further proof that I should have gone for a different degree...

[rivendellrose]

The American Anthropological Association (the leading organization in anthropology in the US) has amended their mission statement to distance themselves from the practice of anthropology as science.

Well, that ought to be the last nail in the coffin of whether anthropology or sociology will win out as the study of human culture that will persist and continue to be worthy of consideration.

I've long had a feeling that there's a problem going on in anthropology, namely that while our little academic sibling sociology delves into broader, deeper, and more interesting subjects in the study of human society and takes advantage of all sorts of fascinating new blood from the fields of psychology, genetics, economics, statistics and science, anthropology... stares blindly around and sticks its collective head in the sand.

Now, to be fair, I kind of liked that I didn't have to do as much statistics in anthro as I did in soc, and I also liked that we tended in anthro to read more historical ethnography than, say, statistical studies from ten years ago. That was all part of why I majored in anthro instead of soc. So I have not exactly been part of the solution in this issue. But in the process of reading recent ethnography (for instance, Sudhir Venkatesh's Gang Leader for a Day which, despite issues mainly stemming from the fact that I found it difficult to believe any intelligent gradudate student could be so fantastically naive as the author apparently was during his research, was a very fun and interesting non-academic book), I've noticed that all the good, new books that are actually getting attention... are filed under sociology, while the anthropology section of any bookstore I walk into consists almost entirely of Ruth Benedict, Margaret Meade, Thor Heyerdahl, and other books written pre-1980.

In short: If my field of academic study implodes, do I get a refund (or a re-do!) on my diploma? If I do, I think I'd like to study psychology this time. They're not ashamed of having science involved in their studies, and from the lectures I've been to they're a whole hell of a lot less in love with post-modern theory.

At least my English degree will never have this particular problem...

Comments

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

Indulge me: what precisely is the difference between anthropology and sociology?

I feel it important to always remind people, when the conversation turns to academics, that I have two degrees in movies.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Indulge me: what precisely is the difference between anthropology and sociology?

....Yeah, that's kind of the problem. :P I've actually never heard a definition of the difference that satisfies me (although maybe somebody else has?). Technically, I think anthropology (the study of humanity) is supposed to be an umbrella term under which fall physical anthropology (the study of human bodies and remains of humans and their ancestors), archaeology (the study of human artifacts from the past), linguistics, and so on. Sociology (the study of human society) ought to be under that umbrella... but it's increasingly not. In practice, sociology has more in common with economics, clinical psychology, and the field of studies surrounding social work than it does with, say, tribal societies in the Amazon, so you could say that anthropology either has come or is quickly coming to be the study of historical or prehistorical cultures... which is the stuff that most interests me about the field, and the reason I left soc behind (well, that and that math is a bit of a struggle for me - I can handle statistical theory with no problems, but the actual equations tend to catch me up when they get complicated).

My 2 cents from studying both a bit. Not sure if there's a technical definition somewhere or not - most of what I've seen leads me to believe that both fields very carefully ignore that the other one exists. :P

How did you manage two degrees in the same thing? Different schools, or did they have a BA and an BS as separate tracks? (Psychology at my university had that - technically until this year you could have gotten both a BA and a BS in Psych, if you were very careful about the classes you took!)

[kungfuwaynewho.livejournal.com]

Ah, okay. That is kind of what confused me - it seemed to me that sociology would be a field of study within anthropology, so I was sort of befuzzled there.

I have a BA in film production and an MFA in screenwriting. So they are different degrees, yes, but ultimately where other people read books and thought thinky-things and were serious, I was watching movies. (I worked hard! I really did! But I always loved that sitting down and watching, like, BSG was kinda like studying.)

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Yeah, totally. Don't worry, you're not the only one feeling confused, by a long shot...

I worked hard! I really did!

Bah, I totally understand that. I had a bunch of science-major friends who took my anthropology and English and history studies as "you're doing the easy stuff." And it was kind of like "well, yeah, but I'm also doing the stuff I'm really good at, and, by the way, it gets a hell of a lot harder after those piddly little 100-level classes you guys took to fulfill requirements!"

Looking back, I do wish I'd stretched myself and taken more hard sciences, because I really do love science... but that's that old 20/20 hindsight talking, of course.

[velvet-midnight.livejournal.com]

The way I see it, being an anthro major who's currently taking only one soc class, is that anthro studies what the societies are made of while soc studies the effect the society has on the individual/smaller group.

But, again, I'm mostly done with only one Soc class and I'm a cultural anthro major. So. :D

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

I didn't have a whole lot more exposure to soc than you did, to be honest.

But I'm curious - your definition seems like it could work, but I'm still not sure how we would draw lines. What would you give as examples of the two? It seems like ethnography would fall on the sociology side of your definition, and maybe the study of particular facets of the culture (religion, child-rearing, etc) would fall in the other? But it's awfully hard to look at those aspects without looking at how they affect the people within the culture.

[velvet-midnight.livejournal.com]

From what I've read--I haven't taken the Classics of Ethnography class yet--ethnography is the detailing of what happens day-to-day, what people do, how people act. Right? That is a detailing of the culture, and yes, the individual effects are part of that with social status and what that entails, but it's not focused on that. From what I've seen of my soc class, we've focused a lot on political aspects and "special groups," a la women, the "poor," farmers. We didn't spend a lot of time on the whole thing, just pieces and parts.

I do agree that they're very closely tied and, much as I railed about it at the beginning of the semester, it's good to see it both ways. My soc class has been all about the political and economic connections, which I'm not sure is indicative of sociology as a whole.

[velvet-midnight.livejournal.com]

Iiiii'm not sure how I feel about this. Haven't finished reading the article yet. As one of those "fluff-minded cultural anthropologists" (which, btw, I take offense at that statement. I'm not science-minded, but the thing I love about anthro, as a whole, is that it covers all our bases. The holistic view.), it doesn't affect me as much. But still... Huh. To ponder, to ponder.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure how to take it, either, honestly. I love science, am science-minded, but... like I said, I got into anthro because I love the way it doesn't get bogged down in statistics and numbers the way sociology often does.

What I don't like about it (and what I feel like this change is moving more toward) is the post-modernist theory and "there's no right answer" type of arguments, which... dude, sometimes there is a right answer. I know that culture is extremely complex, and I'm very much against being imperialist in our interactions with other cultures, but on the other hand I'm really against the sort of nonsense where people start defending FGM and murdering people for witchcraft or homosexuality because "it's their culture." Yeah, it's their culture, and it's wrong. For my money, that's different than our Victorian predecessors walking into other cultures and telling them to start dressing like civilized people and start worshiping the right god and speaking English. It's just not okay to stand by and say "we can't do anything" when people are actually being seriously hurt and traumatized.

...Sorry, rant. We got into a lot of big arguments about that kind of thing in my last few years of anthro, and it drove me up the wall because the moral questions made my head hurt and made me wish I could just curl up in a ball and make everything go away because I couldn't reconcile the ideas of protecting native cultures with the idea that sometimes those native cultures were really, seriously, horribly hurting people. It still drives me crazy, and I still feel like there's no good answer, but... I feel like there just has to be a line, you know?

Also, I feel like there's enough anti-science feeling around the world right now without my own field bowing to it, and that's making me really upset.

[velvet-midnight.livejournal.com]

Ohhh, cultural relativism. I tend to be all "that's their culture," but usually only when people know nothing about a certain culture that is actually not as bad as they assume.

That sounds distressing. Sorry. :( I haven't actually gotten into those arguments, yet, mostly because I haven't taken classes where the cultures were particularly...violent, I guess? Most of what we've studied hasn't been controversial. Then again, I am only a sophomore.

The anti-science makes me sad. If my brain worked differently, I would be all over that. What worries me, though, is that this is really showing how people within the field don't even know where they stand with each other. And what this will lead to for those of us still in school. I mean, I would be totally fine not taking another physical class that is more primatology than humanity, but still.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

Most programs save the controversial stuff until 3rd or 4th year, and you might get lucky and miss it all. It depends a lot on what seminars you take, how your professors handle discussions, what the people in your classes are like... Lots of stuff. You'll probably hit it in at least a few books, though. It really is an interesting dilemma, it just... yeah, gets distressing sometimes.

If my brain worked differently, I would be all over that.

You and me, both, sister. I absorb theory like nobody's business, but once equations come into the matter it's like my poor little brain just shuts down. *Headdesk* It's awful. As for where it's going to lead the field, I know this debate's been brewing for a while (I remember it coming up in a few of my classes and articles I read in college), but I doubt it will really make a huge amount of difference for cultural anthro. If you were specializing in physical anthro it would probably be more of a worry, because those poor guys are really going to be wondering where their field fits now (my guess is they'll break off and go join the biologists, if things get too bad).

[velvet-midnight.livejournal.com]

Icon! ♥

It really is an interesting dilemma, it just... yeah, gets distressing sometimes.

Sounds like all the interesting things. :P

Do you think they'll break into two separate big institutions? It sounds like some of the physical anthropologists are pissed and that they think the cultural anthropologists have been wanting them to leave for years.

[rivendellrose.livejournal.com]

It's my favorite archaeology icon. ♥

They might? I'm not actually sure how these things happen. If I had to guess, I'd say that judging from what the AAA is doing they want to kick out the physical anthropologists (and probably by extension the archaeologists, who've been arguing for a long time that anthropology should be a science). Maybe that will mean closer contact between archy and phys. anth as they break off into their own thing, or maybe they'll get subsumed by some other science (biology seems like a good bet for phys. anth, but I really have no idea who could take in archaeology!).

It probably won't really matter except in terms of departmental squabbles and the structure and inclusion of groups in academic journals and conventions. That could lead to some groups having to make their own conventions and journals in order to get published, and it could lead to funding problems at various universities if the departmental stuff doesn't work out in a good way, but that happens. For an example, folklore and mythology didn't exist as departments at my university, and they were subsumed in the departments of Scandinavian studies and Classical (as well as Far East, Scandinavian, Near East, and American Indian) studies respectively. It got confusing sometimes, and it meant that people like me with an obsession with mythology in general had to hop around a lot, but it was okay. I suppose it's possible we could end up with the same kind of thing for archaeology. It's possible you could have to go to different departments for each region if you wanted to study archy, rather than going to the general department. That could lead to confusion, but probably no less than, for instance, the natural focuses that a given university's archaeology department gets based on where their professors did their work.