December 2013 vol 29 no 6every two months

print ISSN 0268-540X online ISSN 1467-8322

available online at

www.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/anth

atanthropology

todayScholars in many disciplines express ambivalence about the label public whether it is public anthropology, public sociology, public psychology or other fields. Disciplines also construe their publics and the label itself in quite different ways, motivated by contrasting concerns. For example, the clinical relevance of public psychology means it is understood mostly as a form of practice in public institutions and as dealing with psy-chology within communities, a usage that is not quite recognizable in disciplines without clinical settings. Political scientists, by contrast, seldom give explicit attention to public relevance in top-tier journal articles, and indeed they may categorize writing in that area more as service than as scholarship.

Among the exceptions is political philosopher James Tully, who argues that political theory is political prac-tice, and who regards his political philosophy as a public philosophy (Celikates 2011: 266). In sociology, Michael Burawoys call for reciprocity and greater soci-etal engagement during his 2004 presidential address at the American Sociological Association has sparked some opposition but helped gather public sociologists under the banner of public sociology, resulting in scores of publications, including a Handbook of public sociology in 2009.1

* * *Why has anthropology seen a revival of the label

public anthropology in recent decades? Some might assume its resurgence springs in part from disciplinary concerns with self-preservation in a time of funding cuts, or from a desire to burnish anthropologys image in the wake of controversies such as those surrounding Patrick Tierneys Darkness in El Dorado.

But ours is not the only discipline that might want to polish its image. Economics, for example, was bruised by the 2008 financial meltdown. Charles Fergusons critical documentary about the financial crisis, Inside job, criti-cized academic economists who did not disclose finan-cial conflicts of interest when writing about economic policy, and who saw a crisis coming but continued to serve as consultants or board members of large financial corporations, often without disclosing such affiliations on their CVs or in their publications. Fergusons film and other fallout from the economic crisis led the American Economics Association to develop conflict-of-interest rules for the academic journals it sponsors, though many members believe the field needs more explicit and wide-ranging ethical guidelines.

While the American Economics Associations con-sideration of possible professional ethical guidelines is quite recent (and may already be fading), many of the worlds professional anthropology associations decades ago defined professional codes of ethics that are regu-larly reassessed and revised and that remain a subject of lively debate. Assumptions about ethics in anthropology, especially our obligations to those we study, help to con-stitute our notions of the public as bound up with con-cerns about accountability, responsibility, and knowledge dissemination.

* * *Michael Burawoys advocacy of public sociology

prompted opposition from some fellow sociologists such as Jonathan H. Turner (2005: 27), who urged the

Catherine Besteman & Angelique Haugerud 1The desire for relevanceCatherine Besteman 3Three reflections on public anthropologyAngelique Haugerud 7Public anthropology and the financial crisisHugh Gusterson 11Anthropology in the news?Thomas Hylland Eriksen 14The Anansi positionFrancisco Ferrndiz 18Rapid response ethnographies in turbulent times: Researching mass grave exhumations in contemporary Spain

Pat Caplan 23An anthropologist among the film-makers - A cautionary tale: Part 1. The politics of production

CONFERENCESJohanna Zetterstrom-Sharp 27The future of ethnographic museums

BOOKSMagnus Course 28Andrew Canessa. Intimate indigeneitiesCALENDAR 29 NEWS 30 CLASSIFIED 31

Director of the RAI: David ShanklandEditor: Gustaaf HoutmanSpecial Issue Guest Editors: Catherine Besteman & Angelique HaugerudNews Editor: Katrina Burch JoostenEditorial Consultant: Sean KingstonReviews Editor: Hayder Al-MohammadCopy Editor: Miranda IrvingProduction Consultant: Dominique RemarsEditorial Panel: Monique Borgerhoff Mulder, Candis Callison, Richard Fardon, Alma Gottlieb, Hugh Gusterson, Ulf Hannerz, Michael Herzfeld, Thomas Hylland Eriksen, Solomon Katz, Gsli Plsson, Joo de Pina-Cabral, Gustavo Lins Ribeiro, Catherine Lutz, Howard Morphy, John Postill, Alexander F. Robertson, Nancy Scheper-Hughes, Cris Shore, Michael WeschEditorial address: Please read Notes to Contributors before making submissions (http://www.therai.org.uk/at/). Submissions: http://at.edmgr.com. All articles are peer-reviewed. Editorial correspondence (except subscriptions, changes of address etc) via anthropologytoday@gmail.com. Online debate: http://anthropologytoday.ning.com. Postal address: The Editor, ANTHROPOLOGY TODAY, Royal Anthropological Institute, 50 Fitzroy Street, London W1T 5BT, UK. Copy dates: 15th of even monthsPublisher: John Wiley & Sons Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA. Disclaimer: The Publisher, RAI and Editors cannot be held responsible for errors or any consequences arising from the use of information contained in this journal; the views and opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the Publisher, the RAI or the Editors, neither does the publication of advertisements constitute any endorsement by the Publisher, the RAI or the Editors of the products advertised.Copyright and photocopying: 2013 RAI. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior permission in writing from the copyright holder. Authorization to photocopy items for internal and personal use is granted by the copyright holder for libraries and other users registered with their local Reproduction Rights Organisation (RRO), e.g. Copyright Clearance

Center (CCC), 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, USA (http://www.copyright.com), provided the appropriate fee is paid directly to the RRO. This consent does not extend to other kinds of copying such as copying for general distribution, for advertising or promotional purposes, for creating new collective works or for resale. Special requests should be addressed to: permissionsuk@wiley.com.Information for subscribers: Six issues of ANTHROPOLOGY TODAY are mailed free of charge per annum to Fellows and Members of the Royal Anthropological Institute (registered charity no. 246269). Rates for 2014: Member: 31.50, 25.20, or US$45. Single copy: 9 UK, or $21 overseas plus VAT where applicable. Visit http://www.therai.org.uk/joining. Contact: admin@therai.org.uk.Institutional subscriptions for 2014: Premium Institutional: 108 (UK), US$179 (N. America), 136 (Europe) and $196 (Rest of the World). Prices are exclusive of tax. Asia-Pacific GST, Canadian GST and European VAT will be applied at the appropriate rates. Current tax rates: www.wileyonlinelibrary.com/tax-vat. Price includes online access to current and all online back files to 1 January 2009, where available. For other pricing options, access information and terms and conditions: www.wileyonlinelibrary.com/access. Delivery terms and legal title: Where the subscription price includes print issues and delivery is to the recipients address, delivery terms are Delivered at Place (DAP); the recipient is responsible for paying any import duty or taxes. Title to all issues transfers FOB our shipping point, freight prepaid. We endeavour to fulfil claims for missing or damaged copies within six months of publication, within our reasonable discretion and subject to availability.Periodical ID: ANTHROPOLOGY TODAY (0268-540X) is published bimonthly. US mailing agent: Mercury Media Processing, LLC 1634 East Elizabeth Ave, Linden NJ 07036 USA. Periodical postage paid at Rahway NJ. Postmaster: send all address changes to ANTHROPOLOGY TODAY, Journal Customer Services, John Wiley & Sons Inc., 350 Main St., Malden, MA 02148-5020, USA. RAI 2013. Printed in Singapore by COS Printers Pe Ltd.

The desire for relevanceGuest Editorial by Catherine Besteman & Angelique Haugerud

2 ANTHROPOLOGY TODAY VOL 29 NO 6, DECEMBER 2013

discipline to tone the moral debate down, avoid ideo-logical fervor, and instead develop an engineering men-tality in addressing issues, problems, and concerns of publics in present-day societies. Morality and ideology, however, are embedded in any approach, and rather than attempt to tone down internal disciplinary debates, their very vibrancy can be an asset in the public sphere. Indeed it is precisely the rareness of informed public discussion of alternatives to dominant assumptions that can be harmful to the public good.

Economist and philosopher of science Philip Mirowski (2013: 224), for example, argues that the entrenchment of neoliberal theory in economics during the past several decades sets up a treacherous dynamic interplay between the economics profession and the general public, awk-wardly brought closer to the surface by the [2008] crisis. The crisis exposed the possibility that markets can break down and cannot necessarily be trusted as superior infor-mation processors, though some economists believe that crises reveal market flaws that only the economist can be trusted to rectify (Mirowski 2013: 225). The scale of the 2008 financial meltdown, however, appears to have caught many orthodox economists by surprise, and early warnings of crisis did not come from the disciplines centre.

By contrast, the public philosophy developed by James Tully is non-foundational and opposes a monological and consensus-oriented approach, in favour of one that is dia-logical and conflict-oriented. Though political discourses and practices are, and should be, governed by norms, these norms and the (constitutional, for example) framework they establish cannot be removed from political struggle and negotiation. In politics, the rules of the game too are subject to change. And in this game the theorist is only one player among others.

Tully holds that the primary task of the theorist is to pro-vide political actors with a theoretical toolkit that opens up new and alternative ways of acting and thinking and thus allows them to problematize hegemonic practices and discourses. Tullys philosophy views all citizens as partic-ipant-philosophers, which makes him very different from political scientists who conventionally work with elites (who are already presumed to be in the public sphere). However uncertain the political effects of such engage-ment, scholars in political science, sociology, and other fields who move toward such everyday processes, them-selves become concerned individuals for whom both ethics and public matter deeply.

For anthropologists, these are long-standing concerns. Tullys emphasis on a return to working with ordinary citi-zens in a process that does not offer a priori prescriptions or assume outcomes, where public entails dialogue and issues of ethics and methodology, already sits at the core of anthropology. So too his argument that in order for the world to be safe for difference, we need to be less con-cerned with grand theories of identity or justice, but instead engage in and build upon practical reciprocal work with all parties engaged in struggles over recognition.

* * *While some anthropologists are wary of attempts to

popularize their works, fearing its simplification or misuse, anthropology has always been public in the sense that our disciplinary forte is ethnography and we value perspectives that carefully probe the views of our research interlocu-tors, as well as methodologys ethical contours. In earlier decades, the desire for relevance in European anthropology took the form of engagement with and resistance to colo-nial encounters between agents of empire and indigenous peoples. In the United States, relevance included admin-istrative undertakings with native Americans, scholarly contributions to the war effort, and Boass battles about cultural constructions of race.

Questions of relevance drove the development of the applied branch of the discipline and the expansion of anthropologys research topics and units of analysis from small-scale communities to discourses, processes, trans-national networks and large organizations. The 1970s disciplinary self-critique in response to challenges from feminists, political activists, native anthropologists, and others, expanded anthropology to consider arenas outside the savage slot, to develop a critique of Western imperi-alism as well as anthropologys complicity with colonialism and other forms of domination, and to rethink disciplinary assumptions about authority and representation.

Recent writings champion the power of critical eth-nography to document and explain structural violence and to trace the effects of programmes and policies that harm people and the environment. Anthropologists offer counter-narratives to dominant discourses of militarism, neoliberalism, imperialism, counterterrorism, nativism, and so forth. Furthermore, neoliberal currents have pushed universities toward a consumerist, market-driven approach to education in which knowledge is privatized and aca-demic departments must validate their value in market terms. For some, demonstrating anthropologys ability to analyze and perhaps even help to solve contemporary problems and thereby attract research funds and political recognition might ensure a profile beyond that of a ser-vice discipline for undergraduates.

* * *Anthropologys popularization was accomplished in the

19th and early 20th centuries mainly through visual means such as museums and international exhibitions, then from the 1920s to the mid-1970s through books and articles, and in the last decades of the 20th century increasingly through television and film.2 Today the term public has multiple valences, and certainly with the ease and multiplicity of publication channels, every scholar, indeed every person, now can go public. But go public with what?

The Sisyphean task is to reach wide audiences while breaking through conventional media-friendly frames such as exoticism; or orthodox trust in neoliberal markets; or violent outbreaks of putative ancient tribal hatreds; or an ostensibly startling new discovery of a fossilized human ancestor or a remote gold mine or a supposedly isolated tribe living out a stone-age existence in the modern era. In social gatherings in Britain, writes MacClancy (1996: 15), saying one is an anthropologist usually leads to some jokey comment about naked apesters partly because post-War ethologists in the United Kingdom and United States were more willing than many social anthropologists to popularize their work.

Today a desire for relevance in public affairs entices at least some scholars in nearly any discipline, though the stakes and aims vary enormously. Many social and cultural anthropolo-gists would be delighted if the label anthropologist provoked fewer jokes about naked apes and stimulated more questions about the financial crisis, refugee resettlement, hydraulic fracturing, climate change, or corporate personhood. l

This editorial is the outcome of collaboration with Gustaaf Houtman, whom we thank for bringing to our attention many helpful references and ideas.

1. Jeffries 2009.2. This sentence closely

paraphrases MacClancy (1996: 17).

Celikates, R. 2011. Review of Public philosophy in a new key: Volume I: Democracy and civic freedom / Volume II: Imperialism and civic freedom. By James Tully. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008). Constellations 18(2): 264-266.

Jeffries, V. (ed.) 2009. The handbook of public sociology. New York: Rowman & Littlefield.

MacClancy, J. 1996. Popularizing anthropology. In J. MacClancy & C. McDonaugh (eds). Popularizing anthropology, 1-57. New York: Routledge.

Mirowski, P. 2013. Never let a serious crisis go to waste: How neoliberalism survived the financial meltdown. London: Verso.

Turner, J.H. 2005. Is public sociology such a good idea? The American Sociologist Fall/Winter: 27-45.

Catherine Besteman is Professor of Anthropology at Colby College. Her email isclbestem@colby.edu.

Angelique Haugerud is Associate Professor of Anthropology at Rutgers University and Editor-in-Chief of American Ethnologist. Her email ishaugerud@rci.rutgers.edu.

to reach readers in 15000 institutions worldwidewww.therai.org.uk/at/advertising

anthropology today

at

ISSN 0268-540X

April 2009 vol 25 no 2

a disputatio: nature vs culture

Bruno Latour

mixed race: defining identify

Peter J. Aspinall

biometric security

Mark Maguire

US Army goes tribal

Roberto J. Gonzlez

debate in Afghanistan

Magnus Marsden

the financial crisisGustav Peebles,

Stephen Gudeman,

Fabian Muniesa

AAA 2008

SEA

N W

EISG

ERB

ER

anthropology today

at

ISSN 0268-540X

June 2009 vol 25 no 3SEA

N W

EISG

ERB

ER

renewing the war on prostitution

Sophie Day

racial integration at a South African

universityJohn Sharp and Rehana Vally

UNESCOs doctrine of human diversity

Wiktor Stoczkowski

evolution of human behaviour Agustn Fuentes

Native American narratives of enslavement

Max Carocci

childrens rights and the civilizing project

Karen Valentin and

Lotte Meinert

anthropology today

at

ISSN 0268-540X

December 2009 vol 25 no 6DAVI

D C

OM

PTO

N /

SEA

N W

EISG

ERB

ER

journalism and anthropological

ethicsStuart Kirsch

head-stealing rumours in Flores

Gregory Forth

museum anthropologyAnthony Shelton and

Gustaaf Houtman

female genital cutting

Fuambai S. Ahmadu,

Richard A. Shweder,

Carlos D. Londoo Sulkin

anthropology in China: IUAES 2009

Chris Hann

join the world revolution

Keith Hart

obituary: Olivia Harris

AD V E RT I S E

Copyright of Anthropology Today is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may notbe copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder'sexpress written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles forindividual use.