Anthropology (catch all)

[marct]

Hello John,

If you haven't read Marc's article in the new issue of the magazine, I recommend it to you all. As a political scientist with enough courses for a graduate minor in anthropology, I learned much. Marc develops the theme of conflict between card carrying anthropologists and the "military" in a way that demands a dialogue - although how you have a dialogue with those who do not want to talk to you, I don't know.

Thanks for the recommendation . You are quite correct about me trying to develop the theme of a conflict between Anthropology and the "military". My intention was, indeed, to try and lay out where I saw that conflict coming from as well as some of the more extreme versions of it that are surfacing.

I have been concerned by the anti-corporation, anti-military stance within Anthropology for years, now. This is not because I do not believe that there have been corporate or military abuses of power - there have been and there continue to be. Rather, what has bothered me most, is the extreme form of polarization that has happened where any actions by the military and corporations are characterized as "evil". I honestly do not believe that any profitable form of dialog can happen where the "sides" automatically assume evil intentions on the part of the other.

Is a dialog possible? Certainly, but the strategy of setting one up and keeping it going has more in common with a COIN operation than with the more conventional "academic dialog".

The only quarrel I have with Marc is regarding his comments on Project Camelot - a study of political instability in Latin America in the 1960s sponsored by the US Army and conducted by the Special Operations Research Office at American University. The lead investigator was a political scientist, not an anthropologist. My quarrel, then, is that by confining the discussion to anthropolgy Marc doesn't show that the problem extends to nearly all the social sciences to a greater or lesser extent.

John, you are, of course, quite correct in that the problem certainly permeates the entirety of the social sciences. I didn't deal with any of the others for several reasons. First, I know Anthropology best and that is the discipline that has taken the most publicly radical stance. Second, over the past couple of years, the "military" has been identifying Anthropology as a "must recruit" discipline. Third, Anthropology and, to a lessor extent qualitative Sociology, uses a rather unique primary methodology that significantly alters the perception of the user. To my mind, this sets it in opposition to the more "theologically" oriented disciplines - the difference between gnosis and logos as it were.

I would close these comments on two humorous notes:

1. Some have said that the last refuge for Marxist-Leninists is the American university.

True, and the ones who are too radical even for American universities end up in Canada .

2. Several years ago, a retired Army Col and FAO at the Army War College, Don Boose, created what he called the Malinowski Cultural Sensitivity Award. It was based on the fact that cultural anthropoligist Bronislaw Malinowski's 1930s studies of the Trobriand Islanders were marvels of cultural sensitivity. However, when his field notes surfaced some 30 years later in the 1960s, they were scathing and scatological comments on the customs and culture of those same people. In recognition of this human failing Don created the award to be given to that individual who, despite knowing better, makes a truly stupid and culturally insensitive remark. Needless to say, the majority of the recipients have been Army FAOs!

I can think of a few Anthropologists who should receive it .

Marc

[goesh]

"First, I know Anthropology best and that is the discipline that has taken the most publicly radical stance."

In a horse race with Sociology in this category, Anthro might win by a nose. Even after Chancellor DiStefano from U of C set forth the findings of a 5 member panel levied against Churchill, the Public Sociology blogs had any number of credentialed Academics rallying to his defense. Unbelievable.

In DeStefano's statement is mentioned that despite Churchill misrepresenting himself as a Native American, it was not an actionable offense. This could suggest that the hyper-charged politicized environment of Western Academia has yet to reach its zenith, when lying on employment applications in order to attain a salary is not actionable due to other more pressing considerations, like First Amendment rights.

From the Committee's report comes this gem: " However, questions raised in regard to the allegation of misrepresentation of ethnicity to gain credibility and an audience for scholarship were also reviewed, and the Committee felt that such misrepresentation might constitute research misconduct and failure to meet the standards". This sounds like something evil corporations and the evil government would do to 3rd worlders, doesn't it? One could suggest conversely the smaller and poorer an ethnic group is, the less professional standards are applied in interacting with them. Anyway, this Post will probably be sent to the My Bloody Soapbox section of this forum......

[marct]

Anyway, this Post will probably be sent to the My Bloody Soapbox section of this forum......

Not yet . Actually, Academic ethics fit here, and that's what you are talking about.

On the issue of "lying on employment applications", I do have a couple of comments. First, I have never felt comfortable with the race declarations that may American universities use. Technically, they are not required but, according to a number of people I've talked with, you'd better list yours. The first time I filled one out, I was flumoxed: the definitions were so "weird" and poorly defined that I ended up checking off every box. Needless to say, the head of HR emailed me wanting to know what the frak I was doing. My comments back were along the lines of my skin is white, my family lived in Spain 1200 years ago (their definition of "hispanic"), by Mohawk law I am a Mohawk (long story), my family originated on the Asian steppes 2000 years ago, and all modern humans came out of Africa. Her response was, we only care about 3 generations back. These days I just tick off "White" .

Let's get back to academic ethics for a minute. One of the things that has always fascinated me about "academic ethics" is how plastic it is depending on who you are and what your supposed identity is. For example, when I was applying for PhD programs, I originally wanted to study how modern Witchcraft was being institutionalized (I'd done my MA on that topic). I was informed by the Chair of one department that a) I knew a lot about the topic (we'd talked for over an hour) and b) I would never get a job in academia with that specialization because I was a man.

To my mind, "ethics" should be based on transcendent principles. I honestly think that Boas tried to do this 100 years ago. Somewhere along the line, however, these principles got replaced with moral statements masquerading as principles. For example, when I started my PhD fieldwork, it was drummed into me how "privileged" a position the ethnographer is in, and how unequal a power relationship exists between the ethnographer and their subjects. Certainly, this is true in some cases but, in my case, I was doing my fieldwork in the offices of the largest accounting / consulting firm in Canada. There was an unequal power relationship all right, but I certainly didn't have the whip hand!

I truly doubt that, had I been a student of Boas in the 1920's or 1930's, I would have had to deal with either of these problems .

Marc

[120mm]

I love your "race" comment, Marc. I am allegedly Irish-Something, but because I am an anonymous adoptee, who really knows?

My eye-doctor studies ethnic anthropomorphic(sp?) characteristics, and claims my large and well-developed epicanthric eye folds suggest Asian or Middle-eastern descent.

Basically, in the racist world of "equal opportunity" you are what you say you are.

[goesh]

Had Ward Churchill claimed Black heritage based on remotely reported ancestoral connections, like he did with his Native American lineage, he would have been drummed out long ago, despite his vehement, Liberal anti-American stances. He claimed Cherokee then Choctaw heritage. How much traction would he have had if he claimed his great, great, great, great Grandma was a slave on Georgia plantation, then next year he connected himself to a Grandfather coming out of a South Carolina plantation? None. Some cultures simply have more clout than others.

[marct]

Hi 120mm,

I love your "race" comment, Marc. I am allegedly Irish-Something, but because I am an anonymous adoptee, who really knows?

My eye-doctor studies ethnic anthropomorphic(sp?) characteristics, and claims my large and well-developed epicanthric eye folds suggest Asian or Middle-eastern descent.

Basically, in the racist world of "equal opportunity" you are what you say you are.

It is an odd setup in a lot of ways . One of the things that Boas really pushed was to look at individuals rather than phenotypic groups. You're right about the self-declared categories but, it's interesting to note, that you can only use "approved" categories.

I got called by Statistics Canada for a survey of PhD graduates, and one of the questions was my "ethnicity". Being in a somewhat frustrated mood with such silly questions, I answered with my father's family ethnicity, which is Visigoth (yeah, we can track our family back about 1600 - 2000 years, or at least the clan). Well, Visigoth wasn't an "approved" ethnicity so they asked for another one. I gave them Mohawk, which is legally true by Mohawk law (not Canadian law) even though I have no Mohawk blood (long story). It probably ruined their stats but, if they are going to not accept a self-defined ethnicity that they don't list, then their survey isn't worth much.

One of the things I've noticed about PC academia is that there is a distinct game of victim poker going on. The more "your people" have been "abused", the higher the cards in the game. This really came out when I was doing my MA (in Canadian Studies). I realized very quickly that I had 5 strikes against me: white, male, straight, Anglophone, from Toronto. I was informed by one professor that I could never "really understand Canadian culture" because of my "limitations" - this despite the fact that my family has been in Canada for over 200 years and she, who of course did understand Canadian culture, was an American who came to Canada in the early 1970's with her draft dodging boyfriend . Needless to say, I became quite "sensitized" to the "racist, sexist and homophobic" attitudes of my "culture", i.e. PC academia .

The one good thing about that entire experience was that I developed a distinct distaste for PC morality masquerading as "academic research".

Marc

[Steve Blair]

We see this in history as well, Marc, especially with the rise of the post-modernist mafia. I actually had an article come back with "feedback" saying that I wasn't telling enough of the Native American perspective. The article, by the way, was an analysis of the operation patterns of a cavalry regiment. It had more to do with where companies were stationed and their patterns of activity as opposed to any sort of battle history. In fact, there really was no Native American side to show.

On the other hand, I've seen plenty of articles dealing with the Frontier Army period that will dismiss the Army out of hand and go on to focus on the NA perspective or some such. I like balance in my history, but when you start seeing forced "perspective" then I get a little touchy...

[marct]

Hi Steve,

We see this in history as well, Marc, especially with the rise of the post-modernist mafia.

"Mafia" - a good description . Personally, being an individualist, I've always tended to refer to the extreme post-modernist crowd as suffering from Post Modernist Syndrome (PMS); a psychological syndrome characterized by occasional outbreaks of ego-maniacal paranoia, irrational assaults, and the adoption of psychotic forms of reality occasionally accompanied by command hallucinations (e.g. "Foucault has said that...") .

I actually had an article come back with "feedback" saying that I wasn't telling enough of the Native American perspective. The article, by the way, was an analysis of the operation patterns of a cavalry regiment. It had more to do with where companies were stationed and their patterns of activity as opposed to any sort of battle history. In fact, there really was no Native American side to show.

I've had the same thing happen, both from the PMS crowd and from Marxist-Leninist true believers. What always bothered me about the Anthro PMS crowd was their habit of disregarding anything pre-Geertz (~1970). Their rejection of the older works in the discipline didn't come from actually reading them but, rather, from the assumption that they were flawed. Certainly some of them were, but their automatic rejection of all works that didn't meet their "purity laws" meant that they also neglected all of the insights available. Since this included all of the core philosophical assumptions behind the post-modernist movement, many of which had been in Anthro from the 1920's, I was frequently left feeling that the pomos were acting like people who, having just reinvented the wheel, were trying to prove to the world that they were the first to come up with it .

On the other hand, I've seen plenty of articles dealing with the Frontier Army period that will dismiss the Army out of hand and go on to focus on the NA perspective or some such. I like balance in my history, but when you start seeing forced "perspective" then I get a little touchy...

Too true! I have no problems with biases since they are inevitable. Still and all, I think that biases should be stated - e.g. "This article is concerned with cavalry tactics" - or an attempt should be made to present all sides involved. A forced perspective, and maybe we should translate that as a PC perspective that valorizes "victims", is a travesty that, to my mind, erodes core scientific values. As you can tell, I get a bit "touchy" as well .

Marc