Living Anthropologically
The moral optimism of anthropology can change the world
“Anthropology should have changed the world, yet the subject is almost invisible in the public sphere outside the academy”
–Thomas Hylland Eriksen, Engaging Anthropology
(2006:1)
The primary theoretical inspirations for Living Anthropologically are the essays by Tim Ingold in The Perception of the Environment
Ingold has written a similar statement in his latest collection of essays, Being Alive
“Anthropological accounts of the manifold ways in which life is lived would be of no avail if they were not brought to bear on speculative inquiries into what the possibilities for human life might be” (2011:xi).
Living Anthropologically includes attention to a feminist perspective, in part launched by Gayle Rubin’s essay The Traffic in Women (1975), and recognizing that anthropology’s most effective popularizers have been women. Ruth Benedict’s Patterns of Culture
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Moral Optimism
At the end of the day, in this age where futures are murky and utopias mere reminders of a lost innocence, we need to fall back on the moral optimism that has been anthropology’s greatest—yet underscored—appeal. But we need to separate that optimism from the naïveté that has been liberalism’s most convenient shield. We need to assume it as a choice—whether we call it moral, philosophical, or aesthetic in the best sense. We need to hang on to it not because we are historically, socially, or politically naïve—indeed, as social scientists we cannot afford such naïveté—but because this is the side of humanity that we choose to prefer, and because this choice is what moved us to anthropology in the first place. We need to assume this optimism because the alternatives are lousy, and because anthropology as a discipline is the best venue through which the West can show an undying faith in the richness and variability of humankind.
-- Michel-Rolph Trouillot, Global TransformationsPrivacy
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