Evidentiary truths? The evidence of anthropology through the anthropology of medical evidence

Anthropologists have become increasingly concerned about the discipline's lack of 'public engagement' with contemporary issues of late, but a key underlying problem - anthropology's unwillingness to address the nature and evidentiary status of anthropological knowledge itself - has remained largely unacknowledged. Here I approach this problem initially through an analysis of the rise of 'evidence' as a central concept in public policy and practice. Using the exemplar of 'evidence-based' medicine, I analyse anthropological responses to these evidentiary requirements, arguing that this turn to evidence can be seen in many other arenas of research and public policy and presents a fundamental challenge for the credibility and legitimacy of anthropology as a discipline. In the second part of the article comparison with anthropological work on legal issues provides a reflexive opening through which to begin to consider the nature of anthropological 'evidence' itself.     

Sociology or social science?

Modern sociology has set itself up as a specialised discipline dissociating itself from the broad-ranging theories of development of the early sociologists and breaking the links with economics, social anthropology and politics which had formed such an exciting unity in their works or at least in their lives.     

Sociology or social science?

Modern sociology has set itself up as a specialised discipline dissociating itself from the broad-ranging theories of development of the early sociologists and breaking the links with economics, social anthropology and politics which had formed such an exciting unity in their works or at least in their lives.     

Archaeology as Anthropology Revisited

Anthropology was established in the USA during the middle of the nineteenth century. From the beginning, archaeology was considered a part of the discipline, a notion that continues to this day. However, over the course of the past 160 years, periodically, the place of archaeology within anthropology is questioned. Often, this has a reflection in the growth or shrinking in membership of the Archaeology Division of the American Anthropological Association. I explore these trends and try to explain them in terms of the history of anthropology.     

Introduction: Biographies of Anthropologists as Anthropological Data

Biographies of anthropologists are widely recognized as useful for the history of science and the discipline. Introducing this special issue “Biographies of Anthropologists,” I argue that they not only provide information about anthropology, but also data for anthropology because they are studies of human agents enmeshed in social and cultural contexts, comparable to life histories of ethnographic informants. Biographies of anthropologists are of similar importance for empirical and theoretical anthropology as ethnographies, grammars, and monographs in archaeology and biological anthropology. They depict cultural dynamics from a person-centered, intimate, experience-near, and diachronic perspective on anthropology's cluster of sodalities.     

Anthropology in the UK: Never Mind the Biographies,Here's the Reflexive Symbols

Focusing on the concept of the intellectual biography, I explore the relational and symbolic importance of life histories for the reflexive history of anthropology. Legacies of questioning disciplinary self-awareness exist for fieldwork, data analysis, writing up, and academic social networks. The intellectual biography, as a newly developing self-conscious genre, is becoming central to the way in which the discipline writes its own history. This article situates five recent biographies of “British” anthropologists into a theoretical, methodological, and intellectual landscape that encompasses the international development of a century of social anthropology in the United Kingdom.     

Pars Pro Toto Observation: Historical Anthropology in the Textual Field of Rasulid Yemen

This essay addresses the suggestion made over a century ago by F. W. Maitland that anthropology must choose between being history and being nothing. At the time Maitland was correct in criticizing the simplistic unilinear evolutionary schemes of Edward Tylor and Lewis Henry Morgan. My own career combines ethnography among Yemeni farmers in the late 1970s with ongoing analysis of thirteenth- and fourteenth-century Yemeni agricultural texts, demonstrating the value of drawing on both kinds of research to better understand the history of agriculture in Yemen. Details from the textual corpus are provided to supplement observations made in the field. My approach to agricultural and tax record texts from Yemen's Rasulid period is described as an example of what anthropology and history can contribute to each other. I argue that the choice is not between specific disciplines but rather the application of sound methods that seek to approximate reality rather than dogmatically recreate it. Anthropology and history have much to gain, as Evans-Pritchard once noted, in learning from each other. Anthropology is approached as a research field that has no preconceived borders, but one that necessitates learning from past methodological and theoretical trends, whether from within the formal discipline or from without.     

作为独立学科的考古学——考古学、人类学、历史学学科体系之比较

关于中国考古学的学科归属问题一直存在着争议,一种意见认为考古学属于历史学的范畴;一种意见认为考古学应是人类学的分支学科之一。本将考古学与历史学、人类学的学科体系加以比较,论述了在学科起源、研究内容、研究方法、研究对象、分支学科等方面,考古学与历史学和人类学的差异。从而认为考古学与人类学、历史学有极其密切的联系,但它作为独立学科的趋势是必然的。     

Physical Anthropology and Osteoarchaeology in Europe: History,Current Trends and Challenges

This paper provides an overview of the development and current practice of physical anthropology as relating to the treatment of archaeological skeletal remains in Europe. The evolution of physical anthropology as a discipline is covered in detail from the 18th century onwards, and current trends in education and research are also discussed. Additional topics include a synthesis of the legislative framework for studying human skeletal remains in over 40 European countries while also addressing challenges, future trends and emerging ethical questions. This overview is the product of an extensive review of the literature partnered with information received via questionnaires completed by colleagues working in nearly 50 European countries. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Theorizing the City: Recent Research in Urban Anthropology

Half of the world's population now lives in cities. This number is expected to grow to two-thirds in the next fifty years. And yet, it is only recently that anthropologists have begun to take urban contexts seriously as fieldwork sites. In this article, I analyze three recent volumes on urban anthropology which each propose a distinctive theoretical and methodological approach to the study of the city. I suggest that there is a fine line to be drawn between urban determinism—the suggestion that the city is the pivotal force in shaping individual lives, a perspective that ignores both human agencies and the complexities of causality—and anthropology which relegates the city to mere context, ethnographies that, almost by chance take place in urban contexts but say little about the realities of city life. The texts examined share two features in common: firstly, they are most effective when they, through close ethnographic or archival engagement, show the complexity and variation in urban contexts; and secondly, each text displays an absolute commitment to ethnographic fieldwork as a powerful tool to understand the lived experience of the urban. As a commitment to long-term participant observation is the sine qua non of our discipline, my central question is whether “urban anthropology,” is not just anthropology after all?     

Cora Du Bois,Henrietta Schmerler,and the Role of Women in Mid-Twentieth Century American Anthropology

Cora Du Bois (1903–1991) achieved distinction in anthropology and the U.S. government—including leadership roles in the Office of Strategic Services and the State Department, a professorship at Harvard, and the presidency of the American Anthropological Association. Her contemporary, Henrietta Schmerler (1908–1931), suffered rape and murder while conducting her first summer of ethnographic fieldwork. Despite these stark differences, when taken together, Schmerler’s and Du Bois’s careers and reputations shed light on sexism and homophobia in and around the discipline, changing approaches to fieldwork and cultural analysis, and the political and public contexts of American anthropology in the mid-20th century.     

Teaching Southeast Asia through fiction and memoirs

Since few undergraduates intend to major in anthropology, let alone go on to professional careers as anthropologists, I ask students to read materials that I think will most compellingly address the curiosity they have about Southeast Asians' lives. This means drawing on the increasingly rich store of Southeast Asian fiction and memoirs available in English. These materials can be used to illuminate important topics in the study of Southeast Asia. Although my own field is anthropology, a similar strategy could be used to teach courses in other fields, such as history and sociology.     

Climate,History, and Culture: The Power of Change

Global climate change and its consequences for humankind opens up a research field for exploring the diverse dimensions and forces of change through time. Chief among the objects of inquiry is how climatic shifts impact on ecological and social structures and developments and what human agencies are able to unfold under given conditions. Conclusions from such reciprocities can help to deliver a differentiated approach to the inroads of anthropogenic climate change. Central to this enterprise are such analytic perspectives as the discipline of anthropology can bring to researching the impact of climate change on human societies.     

Son Chint’ae and the Foundations of Modern Korean Folklore Studies

Although there were various antecedents, the academic discipline of folklore did not begin in Korea until the third decade of the twentieth century. The leading figure in the country’s development of the discipline is Son Chint’ae, who brought rigour to the methods of research and the collection of material; used a comparative method drawing on research from anthropology, ethnography, folklore, archaeology, and history; and saw ‘Korea’ in the broader context of North-east Asia. A nationalist during the Japanese colonial period, Son used the concept of minchok (the people) both to analyse his material and to serve as a means to revitalize the Korean nation.     

Many voices: Medical anthropologists explore the meaning of health,illness, and cure

Franz Boas organized and shaped American anthropology. No academic discipline of similar scope owed so much to just one person. Within three decades of coming to the United States from Germany he had trained the anthropologists who established its place within the universities and redirected its tone and ethos as well as its theories. The biographies under review help us understand the background, aims, and drive of the man. We shall consider, in particular, the impact he had on the political and ethical tone of the field, the prevalence of women in it, and the importance of his scientific background.     

Two Cultures: French and American Social Science in the Twentieth Century

The development of anthropology in France and North America during the early to mid 20th century showed both similarities and pronounced differences. In both cases anthropology matured alongside sociology, a relationship that would prove increasingly problematic as the century wore on. In France, in particular, another important influence was art and literature, especially the Surrealism of the 1920s and 1930s. This was less the case in North America, but in both countries, anthropology occupied a medial position between science and the humanities.     

侨批公会的建立与跨国侨批网络的制度化（1911—1937）——以潮汕为例的研究

本文以潮汕侨批业为个案研究,利用跨国主义理论,探讨了侨批网络的内部整合与制度化问题。认为侨批网络的制度化表现首先是侨批公会的建立,继而是侨批公会网络的形成,侨批公会网络再通过其制度化机制进入以中华总商会为中心的更高层次的华人社团网络。侨批网络的扩大加强了其对外的集体交涉能力,从而维护了侨批网络的正常运转。在此运作模式中,新加坡中华总商会起着领导核心的作用。侨批网络的运作模式对研究跨国华人商业网络有重要的启示意义。     

Bridging anthropology and its archives: an analysis from the Smithsonian's National Anthropological Archives

Much has been written about the need to open up archives as part of the decolonial turn and decolonizing methodologies. What does this look like in practice for anthropology? Despite increasing interest in archives and ‘the archival turn’ among anthropologists, our study at the National Anthropological Archives (NAA) found that anthropologists who use archives in their work lack familiarity with organizational principles and histories that would help them navigate and gain access to these records, as well as critique them. Beyond reporting this recent research, we posit that the disconnect between archives and anthropology is not isolated to the NAA or the US, but is pervasive in the discipline. In sharing this work, we hope to inspire other similar institutional moves and to promote archival education and scholarly engagement in anthropology and its training programmes.     

Anthropologies of extinction

This guest editorial reflects on the relevance of anthropology for extinction concerns, a rapidly expanding practical, ethnographic and theoretical space at a time of impending mass extinction. While biological extinction is necessarily a multispecies development (usually implicating humans), traditional species talk – focused on taxonomies, collections and classification – needs critical rethinking as it necessarily diverts attention from the vitality of life. The broad discipline of anthropology has much to offer for understanding processes of extinction and recovery, fleshing out habitat problems and prospects of extinction, and advancing meaningful environmentalist practices.     

"Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones": A Personal Geography of Harassment

Over recent months I have received silent phone calls and malicious homophobic mail that has referred to my sexual identity, my research, my teaching, and my position within the discipline of Geography, and I have been "outed" as a lesbian to my parents. This paper attempts to unpack these experiences: first, by examining the different processes (all of which play upon the mutual constitution of my academic self and sexual self) through which my harasser has sought to exclude me from the discipline of Geography; second, by exploring the geography of this harassment—focusing on how malicious letters/calls can disrupt meanings of place, particularly the way that personal geographies can be taken for granted until they are transgressed; third, by considering geographies of the law. Finally, the paper reflects onthe mutual constitution of my sexual identity, geographical research and writing, academic identity as a geographer, and the discipline of Geography itself.