The future of anthropology: two (and a half) debates around the concept of “culture”

 “Culture is the essential tool for making other”

(Abu-Lughod 1996: 470)

 

Let's open a random introductory book about anthropology. It is almost certain that one of its first chapters will be named “What is Culture?” or “The Concept of Culture”. Whether built on evolutionistic presumptions (Tyler 1871), or later on cultural relativism (Boas 1940), anthropology has long been understood as the “science of culture”, that would help us understand the “others” and their ways of living (Crapo 2002: 2). As Monagam and Just put it, “there have probably been more anthropological definitions of 'culture' than there have been anthropologists.” (Monaghan & Just 2000: 35). However, as enduring as it is, the concept of culture has been equally debatable, drawing uncertainties about its relevance and potential dilemmas of using it. So much so that today the time has come to ask ourselves if we still need it.   

Since the 1980s, there have been at least two ways in which anthropologists have been engaging with the question of whether we should give up the concept of culture, so defining for the discipline. Forming two main critiques “against culture”, these two approaches draw from two older discussions in anthropology and social theory: 1) the dispute about whether culture should be understood ontologically or epistemologically, and 2) the persistent debate between culturalists and political economists, in anthropological theory also related to the function/meaning question. Although there are many other approaches, questioning the relevance of the concept of culture, I prefer to focus on these two, because I see them as the main ones to be shaping the contemporary discussions about the very future of anthropology. In the following lines, I will examine them more closely, showing how they also interact (forming the half debate), concluding with my own perspective on the problem – a proposition for a “dialectical anthropology”.

Culture and othering: between ontology and epistemology

One of the most persistent ideas that comes with the notion of culture, and, in fact, is embedded in it, is the idea of differences. As Abu-Lughod (1996) shows in her influential essay “Writing against culture”, anthropology is built on the historically constructed division between self and other, and more specifically, the “non-Western other by the Western self” (ibid: 467). Despite the twentieth-century emphasis on promoting cultural relativism over evaluation, these positions have consistently rested on the recognition and explication of certain differences between “cultures”.

Yet, the idea of differences has always been related to the problem of power and historically the relationship between the West and the non-West has been characterized by Western dominance. Even in its contemporary manifestations, where it explicitly aims to amplify “the voices of the Other” or facilitate a dialogue between the self and other, this indicates that somebody “superior” lets another one “inferior” speak. On the one hand, this problem stems from the belief that objectivity is unattainable when examining one's own society, constructing the long-continuing tradition of western anthropologist studying the other non-westerns (ibid: 467). On the other hand, Abu-Lughod points to the debate about the ontological/epistemological status of culture, emphasizing that ethnographic representations are always "partial truths" (James Clifford 1986a: 6, as cited in Lughod 1996:469).

Said, influenced by Foucault, is one of the first authors to initiate this debate within anthropological theory that challenges the idea of the other as an unquestionable ontological reality. Focusing on "Orientalism," a thought style that rigidly fixes differences between "the West" and "the East," he highlighted the constructive nature of such distinctions (Said 1989: 225, 1978: 2, 470). Abu-Lughod extends these ideas, concluding that namely the very notion of “culture”, as the essential tool for discussing the "other" within anthropological discourse, enforces separations that inevitably carry a sense of hierarchy (Lughod 1996: 470). Therefore, given that ethnography, seen as "a form of collecting cultures," tends to "freeze difference" (ibid: 471), anthropologists should actively pursue diverse strategies to counter the prevailing influence of culture. She proposes three ways to subvert the culture concept and its essentialism: prioritizing practice and discourse over culture, emphasizing connections between communities and the world, and crafting narrative ethnographies that highlight the diversity and complexity of individuals' lives (ibid:472-476).

Is culture the base or the superstructure? The shift towards “dark anthropology”

During the 1960s and 70s, another significant schism emerged in anthropological discourse. Ortner (1984, as cited in Ortner 2016:49) outlines this division as a dichotomy between the "culturalist" and the Marxist or materialist faction. Led by Clifford Geertz, the culturalist faction focused on a symbolic understanding of culture, emphasizing its role in providing meaning to people's lives rather than its functions. In contrast, the Marxist approach, championed by Eric Wolf, directed its focus toward understanding how economic and political forces structured people's lives or cultures, often criticizing the culturalist approach for overlooking "the harsh realities of power that drove so much of human history" (ibid).

Interestingly, namely against the backdrop of “the conditions of the real world”, the 1980s would bring the Marxist approaches to a new prevail. With the rise of neoliberalism more and more anthropologists felt the need to emphasis on the “brutal dimensions of human experience, and the structural and historical conditions that produce them”. Ortner termed this new phase “dark anthropology” – both a response to the outlined internal anthropological debates and a product of the “increasingly problematic conditions of the real world under neoliberalism” (ibid: 50).

Given these circumstances, the relevance of the notion of culture came into question once again. In a world where even issues of race and gender, and religious and ethnic violence, are not separated from the influence of marketization, a blind focus on everyday life and meanings is no longer tenable; instead (in the line of this argument), it has become more clear than ever that we should engage with the economics shaping these realities. Moreover, contemplating the future of anthropology suggests a closer alignment with a more comprehensive social science that encompasses politics and economics.

From the “other” to the suffering subject: towards an anthropology of good?

Going back to the othering concerns that come with the debate about the epistemological status of culture, Joel Robbins intertwines them with the broader influences of the "histories of the world" (Trouillot 2003: 26, as cited in Robbins 2013: 449). He highlights another facet of the shift in the "cultural point" of anthropology during the 1980s. Even though the discipline has from the beginning “been stuck studying the savage, the primitive, and the radically other” (ibid: 448), throughout the 1980s several anthropologists and interested scholars from other fields (like the already mentioned Said) started to be more critical about the power dynamics related to those type of inquiry. This scrutiny, Robbins argues, led to the abandonment of the consistent idea of the “other” as primary subject of anthropological research and replaced it with the “suffering subject” – “the subject living in pain, in poverty, or under conditions of violence or oppression” (ibid).

However, following Trouillot, Robbins urges us to understand this shift within a broader cultural context beyond anthropology. As the first had previously illustrated, the demise of the "savage" wasn't solely due to our anthropological progress and self-critique. On the one hand, it resulted from an ‘empirical’ history of the vanishing savage, where “the differences between Western and non-Western societies’ had by the 1980s become ‘blurrier than ever before” (2003: 9, as cited in Robbins 2013: 449). On the other hand, the West's waning interest in the "savage" reflects a crisis in its own intellectual life and self-understanding as the loss of space for difference led to the loss of the radically other, in relation to whom the Western identity was constructed on the first place.

Tracing this change, Robbins also comes to suggest that with this transition some strengths of earlier work were lost. Unlike Abu-Lughod, who sees the notion of difference as having lost critical potential, Robbins believes that the concept still holds the power to enrich anthropological inquiry. He envisions a further shift toward an "anthropology of the good," aiming to recover the critical force of earlier anthropology without inheriting its weaknesses. This new anthropology explores how people organize their lives to pursue what they consider good, delving into topics like value, morality, imagination, well-being, empathy, care, the gift, hope, time, and change (ibid: 457). Therefore, Robbins’ “anthropology of good” reinforces the potential of the idea of differences and with it –“culture”, by proposing a methodological shift that involves understanding these distinctions emicly, from the inside—moving away from imposing external moral categories and instead tracing how people define the concept of good themselves.

Some conclusory thoughts on culture: towards a dialectical anthropology?

Bearing in mind the thoughtful concerns surrounding studying culture and the differences upon which anthropology has traditionally been built, one must ponder the future of the discipline. If culture is deemed no longer useful due to its reinforcement of othering, the strong influence of the neoliberal agenda, or the argument that differences no longer exist, how should anthropology be practised?

In response to the orthodox political economists advocating for a focus on the structural forces of the marketization logic, I contend that emphasizing culture does not necessarily neglect the impact of "harsh realities." Moreover, while postmodern blurriness and neoliberalism may have erased the "savage," they have given rise to new types of differences, reflecting diverse community responses to economic and political forces based on cultural traits, beliefs, values, and notions of the "good," as suggested by Robbins. Therefore, I advocate for an approach that acknowledges both macro forces and remains attuned to the diverse "cultural" responses to them.

However, how should we approach the study of cultural differences? While it is clear that anthropology today cannot and should no longer understand “cultures” as unquestionable ontological realities, this doesn't imply that we should abandon studying them altogether. Instead, we can emphasize the examination of different systems of knowledge that construct these cultural differences. Anthropology should shift its focus from questioning the inherent reality of culture to exploring how different ideas about it—whether emic or etic—interact as epistemological realities with distinct ontological claims. Hence, studying culture is particularly relevant today as it contributes to the analysis of real existing inequalities, shaped not only by the neoliberal agenda but also by the very hierarchy of knowledge.

To move forward, we give up rigid distinctions between political economy and culturalism, as well as the dichotomy regarding the epistemological or ontological status of culture. Instead, methodology-wise we must adopt a scale-sensitive approach that grasps forces at both micro (culture) and macro (economy) levels. Second, sensitivity to the hierarchy of ontological claims about certain epistemologically produced ideas on cultural differences and recognition of the importance of asking which ideas of culture are mobilised and for what purpose is crucial. And finally, I endorse Robbins’ proposal for a more emic and hermeneutic approach, whereby the study of cultural differences emphasises on what people themselves consider good. I refer to this comprehensive three-step approach as "dialectical anthropology."

 

 

Bibliography

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Boas, F. (1940). "Race, Language, and Culture." New York: Free Press.

Crapo, R. H. (2002). Cultural anthropology: Understanding ourselves & others. McGraw-Hill.

Monaghan, J., & Just, P. (2000). Social and Cultural Anthropology: A very short introduction. Oxford University Press. Said, E. W. (1978). Orientalism. Pantheon.

Ortner, Sherry B. 1984. “Theory in anthropology since the sixties.” Comparative Studies in      Society and History 26 (1):126–66.

Ortner, S. B. (2016). Dark anthropology and its others. HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory, 6(1), 47–73. https://doi.org/10.14318/hau6.1.004

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Said, E. W. (1978). Orientalism. Pantheon.

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