’t win out. (A good thing too.) Modern anthropology became what it is now once people like Malinowski started bridging the division. Thus it’s not the divide that’s the problem, but how it’s crossed, since the division itself is foundational to anthropology as such. The division, as it were, defines the vision of what anthropology currently is.
I’m not suggesting, incidentally, that the academy is intrinsically important to anthropology – although I find it funny to be defending the academy, given that I’m not in it. (Funnier still are certain radicals who say they can’t wait for anthropology to end as an academic subject, when the academy itself is paying their wages.) Perhaps – though I don’t think this is Joel’s argument exactly – there’s something to be said for the vision of anthropology without the academy. But a different vision will make for a different division, if not institutional then epistemological at least, because division – or better still – distance, is, I think, critical to what anthropology is. And, by distance, I don’t mean geographical span (the distance between the LSE and the Trobriand Islands), I mean the distance of difference, an analytical device to be used even if your ‘field’ is the house next door.
Joel raises the important question of ethics, and quite rightly points out the likelihood that our descriptions and analytical constructs would be ‘barely recognizable to the actors considered in the first place’. This may well be the case, but then what – or more crucially who – is anthropology for? I happen to think that anthropology is largely produced for anthropologists. This may be depressing, but at least it’s realistic. (Alfred Gell, by the way, thought the same. Maybe it’s a British thing.) Of course, that’s not to say that anthropology can’t be for anyone else. All sorts of people might potentially be interested in what we’re doing, not least – we might hope – the people whose doings interest us.
Having said all that (and spent time typing it!), I've just at this moment read John's useful comments, and his reiteration of Keith's argument. What do anthropologists do? They write (Geertz's celebrated statement.) If, as Keith says, writing now defines pretty much all that they do, in order to satisfy the audit cultures of the university, then maybe the academy has had it as a home for anthropology...
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So Philip's argument leads us into an impasse. Anthropology is for anthropologists. Who are they? People with an academic accreditation. Or, as Meyer Fortes said, after he and his friends had established the British guild, Association of Social Anthropologists of the UK (later amended to the Commonwealth), "Social anthropology is what social anthropologists do". And he had the means of deciding who got admitted to the union. But the academy is killing anthropology. There was a time when we could survive there in the cracks, but no longer. The game is up. The bureaucracy will make sure that there is no time to spend in the field or even to write thoughtful papers. What is this anthropology anyway? you can hear them saying. Sounds iffy to me. In Britain there is a monopoly funding body which issues 20 grants a year to doctoral students. Work it out.
The illusion that anthropology could be just for academic anthropologists and their students was fed by the unusual conditions of the 60s and 70s which supported an academic publishing boom that is now over, as far as our books are concerned. Before that it was impossible to hold the view that anthropologists could survive without talking to anyone else. They had to teach colonial administrators, write for the public, go on the radio. They do public anthropology today in Scandinavia, Brazil and elsewhere to a variable degree.
I have a proposed paper for this year's European Association meetings:
Open systems and closed minds: why most anthropologists shun the public
My argument takes off from Max Gluckman's edited book, Closed Systems and Open Minds (1964), where he says that fieldwork requires anthropologists to be open to everything around them as part of their commitment to studying humanity as a whole, but later they have to make closed arguments that often seem to be naive from the perspective of other disciplines. Anthropology is now a diffuse global project, where the imperial centres are more backward than other regions such as Brazil and Scandinavia. The acdemic division of labour in particular countries is an important variable shaping anthropologists' public posture. So generalization must be qualified. The collapse of empire has something to do with anthropology's contemporary predicament. But my main thesis is that our amateur investigations of everything under the sun lead us to retreat into our own company for purposes of mutual protection and to shun the public. The public success of economists is the inverse of this. My paper will explore how we might overcome the limits of naivety in order address the general public more effectively.
In the meantime, for the purposes of this debate (but I am not sure what the sides are), I would argue that the academy is the problem, especially in the old imperial centres,not the division between the academy and fieldwork which has been largely superceded.
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