Is anthropology more important than ever?
New books in 2021 plug Anthro-Vision. But is anthropology more important than ever? After decades of teaching, we need to ask: What happened?
Eric Wolf
When will the United States collapse?
In historical perspective, what seem like lived events become identifiable as processes. However, recent rumblings indicate a US collapse could be swift.
Anthropology: Unfinished Revolution
What Would Sid Do? Reflections on the Sidney Mintz legacy in anthropology. Teaching Introduction to Anthropology as Global History & Interconnection.
How Did Anthropology Begin?
Early episodes of European colonialism, plantation slavery in the Caribbean, and Darwin in Tierra del Fuego are crucial to “How Did Anthropology Begin?”
Anthropology’s Brief Reign (2015)
With President Ashraf Ghani of Afghanistan, President Barack Obama of the US, and World Bank President Jim Yong Kim, Anthropology is taking over the world.
Margaret Mead & Jared Diamond
What makes Jared Diamond possible? Discussant commentary for the panel “Margaret Mead and Jared Diamond: Past Publics, Current Engagements.”
Globalization Stories
Contemporary stories of globalization erase centuries of contact and encounter: Exploring the North Atlantic fiction of modernity as a seductive universal.
The Concept of Culture
Ruth Benedict’s Patterns of Culture translated Boasian Anthropology and its concept of culture to a mass audience. Plus problematic cultural wholes.
Anthropology Is Your Ally
An impassioned plea to lower the arrogance decibels. In the wake of Steven Pinker’s “Science Is Not Your Enemy” assessing humanities & science together.
We Cannot Abandon Humanity
When Bill Gates recommends Jared Diamond & Steven Pinker, reiterate anthropology’s calling: “the fate of no human group can be irrelevant to humankind” (Trouillot).
Links to the Highly Improbable
An anthropologist caught between “The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable” and “Marginal Revolution: Small Steps Toward a Much Better World.”
Party Like It’s 1999… with Napoleon Chagnon!
If “anthropology’s future depends largely on its ability to contest the Savage slot” (Trouillot) then what about Napoleon Chagnon?
Jared Diamond, Science, Violence & the Facts
The Ax Fight shows how Yanomami used steel axes long before anthropologists arrive. The Jared Diamond violence calculations must consider interconnection.
Angry Papuan leaders demand Jared Diamond apologizes – Survival Intl
Papuan leaders jump into the discussion, as Stephen Corry and Survival International challenge two very public figures–Jared Diamond and Steven Pinker.
Indigenous Allies & Politics of Empire
The indigenous allies in Matthew Restall’s Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest point to contingent histories, not the inevitability of guns, germs & steel.
Geography, States, Empires
Eric Wolf’s Europe and the People Without History attempts to answer Yali’s Question – Why Europe? It’s time to rediscover the history of Eric Wolf.
Patterns of Culture (1934) wins Jared Diamond (2012)
Ruth Benedict’s Patterns of Culture wins Jared Diamond for conceptual clarity, writing style, ethnographic example, and impact. Pretty good for 1934.
Jared Diamond won’t beat Mitt Romney
The really scary part of the Diamond Romney dustup is how Romney recaps Diamond: European imperialism is accidental but societies choose to fail.
Whiteness is a Project
Power and how power is projected must be understood as a process, not as a thing. Whiteness & White Privilege is an ongoing project and process.
Traditional Race Ideas
Anthropology has debunked traditional race ideas that humans come as 3-5 genetic types. But backlash & misunderstandings around social construction persist.
Scientific Humanism
“We should be the humanistic science and the scientific humanism that Eric Wolf described nearly 50 years ago” (H. Russell Bernard, Science in Anthropology)
Four Field Manifesto
Anthropology’s Moral Optimism: Four Field Manifesto & alternative visions of humanity. Capitalism is not the most beautiful or respectful of shared planet.
Admixture All the Way Down
Despite Nicholas Wade’s emphasis on splits among human groups, the research is clear that it’s admixture all the way down. Plus some Malinowski!
Do anthropologists study everything?
Anthropologists don’t study everything. Anthropology studies important issues, in context, and gets real data. Anthropology is necessary.