Anthropological Theory in North America

Anthropological Theory in North America PDF Author: E. L. Cerroni-Long
Publisher: Praeger
ISBN:
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 312

Get Book

Book Description
Cultural anthropology is at a crossroads. Under the impact of postmodernist critiques, serious doubts have been raised about the scientific validity—indeed, the very viability—of the ethnographic enterprise. These doubts have been voiced most loudly in North America, where the field nonetheless still enjoys the broadest academic base, and attracts the largest number of practitioners. Over the last decade, a set of critical issues has increasingly engaged cultural anthropologists in heated debate. The first part of this volume includes a full-fledged discussion of these issues, offering suggestions for their constructive resolution. In spite of the disciplinary self-doubts engendered by postmodernism, the theory-building process in anthropology has not been abandoned. The second part of the volume presents a range of original theoretical statements by which American and Canadian anthropologists set the premises for disciplinary trends likely to shape anthropological practice for years to come. If, as it is prognosticated, the 21st century will see an explosion of interest in cultural anthropology, the models and ideas presented in this volume define the parameters of disciplinary expansion. North American cultural anthropology enters its second century on a wave of theoretical innovation and pragmatic translatability that may finally resolve the disciplinary contrast between analysis and application.

Anthropological Theory in North America

Anthropological Theory in North America PDF Author: E. L. Cerroni-Long
Publisher: Praeger
ISBN:
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 312

Get Book

Book Description
Cultural anthropology is at a crossroads. Under the impact of postmodernist critiques, serious doubts have been raised about the scientific validity—indeed, the very viability—of the ethnographic enterprise. These doubts have been voiced most loudly in North America, where the field nonetheless still enjoys the broadest academic base, and attracts the largest number of practitioners. Over the last decade, a set of critical issues has increasingly engaged cultural anthropologists in heated debate. The first part of this volume includes a full-fledged discussion of these issues, offering suggestions for their constructive resolution. In spite of the disciplinary self-doubts engendered by postmodernism, the theory-building process in anthropology has not been abandoned. The second part of the volume presents a range of original theoretical statements by which American and Canadian anthropologists set the premises for disciplinary trends likely to shape anthropological practice for years to come. If, as it is prognosticated, the 21st century will see an explosion of interest in cultural anthropology, the models and ideas presented in this volume define the parameters of disciplinary expansion. North American cultural anthropology enters its second century on a wave of theoretical innovation and pragmatic translatability that may finally resolve the disciplinary contrast between analysis and application.

Anthropological Theory for the Twenty-First Century

Anthropological Theory for the Twenty-First Century PDF Author: A. Lynn Bolles
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 148753907X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 477

Get Book

Book Description
Anthropological Theory for the Twenty-First Century presents a critical approach to the study of anthropological theory for the next generation of aspiring anthropologists. Through a carefully curated selection of readings, this collection reflects the diversity of scholars who have long contributed to the development of anthropological theory, incorporating writings by scholars of color, non-Western scholars, and others whose contributions have historically been under-acknowledged. The volume puts writings from established canonical thinkers, such as Marx, Boas, and Foucault, into productive conversations with Du Bois, Ortiz, Medicine, Trouillot, Said, and many others. The editors also engage in critical conversations surrounding the "canon" itself, including its colonial history and decolonial potential. Updating the canon with late twentieth-century and early twenty-first-century scholarship, this reader includes discussions of contemporary theories such as queer theory, decolonial theory, ontology, and anti-racism. Each section is framed by clear and concise editorial introductions that place the readings in context and conversation with each other, as well as questions and glossaries to guide reader comprehension. A dynamic companion website features additional resources, including links to videos, podcasts, articles, and more.

The History of Anthropology

The History of Anthropology PDF Author: Regna Darnell
Publisher: U of Nebraska Press
ISBN: 1496228731
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 497

Get Book

Book Description
In The History of Anthropology Regna Darnell offers a critical reexamination of the Americanist tradition centered around the figure of Franz Boas and the professionalization of anthropology as an academic discipline in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Focused on researchers often known as the Boasians, The History of Anthropology reveals the theoretical schools, institutions, and social networks of scholars and fieldworkers primarily interested in the anthropology and ethnography of North American Indigenous peoples. Darnell's fifty-year career entails seminal writings in the history of anthropology's four fields: cultural anthropology, ethnography, linguistics, and physical anthropology. Leading researchers, theorists, and fieldwork subjects include Edward Sapir, Daniel Brinton, Mary Haas, Franz Boas, Leonard Bloomfield, Benjamin Lee Whorf, Stanley Newman, and A. Irving Hallowell, as well as the professionalization of anthropology, the development of American folklore scholarship, theories of Indigenous languages, Southwest ethnographic research, Indigenous ceremonialism, text traditions, and anthropology's forays into contemporary public intellectual debates. The History of Anthropology is the essential volume for scholars, undergraduates, and graduate students to enter into the history of the Americanist tradition and its legacies, alternating historicism and presentism to contextualize anthropology's historical and contemporary relevance and legacies.

A History of Anthropological Theory, Fourth Edition

A History of Anthropological Theory, Fourth Edition PDF Author: Paul A. Erickson
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 1442606614
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 603

Get Book

Book Description
In the latest edition of their popular overview text, Erickson and Murphy continue to provide a comprehensive, affordable, and accessible introduction to anthropological theory from antiquity to the present. A new section on twenty-first-century anthropological theory has been added, with more coverage given to postcolonialism, non-Western anthropology, and public anthropology. The book has also been redesigned to be more visually and pedagogically engaging. Used on its own, or paired with the companion volume Readings for a History of Anthropological Theory, Fourth Edition, this reader offers a flexible and highly useful resource for the undergraduate anthropology classroom. For additional resources, visit the "Teaching Theory" page at www.utpteachingculture.com.

Theory from the South

Theory from the South PDF Author: Jean Comaroff
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317250621
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 274

Get Book

Book Description
As nation-states in the Northern Hemisphere experience economic crisis, political corruption and racial tension, it seems as though they might be 'evolving' into the kind of societies normally associated with the 'Global South'. Anthropologists Jean and John Comaroff draw on their long experience of living in Africa to address a range of familiar themes - democracy, national borders, labour and capital and multiculturalism. They consider how we might understand these issues by using theory developed in the Global South. Challenging our ideas about 'developed' and 'developing' nations, Theory from the South provides new insights into key problems of our time.

Anthropologists at Home in North America

Anthropologists at Home in North America PDF Author: Donald A. Messerschmidt
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521284196
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 324

Get Book

Book Description
The issue of practising anthropology in one's own society is the focus of this volume of seventeen essays, originally published in 1981. The contributions, written by US and Canadian anthropologists, deal with methods, theories and styles of doing research in North America. Rich and sometimes candid descriptions of the strategies and orienting concepts employed to order the data and the research experience made this book a contribution to both theory and method. Traditionally, the research domains of anthropologists have been societies and cultures other than their own. Research by anthropologists in their own societies received renewed emphasis partly because of a heightened awareness of social problems. This book examines how innovative scholars applied anthropology to non-traditional research questions in urban and rural society, in health and education systems, and in the field of contract anthropology.

A Social History of Anthropology in the United States

A Social History of Anthropology in the United States PDF Author: Thomas C. Patterson
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000182215
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 345

Get Book

Book Description
This book offers a comprehensive introduction to the social history of anthropology in the United States, examining the circumstances that gave rise to the discipline and illuminating the role of anthropology in the modern world. Thomas C. Patterson considers the shifting social and political-economic conditions in which anthropological knowledge has been produced and deployed, the appearance of practices focused on particular regions or groups, the place of anthropology in structures of power, and the role of the educator in forging, perpetuating, and changing representations of past and contemporary peoples. The book addresses the negative reputation that anthropology took on as an offspring of imperialism, and provides fascinating insight into the social history of America. In this second edition, the material has been revised and updated, including a new chapter that covers anthropological theory and practice during the turmoil created by multiple ongoing crises at the beginning of the twenty-first century. This is valuable reading for students and scholars interested in the origins, development, and theory of anthropology.

Anthropology in the City

Anthropology in the City PDF Author: Italo Pardo
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317180402
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 242

Get Book

Book Description
With half of humanity already living in towns and cities and that proportion expected to increase in the coming decades, society - both Western and non-Western - is fast becoming urban and even mega-urban. As such, research in urban settings is evidently timely and of great importance. Anthropology in the City brings together a leading team of anthropologists to address the complex methodological and theoretical challenges posed by field-research in urban settings, clearly identifying the significance of the anthropological paradigm in urban research and its centrality both to mainstream academic debates and to society more broadly. With essays from experts on wide-ranging ethnographic research from fields as diverse as China, Europe, India, Latin and North America and South East Asia, this book demonstrates the contribution that empirically-based anthropological analysis can make to our understanding of our increasingly urban world.

History of Theory and Method in Anthropology

History of Theory and Method in Anthropology PDF Author: Regna Darnell
Publisher: U of Nebraska Press
ISBN: 1496232259
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 318

Get Book

Book Description
Regna Darnell offers a critical reexamination of the theoretical orientation of the Americanist tradition, centered on the work of Franz Boas, and the professionalization of anthropology as an academic discipline in the United States in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. History of Theory and Method in Anthropology reveals the theory schools, institutions, and social networks of scholars and fieldworkers primarily interested in the ethnography of North American Indigenous peoples. Darnell’s fifty-year career entails foundational writings in the four fields of the discipline: cultural anthropology, ethnography, linguistics, and physical anthropology. Leading researchers, theorists, and fieldwork subjects include Claude Lévi-Strauss, Franz Boas, Benjamin Lee Whorf, John Wesley Powell, Frederica de Laguna, Dell Hymes, George Stocking Jr., and Anthony F. C. Wallace, as well as nineteenth-century Native language classifications, ethnography, ethnohistory, social psychology, structuralism, rationalism, biologism, mentalism, race science, human nature and cultural relativism, ethnocentrism, standpoint-based epistemology, collaborative research, and applied anthropology. History of Theory and Method in Anthropology is an essential volume for scholars and undergraduate and graduate students to enter into the history of the inductive theory schools and methodologies of the Americanist tradition and its legacies.

Theory Groups and the Study of Language in North America

Theory Groups and the Study of Language in North America PDF Author: Stephen O. Murray
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN: 9027245568
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 615

Get Book

Book Description
Theory Groups in the Study of Language in North America provides a detailed social history of traditions and "revolutionary" challenges to traditions within North American linguistics, especially within 20th-century anthropological linguistics. After showing substantial differences between Bloomfield's and neo-Bloomfieldian theorizing, Murray shows that early transformational-generative work on syntax grew out of neo-Bloomfieldian structuralism, and was promoted by neo-Bloomfieldian gatekeepers, in particular longtime Language editor Bernard Bloch. The central case studies of the book contrast the (increasingly) "revolutionary rhetoric" of transformational-generative grammarians with rhetorics of continuity emitted by two linguistic anthropology groupings that began simultaneously with TGG in the late-1950s, the ethnography of communication and ethnoscience.