I recently started following ‘thesweetfeminist’ A.K.A Becca Rea-Holloway on Instagram. She posts pictures of her cakes which are iced with a generous amount of buttercream and political advocacy. On June 20th 2018 Becca posted a photo of a cake which said “Abortion is Healthcare.” She has reposted this same cake many times since and particularly as of late with the 27 abortion bans that have been passed in 12 American states. Becca, however, wasn’t the only one to express her outrage via frosting. Miley Cyrus announced she’d be collaborating with Marc Jacobs to sell a jumper with the words “Don’t F*ck With My Freedom” of which all the profits are claimed to go to planned parenthood. One of the photos for this campaign depicts Miley licking a cake that not only resembles Becca’s creation, but is an EXACT replica. In response Becca wrote, “Cake art is for everyone, but this is inexcusable.” The issue is that her work was blatantly copied without her consent or any form of acknowledgement or compensation. Now while this may not be an example of cultural appropriation, parallels can be drawn from this case to the arguments presented by Brown (1998) in his paper “Can Culture be Copyrighted?”
Posted by ‘thesweetfeminist’ June 20th 2018
Trying to copyright ‘culture’ is like trying to copyright ‘cake’ (for different reasons of course) but in the same way that they are both unstable grounds to work on. Firstly, how do we define culture? Do we need to distinguish between material, tangible culture and intangible cultural knowledge? Brown (1998) argues the notion that we can somehow ‘copyright’ culture is flawed because it rests on a romanticized and purist understanding. If we can ‘replicate’ culture then it must be original and authentic to begin with. I could argue this point further or I could insert a compelling quote from Edward Said (1994, p. 448): “All cultures are involved in one another; none is single and pure, all are hybrid, heterogeneous, extraordinarily differentiated, and unmonolithic.”
Now just because culture is fluid and cake is delicious, does that mean they should be a free for all where we can steal as many symbols and slices as we want without any consequences? While at first glance it may seem as though Brown (1998, p. 207) is arguing for the protection of a liberal democracy above all else, he makes an important declaration, “Reduction of inequalities in the distribution of power is just as essential for maintaining liberal democracy as is a free flow of information.”
Becca & some of her other creations
Becca believes that, “Cake art is for everyone” and likewise Brown (1998) argues that ideas, knowledge and personal expression should not be threatened by copyright laws. Institutionalized secrecy has a tendency to result in abuses of power. For instance, the Church of Scientology has been attempting to privatize their religious texts and ‘sensitive’ information about their organization (and I think we can see how problematic it would be to keep that info confidential).
Many debates about cultural appropriation have centered on control and the notion that by copyrighting cultural artefacts, symbols and knowledge the ‘original’ culture regains power. But will this really give power back to marginalized and minority voices? Instead Brown (1998, p. 208) asserts that greater change can be enacted through an “agreed-upon social goal” and mechanisms which provide compensation for the use of cultural symbols/knowledge. Brown (1998, p. 203) believes that all this talk about copyrighting culture is actually detracting from more important discussions such as “the fragility of native cultures in mass societies.”
What can Becca’s feminist cakes and Brown’s (1998) arguments in favour of a liberal democracy teach us about cultural appropriation? For one, copyrighting something as crumby as cake and as elusive as culture is a problematic foundation to work on. Instead we should focus on developing ‘social goals’ which foster respect for cake artists and cultural ideas. We need to think critically about how compensation can best be given to those who have inspired us and how imbalances of power effect the actors involved. I realize that these suggestions are quite ambiguous and ‘fuzzy’, but when dealing with a phenomenon as complex as cultural appropriation, perhaps any possible solutions will be just as elusive.
References:
Brown, MF 1998, ‘Can Culture Be Copyrighted?’, Current Anthropology, Vol. 39, No. 2, pp. 193-222.
Said, EW 1994, Culture and imperialism. New York, Knopf.
Enjoy thinking about the pitfalls of defining & appropriating culture? See also:
Tio gong tao is a narrative used to justify male victimhood when men spend excessive amounts of money on a foreign stage performer.It is a growing phenomenon that involves men developing an “unexplainable” infatuation with female stage performers, dancers and models when patronising Siam Dius (or Thai Discos). Siam Dius are drinking joints spaced around a stage that holds live band performances, all-female choreographed dancers of Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Thai nationalities and relatively cheap alcohol. Patrons are encouraged to tiau huey (gift a garland) to a stage performer he fancies on stage. In return, the performer is obliged to reciprocate by interacting and sharing drinks with the patron for 20-30 minutes during the song and dance breaks. These garlands range from S$50-S$20,000.
Note: Only the person who has bought the most expensive garland will have the accompaniment of the performer. Performers commonly face unsolicited sexual advancements and reciprocation is on the discretion of performer and patron, as it is with any other sexual relationship. I do not condone any vitriol against these stage performers, while my post is to better highlight the relationalities between witchcraft and male victimhood better.
The video below is an emic view of the venue and the lives of the performers.
While the conduct of siam dius appear to be derogatory and disadvantageous to women on many levels, why do men still rely on tio gong tao narratives to justify male victimhood?
Tio gong tao, like witchcraft, is a spatial imaginary. Like an anthropological field, one can visualise the consistent reproduction of imaginative nuances and material practices through various political, economic and cultural channels. Over time, the imaginary is identifiable as either an accepted or deviant practice, which is integral to how people construct meaning (Comaroff & Comaroff 1999, p.285). The tiogong tao field extends or shrinks according to how relationships between men and their companion performer develop. For example, should the companionship transit into a long-term relationship, the man is typically identified as someone under very strong gong tao and is at risk of getting his freedom, wealth and material belongings manipulated.
“I don’t think it’s a bad idea to date these girls. I give them money and they can send the money home to their families. I help them and they are grateful to me and show their gratitude.” – Jonah.
According to Jonah, the nature and terms of exchange between performer and patron are distinctively different as compared to sexual transactions. For men who repetitively gift garlands to performers for companionship, observers often see such behaviour to be incredibly artificial and driven by the need for sex. However, observers do not perceive the underlying relations as what O’Connell Davidson suggests: “an affirmation of a particular racialised and sexualised masculine identity” (1995, p.44). An affirmation is how men view themselves as “white knights” (Garrick 2005, p.502). White knights perceive the on-stage performers as helpless victims of circumstance and the knights are ready to “liberate” these women through material means.
I find many parallels between tio gong tao and the anthropological study of witchcraft. Edward Evans-Pritchard argues that “primitive” belief systems are just as logical as “modern” secular versions but shaped through different cultural and social conditions (1937, p.37). Gong tao or witchcraft are systems of values which regulate human conduct and contain rich complexities and nuances.
With these in mind, the discipline of anthropology may benefit from examining the link between tio gong tao and Evans-Pritchard’s ideas of witchcraft to better understand contemporary phenomena on masculine identity in Singapore.
References:
Comaroff, J & Comaroff, JL 1999, ‘Occult Economies and the Violence of Abstraction: Notes from the South African Postcolony’, American Ethnologist, vol. 26, no. 2, pp. 279–303.
Davidson, O 1995, ‘British Sex Tourist in Thailand’, in M Maynard & J Purvis (eds), (Hetero)sexual Politics, Taylor & Francis, London, UK, pp. 42–64.
Evans-Pritchard, E 1937, Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic Among the Azande, Clarendon Press, Oxford, UK.
Garrick, D 2005, ‘Excuses, Excuses: Rationalisations of Western Sex Tourists in Thailand’, Current Issues in Tourism, vol. 8, no. 6, pp. 497–509.
In the ‘Anthropological Room’ (or space), there are multiple peer-reviewed journals publishing new and upcoming anthropological research with various aims from ‘what it is to be human’, ‘ethnology’ to ‘critical analysis’. Had I known of these resources in my first year of anthropology, I would have been able to peruse through multiple journal volumes and discover my love for the anthropology of nature much sooner – because if we’re being honest, I was never entirely sure what the scope of ‘anthropology’ really covered.
Recently, I was introduced to a new academic journal that I hadn’t come across before when I was discussing colonialism with my supervisor. It is named, HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory. This is an international, peer-reviewed anthropology journal that seeks to situate ethnographic material “at the forefront of conceptual developments in the discipline” (HAU Journal 2017, p.1). To the novice anthropologist, such as myself, it sounds like a fine and dandy resource to keep up to date with emerging anthropological research! But wow, on further investigation it sure does have some problematic practices and colonial underpinnings.
On the home page, the journal explains its name as:
In Mauss’ classic work, The Gift, he included the Māori example of the ‘the hau of the gift’. He interpreted the ‘hau’ as the spiritual force of the giver in the gift, which demanded to be returned (Mauss 1925). However, his interpretation of ‘hau’ completely excluded Māori voices. His work is an explicit illustration of the Eurocentric appropriation of Indigenous knowledges and cultural belief systems that have, for so long, been a dark feature (or the elephant in the room) of anthropology.
On June 18th, 2018, a group of Māori anthropology scholars wrote an open letter to HAU. They asserted that the lack of acknowledgement for the term Hau – being taken from Māori culture – exhibited “an absence of ethics of care, respect, inclusiveness and openness within HAU’s leadership” (Mahi Tahi 2018, p.1). The scholars further questioned whether the journal upheld the spirit, understandings and ethos of the Hau concept in their practices. The journal responded, providing a justification for their appropriation of the term:
“Although this Maori concept has become anthropologist’s common parlance, HAU…should have consulted you before using
it” (Ibid).
HAU’s unethical practices are unsurprising given the wider controversy surrounding the journal, involving issues with the practices of the journal’s management and their lack of response to public critiques. However, this was an extremely disappointing moment for the anthropology world, particularly as it undermined all decolonial efforts that many scholars had been engaging in. HAU have merely extended the appropriation and colonisation of Indigenous knowledges that Mauss established in his work by further misappropriating it as a marketing, and thus economic, tool for the popularisation of the journal.
The cultural appropriation practices of HAU spark broader concerns about how we can continue shifting the colonial patterning of anthropology. For many students just entering and exploring the anthropology discipline, this can be a daunting task.
I believe it is our responsibility – particularly those self-locating as white settlers – to engage consciously and directly with Indigenous peoples. We must continually learn what practices can be integrated to best rectify the harm that continues to be inflicted against their communities in academia.
I am no expert in what decolonisation should look like or how it should be engaged with; but Indigenous scholars, Jeff Corntassel, Rita Dhamon and Zoe Todd, have suggested practical ways we can work towards this in academia. To monitor your personal ethics as beginner anthropologists, I would recommend actively incorporating at least two of their points into your work:
Self-location: We must self-locate to the conceptions of “settler” and settler colonialism (Snelgrove, Dhamoon and Corntassel 2014). This involves articulating (in your research, essays and day-to-day lives) how you situate yourself and your awareness of the colonial occupations of Indigenous lands (see my bio for an example).
Centring Indigenous
scholars:
As stated by Zoe Todd (2017), it is our responsibility as anthropologists to
centre Indigenous scholars to “disrupt
the privileging of euro-colonial thinking over Indigenous praxis”. We must
not conceptualise Indigenous thought through a euro-colonial and philosophical
lens. Instead, we must incorporate and centre Indigenous thinkers in our
academic work to de-stabilise the Euro-American anthropologists that have been
conventionally relied upon for the understanding of Indigenous philosophies.
*side note: the journal still has not, one year later, revised the
description of their name on the website to recognise the Māori origins of the
Hau concept (yikes…).*.
References:
Davis, H. and Todd, Z 2017, ‘On the Importance of a Date, or Decolonizing the Anthropocene’, ACME: An International E-Journal for Critical Geographies, vol. 16, no.4.
Mauss, M 1925, The gift: The form and reason for exchange in archaic societies. Routledge.
Snelgrove, C., Dhamoon, R.K. and Corntassel, J 2014, ‘Unsettling settler colonialism: The discourse and politics of settlers, and solidarity with Indigenous nations’, Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society, vol.3, no.2.
At the intersection of political, economic, and power-focused anthropology there is an emerging concern for the current state, and more importantly future state, of job security in the face of the widespread automation of production and services. In the technological age change is rapid, and the consequences of this are especially significant for the working class. Granted, there are multiple perspectives on this debate, with some arguing that jobs will simply need to be redesigned to accommodate changes and that this will be an opportunity to re-engineer businesses. I think this might be easier said than done (how’s our re-adjustment to renewable energies from fossil fuels going?).
I don’t present the total automation of working class jobs as a given, but it’s worth thinking about. When talking about this issue recently, I remembered an episode of the Simpsons that dealt with this: ‘Maximum Homerdrive’. In this episode, Homer ends up taking over the last job of a truck driver after beating him in an eating contest (the trucker died from over-consumption). After driving the truck for some time, he realises that with the push of a button the truck went into autopilot. Of course, he soon takes advantage of this and blatantly stops driving on the highway, to the dismay of other truckers who then band together to protect their secret and keep themselves in work. The Simpsons quite often tackles social issues, but I was surprised to find out when I looked it up that this episode actually aired in 1999. To me this is testament that anxieties around job automation have been around for some time, though in this case it was in jest and might soon be added to the Simpsons surprising track record of predicting the future.
The trucking community is huge in America, at 3.5 million drivers. A quick look at some of their online forums, shows a concerted effort to track the possible timeline and consequences of autonomous vehicles hitting the roads. Truckers only represent one coherent block of employment that we risk to lose; what about the slowly cumulative changes in factories and offices? What about mining? My own thesis topic concerns a town currently suffering under a indefinite mine closure by the town’s main employer, and should the mine re-open at all they will have to expect changes that will likely mean fewer jobs. And this predicament of underemployment and uncertainty ripples through the other interlinked local concerns of community, identity, art and regeneration, just like it would in any part of the world.
In recent years, anthropology has adopted the notion of ‘precarity’ to describe the current instability of work and incomes in the neo-liberal age (though now its use has stretched beyond political economy to describe a more general contemporary vulnerability). The emergence of precarity is a good example of how changing global dynamics challenge anthropology to attend to the culture of work and push further the scope of anthropology. If we are indeed headed for an employment crisis, could it be anthropology’s attention to job automation that could offer insight on solutions? LSE anthropologist David Graeber thinks we should have a 15 hour work week by now with the level of technology available, while others who delve into post-work theory tout the idea of a universal income.
So what will the future hold? A post-work socialist future where robots do the work and we… pursue our passions? Sounds wonderful, but not like something the corporate stakeholders of capitalism, our true overlords, would go for. While we wait to find out, it might comfort you to know that the job of anthropologist is not yet remotely threatened by the lighting fast growth of AI.
References:
Graeber, D. (2018) Bullshit jobs : a theory. Allen Lane.
On the 15th April, the Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris, France became engulfed in flames underneath the structure of the roof, leading to the collapse of the centuries-old Spire. As the Cathedral continued to burn with flames lighting up the sky, Parisians, tourists and international residents were seen gathering across the Seine River to pray and sing hymns together. It was a pivotal moment in history that pierced the national consciousness of France, a piercing that was felt in communities around the world as an iconic, international masterpiece began to fall.
For centuries, the Notre-Dame Cathedral has been the centrepiece of local and international societies; as an exemplar of French Gothic architecture, for the coronation of Napoleon Bonaparate, the blessing of Joan of Arc and as the sacred meeting place for millions of Catholics around the globe. From the religious perspective of many individuals, the Notre-Dame is a Catholic icon that inspired many to engage in larger devotional lives. As one onlooker to the Cathedral’s fire described:
“It (Notre-Dame) represents our ability as human beings to unite for a higher purpose” (Patel and Yuhas 2019, p.1).
Even more so, the Cathedral is a symbol that reinforces how influential Christianity was in structuring Western civilization and European culture, providing it with its morality, virtues and understanding of the cosmos. Over time, the significance of Notre-Dame has expanded beyond the boundaries of France, and it now includes an international community of Catholics that admire its religious symbology in the practice of their faith. When images and reports of the burning Cathedral flashed across televisions, newspapers and social media around the world, the international Catholic community united to donate to its reconstruction.
“New York Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan announces a fundraising effort from St. Patrick’s Cathedral April 18, 2019 to help support the restoration and rebuilding of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.” New York
I argue that this collective effort to save and rebuild Notre-Dame emerges from the importance of having the Cathedral as a unifying symbol of Catholic faith. Why is this so important? Well, it reinforces imaginings of an international Catholic community. This collective imagining, according to Benedict Anderson (1983), is facilitated through the distribution of cultural materials that seek to construct and represent social cohesion. The significance of these cultural materials is then reinforced by the collective imagining.
It is the cultural force of the Notre-Dame Cathedral that Anderson (1983) argues promotes the strength of the Catholic community. The Cathedral is a cultural symbol that reflects the Catholic community back to themselves, which creates a unified imagining of the religious beliefs that rule their community.
While this is an effective way of analysing the importance of Notre-Dame as an international Catholic symbol, I’m not convinced that Benedict Anderson would be too pleased with me applying his theoretical assumptions from Imagined Communities (1983) in this context. Sorry Benny, but you laid excellent theoretical groundwork here that was too good not to build upon!
In Anderson’s original text,
he asserted the “imagined community” is created by our collective imagining of
the spaces we inhabit – spaces that are locally and geographically bounded. He
limited the scope of the imagined community to the nation. Anderson (1983) focused
on how the collective identity of the nation was spread through print
capitalism (newspapers, language, literature, material maps, museums and
census’), which strengthened the shared culture and nationalism that reinforced
the boundaries of the nation. However, this is a major flaw in Anderson’s
theory. He thought that the nation (aka community) had to emerge from a “local”
group that differentiated itself from other communities and societies. He
further neglected to question and understand the different forms of “community”
and how these were not always bounded to one place in space and time.
It pains me to limit Anderson’s analysis locally, and I think his theory is just as effective in a global framework! I, similar to other scholars, have taken inspiration from Anderson’s ideas and used them to understand the transnational context of Notre-Dame and the Catholic community. Surely Benny would be pretty impressed with how far-reaching his original theories now are!
Let’s look again to Notre-Dame. Catholics around the world saw representations of the Cathedral burning and the devastated reactions of Catholic (and non-Catholic) Parisians on television, social media and in newspapers. These representations reinforced their imagining of Notre Dame as an iconic Catholic monument, which re-stablished their collective knowing of its sacred importance to Catholics around the world. As one facebook user described:
As a result, this collective ‘knowing’ reassured them – whether they were in Brazil, the Philippines, the United States, Ireland or wherever – that they were part of an international Catholic community devastated by this destruction. And… to try and please Benny, this global community does still consist of what he required must be “outsiders” – who in this case could be viewed as people in different religious groups.
The importance of Notre-Dame to the international Catholic community is a prime example of how it is possible to be part of a community that expands beyond the borders of France, Europe and the West; a global community that is imagined across multiple cultures, identities and languages.
References:
Anderson, B 1983, Imagined communities: Reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism, pp.427-449
You’ve been very solemn there in the corner, Squid, and I’d like to hear your thoughts on the term “Capitalocene” and what it means for the people who write about humans and non humans?
Squid:
First allow me to introduce myself. I am the envoy of Donna Haraway, who is a dear friend of my squid squad. Haraway also agrees with you, Spider, that the term Anthropocene avoids calling out capitalism and also puts too much emphasis on humans (2015, 159). Donna always says that language how we build our world, and unfortunately the name of the Anthropocene puts humans in the middle of it (Haraway et al 2016, 538).
Donna Haraway uses a multitude of terms, including the “Capitalocene”, the “Plantationcene” and the “Chthulucene” (Haraway et al 2016). The Plantationcene is an effort to acknowledge that the destructive habits of humans do not only date back to the onset of industrial capitalism. They actually began with the earlier colonialist history that fed into capitalism, where slave labour was used to exploit land for agricultural and mineral purposes. Yet Donna is often criticised for being too political for using the term “Capitalocene” and “Plantationcene”. Humans are strange creatures like this, they try to evade any kind of responsibility, but Haraway actually says that the responsibility of humans is also a “response- ability” (2015, 164).
Humans need to work out how to live with their non-human kin. In fact, in Donna Haraway’s recent book the “Chthulucene manifesto” she has even said that we could even call this present era the “Chthulucene” rather than the “Anthropocene”. This is not actually to honour our leader Cthulhu, but it is to show that humans actually have tentacles (and webs and roots) in the non-human world. When humans study and write about the world, they should make an effort to include the narratives of all entities like us, mushrooms, spiders and squid. I don’t just want to hear the old trees and polar bear narrative. Just look at what is happening with the sixth Great Extinction of plants and animals, maybe a better name for this period is just ‘the trouble’ (Haraway et al 2016, 537).
Haraway says that people are hesitant to act because they haven’t read the newest critique of the system (Terranova 2016). This is one of the problems with academia, it is easy from those academics to say that you don’t know how the world works, because you haven’t read a particular theory and you are just a student, or a taxi driver, or a mushroom, or a spider. The most important thing is that people are recognising that the current system is destructive, even if they don’t have the most fully developed critique of it. What we need to focus on is less on having a perfect vision of what is going on right now and turn towards where we could be going, looking at the possibilities of life on Earth. Science fiction and speculative anthropology are ways of accomplishing this vision, which is why Haraway often works with science fiction writers and anthropologists to create stories for Earthly survival (Terranova 2016).
What I am proposing is a call-to-action for our human kin to respond to this climate emergency and resist individualist or human-centred ways of depicting the world. Otherwise there will be grave and perhaps even chthonic consequences for all of us, a true Cthulu eruption of doomsday proportions! Beware!
Mushroom:
What you are saying seems very morbid, Squid, but I agree with you. Imagining a shared future can be a useful way of acting in the present to avoid the worst of this oncoming storm. My mycelium networks have been retelling a lecture by Bruno Latour, who says that even though the apocalypse is a bit of a literary trope, the only way to move humans to respond to this storm is by telling stories. By the way, where is our friend the ant, who always brings messages of hope from Bruno Latour?
An ANT scurries in, late to the gathering, but carrying a message of hope from Bruno Latour:
So sorry I’m late. It’s so hard to get anywhere on time on the antway, it’s only one lane. I do come bearing a gift for the anthropologists in the room, that is, from my colleague Bruno Latour, who sends his regards.I know you may have your criticisms of the Anthropocene, but really it is an amazing gift. In the age of the Anthropocene, we are acknowledging that humans are quite literally re-shaping the earth (Latour 2014). The links between humans and non-humans are no longer merely the objects of symbolism and myth (Latour 2014). Many hard scientists are realising they too need to ponder the relationship between physical and cultural anthropology, and the blurring of nature and culture (Latour 2014). The Anthropocene has destabilised the hierarchy between hard sciences and social sciences, relieved anthropologists somewhat of having to question: ‘Are we an art or a science?’ and brought a greater appreciation for the multispecies anthropological work anthropologists like Anna Tsing are doing. Isn’t this exciting?!
Mushroom:
Yes it most certainly is. More enthusiasm for interdisciplinary collaboration is a gift of the Anthropocene. If we compare disciplines to genres, it seems even more obvious (Haraway D et al. 2016, p. 553)! Imagine one discipline is a science fiction novel and the other a mystery novel (Haraway D et al. 2016, p. 553). There’d be no reason to doubt we could have a science fiction mystery novel, would there be (Haraway D et al. 2016, p. 553)?
ANT:
That’s very true, Mushroom. And this sort of collaboration is already happening at AURA (Aarhus University Research on the Anthropo-cene) (Latour et al. 2018, p. 598), which is a hopeful outcome, one that shows us that there isn’t even ‘interdisciplinarity’ in the same sense any more, because there are no longer two sides. In the Anthropocene there is no longer a physical and a cultural side–and humans are the center for everyone and for no one. (Latour 2014). And Bruno is very excited about the opportunity for collaborative work with geo-scientists because their science ‘is not a science of the globe, it is a highly local, pluralised, multiple kind of science (Latour2014b)’ (Latour et al. 2018, p. 597). The epistemology of the globe is what got us in the mess we are in. This epistemology is why perhaps Platationocene is a more productive term to describe this era (Latour et al. 2018, p. 591). Bruno would agree with Donna that the Plantationocene is both useful for the reasons you have stated, Squid, but also because, and I think Anna would agree, ‘it refers to a certain, historically specific, way of appropriating the land, namely an appropriation of land as if land was not there. Plantationocene is a historical ‘de-soilization’ of the Earth’ (Latour et al. 2018, pp. 591-592). The modernist and capitalist project is literally founded on the mass extraction of minerals and plants from the Earth and the removal of people from their lands. Metaphorically humans have also been separated from the Earth with the ideology that humans are outside of nature.
Mushroom: By labeling this new age the Platationocene it shifts our awareness to the need for more analytical work in the field that is ‘soil-rich’, and grounded in the arts of noticing (Latour et al. 2018, pp. 598-599)(Tsing 2015, p. 37). This is what anthropologists do best!
ANT:
Yes, exactly, this highly local and pluralised sort of work (Latour et al. 2018, p. 597)! Except now, the field has also changed. We know that any field study (be that anthropological) will be ‘studying devastated sites in crisis’ (Latour 2014). But don’t be confused, this is still a message of hope. Latour believes that it is best to think we are in the apocalypse now (Latour et al. 2018, p. 601). And yes the apocalypse may be a bit of a literary trope, but rather than being catastrophising, apocalyptic thinking spurs us into action (Latour et al. 2018, pp. 603-604). We are not living in the indifferent time ‘after’ an apocalyptic time, nor are we ignorantly waiting for the apocalypse to happen in the future, but we are in it now (Latour et al. 2018, p. 601). The arrival of the Anthropocene as the apocalypse destroys modernization’s ideas about linear progress that fuel capitalism. It also reveals the entanglements, as you might say Mushroom, across space and time of different species to each other as they face extinction (Latour et al. 2018, pp. 604-605). And these entanglements include humans, and as Squid says, the Anthropocene raises the question of human moral and political responsibility (Latour 2014). I think the key question here for scientists (anthropologists included!) is ‘how do we redistribute human agency without being humanist, or post-humanist, or anti-humanist’ while simultaneously humans have become the center of all of our research and the question of what it means to be human has become blurry, as it is now recognised that we are morally tied to what used to be called ‘beyond the human’ (Latour 2014). The gift of the Anthropocene (and perhaps it is a difficult pill to swallow), in short, is that how we define: time, space, and otherness (Latour 2014)–all very important concepts to anthropologists–and consequently how we define anthropology as a discipline needs to change and be reworked!
References:
Terranova, F. (Dir.). 2016. Donna Haraway: Storytelling for Earthly Survival. Icarus Films.
Latour, B. et al. 2018. ‘Anthropologists are Talking — About Capitalism, Ecology, and Politics’, Ethnos, 83(3): 587-606.
Tsing, A. 2015. The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins, Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press.
It’s a chilly winter evening and you find yourself in a dimly lit basement bar. Smoke from cigarettes is wafting around the room, and you can hear people clicking their fingers to the soft beats of jazz music. It’s an Anthropo Scene gathering. Some of the most outspoken anthropologists, Anna Tsing, Jason W Moore, Donna Haraway and Bruno Latour were unable to attend this gathering, but they have sent envoys to carry their messages. These envoys seem to be posing as undercover social scientists, wearing ill-fitting hip couture in an effort to blend in. They mingle in a corner discussing topics ranging from philosophy to geology to anthropology and you sit at a table nearby and listen eagerly…
What is the Anthropocene?
Anonymous blob wearing dark glasses and a beret: Well, from my understanding, it is a term that was first proposed by atmospheric chemist Paul Crutzen and biologist Eugene Stroermer to the scientific community in 2000 to describe a new geological epoque for the earth (Raffnsøe 2016, p. 3)(Moore, A. 2015, p. 32). The idea is that we have moved into an era where humans have become the most influential factor in global changes–most notably biodiversity loss, climate change and changes in the earth’s fossil record (Raffnsøe 2016, p. 4). It is contested whether this shift began with the Neolithic introduction of farming or much more recently around the time of the Industrial Revolution which caused a massive increase in carbon dioxide levels (Raffnsøe 2016, p. 4)(Tsing 2015, p.19). The shift has also been marked by the testing of nuclear bombs in mid-20th century which disseminated radioactive isotopes all over the globe (Raffnsøe 2016, p. 4). This era is said to continue today and will continue to shape the earth for an indefinite future…
But tell me, what does that mean for anthropology?
Yes, how did this topic of geological science become so influential to social and political sciences?
Mushroom: Excuse me let me introduce myself. I was bred from an old and deep mycelium, to bring us the message of the Anthropocene anthropologist Anna Tsing. Simply put, in the Anthropocene ‘progress’ stops making sense (2015 p. 25). This view of the world that has been clouded by dreams of progress, science, and advancement is destabilised (Tsing 2015, pp. 20-21). And with it, the Enlightenment dualism between nature and culture and humans and nature is brought into question. This realisation that, in the Anthropocene, humans cause more disturbance to the earth, and by extension non-human beings, than other geological forces means that the distinction between humans and nature is blurred.
Anthropology as a discipline is more important now than ever. The progress mentality that drove humans to look ahead has failed us, and instead we need to start looking around (Tsing 2015, p. 22). We need to revitalize arts of noticing (Tsing 2015, p. 37), like ethnography and anthropology more generally. Anna wants me to pass on the message about the very useful concept of assemblage (Tsing 2015, p. 22). Keeping in mind the concept of assemblage helps us to ask how varied species, human and non-human, influence each other (Tsing 2015, pp. 22-23). The nature of the field has changed. Despite the looming ‘anthropos’ of the Anthropocene that refuses to acknowledge our collaborative survival with non-human beings (Tsing 2015, p. 19), the Anthropocene also forces anthropologists to take note of how the focal subjects our study, humans, are entwined in the lifeways outside of ourselves (Tsing 2015, p. 23). It brings anthropologists an appreciation for multi-species and multi-sited ethnographies. Anna also wanted me to read you this quote from Ursula K. Le Guin:
‘I am not proposing a return to the Stone Age. My intent is not reactionary, nor even conservative, but simply subversive. It seems that the utopian imagination is trapped, like capitalism and industrialism and the human population, in a one-way future consisting only of growth. All I’m trying to do is figure out how to put a pig on the tracks.’ (Tsing 2015, p. 17)
Perhaps the work of anthropologists in the Anthropocene can be that pig on the tracks, to persuade humanity to stop and look around.
Spider: Let me cut in here, I’m a spider who crept out of Jason Moore’s book “Capitalism and The Web of Life”. I’m here to talk about how Jason Moore thinks the concept of the “Anthropocene” needs to be reframed (2015). I agree that what we are seeing an unprecedented climate emergency, but the name “Anthropocene” can be used be humans to evade responsibility and create apathy. We have even seen corporations hijack the word “Anthropocene” by using it as a buzz word to suggest human exceptionalism. For example, look at this article in The Economist where the Anthropocene is elevated as giving “humans an unexpected promotion—to the status of geological movers and shakers” (The Economist 2016). The reason that the planetary life support system is dying is because of capitalism, a political and economic system that values profit and an uneven distribution of resources.
My suggestion is to rename this era the “capitalocene”, but I’m not just arguing “about replacing one word with another” (Moore 2015, 81). We need to reframe the thinking around it as well. Theorists of the Anthropocene are trying to collapse the old dualisms such as nature/culture. Yet placing emphasis on the idea that it is human activity that is destroying an external nature is also dualistic. Humans aren’t an external force that are impacting the natural world, they are inextricably linked together in the earth system, like it’s just one big web. Capitalism as a socio-economic system is also part of this web, and it is the growth of capitalism is what has caused colossal imbalances in the Earth system.
Anthropocene theorists haven’t quite acknowledged this, although they have tried to overcome dualistic thinking by using new terms such as “assemblages”. I disagree that these theoretical tools are able to destabilise the capitalistic categorisation of nature as a resource external to humans. Post modernist concepts such as “assemblage” diffuse knowledge and make it harder to locate the power imbalances that are destroying living systems (Moore 2015, 5). If we describe the source of climate destruction as the entire human race, as the name “Anthropocene” suggests, then the corporations and countries who contribute the most to climate destruction are let off the hook. The worst experiences of the climate emergency will be in countries who don’t have the infrastructure to cope with extreme climates, which is unfair because it is the Global West and large corporations who contribute the most carbon emissions. The term “Capitolocene” highlights these contradictions.
Moore, A. 2015. ‘Anthropocene anthropology: reconceptualizing contemporary global change’, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 22(1): 27-46.
Moore, J W. 2015. Capitalism in the web of life: ecology and the accumulation of capital. London:Verso Press.
Moore, J W. 2017. The Capitalocene, Part I: on the nature and origins of our ecological crisis, The Journal of Peasant Studies, 44(3): 594-630.
Tsing, A. 2015. The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins, Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press.
Raffnsøe, S. 2016. Philosophy of the anthropocene : the human turn, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan.
Ethnography these days can be like a jumble of different genres, including poetry, prose, narrative, memoirs and other forms of experimental writing. This pastiche captures anthropology as an art form rather than as a science.
The term ethnography means to write about people. Most early ethnography tried to seem objective by using constructions such as the passive tense, third person pronouns and scientific terminology (Maynard and Cahnmann-Taylor 2010, 2). Yet this detached tone was misleading, since ethnographers are individuals with distinct experiences who can only ever create interpretations of social reality. Since Geertz argued that anthropology is more of an art form, many ethnographers have written “thick description” and embraced their subjectivity by and being reflective of their own position (1979).
Anthropologists such as Adrie Kusserow, Nomi Stone, Michael Jackson, Ivan Brady and Renato Rosaldo have been using poetry to represent their perspectives in ethnography since the 1980s (Maynard and Cahnmann-Taylor 2010, 5). The Society for Humanistic Anthropology also runs an annual poetry competition, to prompt anthropologists to explore the interests of their discipline in other literary forms. Poetry already shares many of the same seeds of cultural anthropology, it is based on human experiences and representation.
Ethnographic poetry is not to be confused with the analysis of poetry within ethnography. Some ethnographers analyse the metaphor and literary forms of a culture, whereas other ethnographers use poetry as a literary genre to convey their experiences during field work. Clearly some ethnographic texts are more suitable to use poetry than others. When encountering a poem nestled in an ethnography, the reader might wonder why the anthropologist doesn’t just pursue poetry as a separate practice, rather than trying to be like a renaissance figure who tries to dabble in a bit of everything. Poetry is an abstract form that might cause misunderstanding for anthropologists who are trying to describe elements of human culture.
But if we assume that anthropology is not just about advancing knowledge, but an attempt to capture and translate other life rhythms and experiences, then poetry is a good fit for anthropology. If everything that could have been known has been known before, there are only “new ways of making them felt- of examining what those ideas feel like being lived” (Lorde 1977, 250). Lorde considers poetry the “revelatory distillation of experience” (248). It should never be considered as a luxury practice that is hidden away in private notebooks (248), just as anthropologists should not be limited to rigid writing styles to circulate within the confines of their ivory towers. For example, the anthropologist Ruth Benedict published her poetry under the name “Anne Singleton”, to avoid scrutiny from Franz Boaz and her other academic associates, who didn’t take poetry seriously (Maynard and Cahnmann-Taylor 2010, 5). The potential of poetry to capture insights into human experience is clear in the following poem of anthropologist and poet Adrie Kusserow (2016, 27-28):
Thirty-One, Anthropologist, No
Gods Left,
If meaning has shape,
then I am searching for a bowl of it.
[….]
I don’t know anything anymore
except this:
If Knowledge came to me
in the thickest part of the night,
woke me with a flashlight,
asked me, What do you know?
I would say, nothing, nothing at all,
except diving, and loving this world.
There is plenty of academic writing in ethnography that unfortunately leaves the reader feeling indifferent, alienated or bored. Even the subjects of ethnography, whether people or places, can become “frozen in time” (Kusserow 2013, n.p). Poetry in ethnography can capture the flashes of perception that ethnographers experience. This can have a jolting effect, by displacing the reader from a sense of comfort and reserved distance. For this reason, ethnographers should accept poetic licence as a gift.
References:
Tyler, S. 1984, The Poetic Turn in Postmodern Anthropology: The Poetry of Paul Friedrich. American Anthropologist,86(2), new series. pp 328-336
Geertz, Clifford. 1973, “Thick Description: Toward an Interpretive Theory of Culture.” In The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays. New York: Basic Books. pp 3–30.
Maynard, K, Cahnmann‐Taylor, M. 2010, Anthropology at the Edge of Words: Where Poetry and Ethnography Meet. Anthropology and Humanism, Vol. 35, Issue 1, pp 2–19,
Kusserow, A. 2016, A Different Kind of Ethnography: Imaginative Practices and Creative Methodologies. Edited by Elliott, D and Culhane, D. pp 27- 29.
Lorde, A. 1977, “Poetry Is Not A Luxury”. Chrysalis: A Magazine of Female Culture. Pp 248-250.
You’ve been lured this far by a clickbait title, so I’m going to use this space to talk about something that I find exciting in current anthropology; activists who are using ethnography to reinforce their social justice agendas.
This seems against the aims of anthropology though?! Can you even be an activist and an anthropologist? My feeling is that anthropology actually has a distinct capacity to take a stance and make change in the world, through the practice of ethnography.
First, lets take a trip back a few years when the anthropologist Nancy Scheper-Hughes rejected anthropology’s aspirations for extreme cultural relativism and objectivity, in favour of taking a moral stance in her ethnographic fieldwork (1995). She endeavoured to stand in solidarity with the communities she was studying, by being a witness to suffering and exploitation. Scheper-Hughes entered Brazil initially as an aid worker, which involved working with the community to ensure better infrastructure, workers rights and healthcare. Then later on in her life, she re-entered this same community as an anthropologist, but she felt disillusioned at the pressure to remain a detached and objective observer. Her work shows that there are the sides of the oppressor and the oppressed, and to not act in the face of suffering is to take the side of the oppressor. Scheper-Hughes believes it seems like a perpetuation of the colonial underpinnings of anthropology when ethnographers try to only be objective and detached from the communities they study.
Since Scheper-Hughes’ call for a militant anthropology, Juris has argued that anthropologists also have a role in alleviating oppression by using ethnography as a tool to build better resistance movements (2008). What Juris and other activist anthropologists advocate for is creating a feedback loop in ethnography, where the data is circulated within the community of participants to improve their practice. This could be a way of bringing anthropology back to a grounded level, rather than the problematic cycle of extracting knowledge from participants for audiences in the ivory tower of academia. Activists use the anthropological delights of thick description and complete participant observation, as insider ethnographers. This means that they can give feedback about social organisation and effective communication to activist communities that they usually already belong to. This type of ethnography is called “ethnography of resistance” (Urla & Helepololei 2014, 431) and the subjects of these studies are usually participants in resistance movements against capitalism and neo-liberal globalisation. Ethnography is a perfect tool for improving social justice movements, it shows the nuanced lives and interactions of subjects whilst also highlighting places where collective effervescence could be strengthened. The very practice of ethnography is a model of how to build a better world, it involves trying to understand and work with other people, and then giving their ideas back, “not as prescriptions, but as contributions, possibilities—as gifts” (Graeber 2004, 11). Some recent examples of activist ethnographers include Graeber (2002, 2009), Maeckelbergh (2018), Juris (2008) and Tominaga (2017).
Activist ethnography is distinguished from other types of ethnography through the position of the ethnographer, for example ethnographers who are activists will usually observe as a complete participant, whilst being very explicit about their position as a member of the group they are studying. Many anthropologists in activist spaces also choose to not do interviews, because the participants do not want to be “subjects”, or because there are power imbalances in interviews that do not work well in anti-hierarchical organising collectives. It could also be because subjects are in positions where they need to remain anonymous. Another way of making ethnography more accessible to social movements is by publishing them in journals that don’t necessitate institutional access. It can involve using forms that aren’t journals to distribute them easily, including zines, social media and blogs… come and join the ranks of your fellow anthro-blog-ists!
David Graeber is an anthropologist who writes with thick description as opposed to using a lot of theory. His works are largely focussed on accessibility, targeting a popular audience. For example, Graeber’s ethnography “Direct Action” depicts the social relations of the Occupy Wall Street movement, whilst avoiding jargon and theory dumps in the text (2009). His vision for anthropology is that it could create a constant dialogue between the ethnographic project and the utopian vision (Graeber 2004, 12).
I’m excited at the possibility that activists can use ethnography and claim it as a grounded method to build a better world, rather than just watching the problems of the world from a distance. Anthropology also has a place in resisting the problems of colonialism and capitalism that it once contributed to.
References:
Graeber, D. 2004, Fragments of an anarchist anthropology. Prickly Paradigm Press ; distributed by University of Chicago
Graeber, D. 2009, Direct action. [electronic resource] : an ethnography. AK Press.
Juris, J. 2008, Networking Futures: The Movements Against Corporate Globalisation. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
Maeckelbergh, M., 2018, “Don’t Get Arrested!” Trust, Miscommunication, and Repression at the 2008 Anti-G8 Mobilization in Japan. Political and Legal Anthropology Reveiw, 41(1). Pp 124-141.
McCurdy, P., & Uldam, J. 2014, Connecting Participant Observation Positions: Toward a Reflexive Framework for Studying Social Movements. Field Methods, 26(1), 40–55.
Scheper Hughes, N. 1995, “The Primacy of the Ethical: Propositions for a Militant Anthropology.” Current Anthropology 36: 3.
Sutherland, N., 2013, Social movements and activist ethnography. Organization, 20(4). Pp 1-45
Urla, J. Helepololei, J. 2014, “The Ethnography of Resistance Then and Now: On Thickness and Activist Engagement in the Twenty-First Century.” History and Anthropology: Rethinking Resistance in the 21st Century. Volume 25, Issue 4.Pp 431-451
As an anthropology student, ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ is a great movie to watch for all the wrong reasons. Left in a state of despair and loneliness after the end of her marriage, Gilbert (played by Julia Roberts) embarks on a journey of self-discovery where she ‘eats’ in Italy, stays at an ashram to ‘pray’ in India and finds her one true ‘love’ in Bali.
Where did we get this idea that travel = self-discovery? According to Savage (2013, p. 28) travelling for leisure is a “historical anomaly.” Technology allows us to see the world in a way that was once impossible. If planes and trains didn’t exist would it be impossible to find our truest self?
In addition, solo travel (the epitome of self-discovery) is culturally specific. Carroll (2009) claims that mere consideration of ‘solo travel’ is seen as highly ‘illogical’ for many Lao travelers. Travelling in a group simply makes more ‘sense’ because it provides “social security” and reduces the overall cost because expenses are shared (Carroll 2009, p. 285).
The argument I am trying to make here is that the way we understand ‘self-discovery’ is specific to a certain context and point in time. This notion of self-discovery does not exist everywhere and it is a fairly recent development. This is true of many concepts, but I believe it is especially important that we understand the extent to which ‘self-discovery’ is socially constructed. Self discovery is often conflated with phrases like ‘becoming more aware’, ‘evolving’ and ‘reflecting.’ It therefore seems contradictory to reflect on the self, without reflecting on where this notion that we must find the self came from in the first place.
The kind of journey of ‘self-discovery’ I’m talking about here is also an issue of class and race. Benedetto (2012, p. 34) highlights a major contradiction in Gilbert’s journey, that is she reflects on everything except for her “white privilege.” Throughout the movie Gilbert speaks about the “the commonality of humanity” and positions herself as an authority on everyone’s suffering and life experience (ibid.). For example, the film’s opening lines:
I have a friend, Deborah,a psychologist who was asked by the city of Philadelphia if she could offer psychological counselling to Cambodian refugees…boat people, who had recently arrived in the city. Deborah was daunted by the task. These Cambodians had suffered genocide, starvation, relatives murdered before their eyes…years in refugee camps, harrowing boat trips to the West. How could she relate to their suffering? How could she help these people? So guess what all these people wanted to talk about with my friend Deborah, the psychologist. It was all, “I met this guy in the refugee camp. I thought he really loved me, but when we got separated, he took up with my cousin. Now he says he loves me and keeps calling me. They’re married now. What should l do?” This is how we are.
What films like ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ have created is a “recipe for obtaining enlightenment” which guarantees the traveler “cultural capital” upon return home (Badone 2016, p. 39). In Gilbert’s case she becomes an expert on the human condition: “This is how we are…” Gilbert’s quest for self-realization is achieved through a number of romanticized and reductive depictions of the people she meets along the way. For instance, Gilbert journeys to India because of her attraction to the “radiantly beautiful Indian woman” (Chandra 2015, p. 502). There is an underlying assumption that the ‘spiritually endowed’ Indian woman must heal the ‘spiritually desolate’ American woman (ibid.). The ‘exotic’ people Gilbert meets (including a traditional Balinese healer named Wayan) fade into a “reductive backdrop” where their only purpose is to ‘enlighten’ Gilbert (Benedetto 2012, p. 5).
‘Spiritual voyages’ are often juxtaposed against mass tourism, however, the popularity of ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ has resulted in a watershed of commercial opportunities. Intrepid Travel (2018) have recently “built the ultimate Eat, Pray, Love journey of self-discovery” which promises to be a “life-changing adventure.”
After reading so far you may have come to the conclusion that I think we cannot learn anything about ourselves through travel, but that is certainly not the case! Here is where I stand – I believe that travel challenges us in many ways; we are forced out of our everyday routines and can encounter situations which feel strange and foreign. This in turn can lead us to reflect on our ‘normal’ lives back home and perhaps see how limited our worldview was before going abroad. We may also reflect on the self because we can see how deeply our cultural context has shaped our identity.
What I perceive to be the ‘real’ issue with journey’s of self-discovery is when they become reliant on problematic and reductive imaginings of the people we encounter. Stasch (2016, p. 11) argues that travellers sometimes fall into the trap of observing people like they are in a “human zoo.” Tourists become fascinated with the exotic ‘Other’ because they resemble humanity’s “primitive” and “archaic past” (ibid.). When we generalize and stereotype cultures we start to adopt an ‘ethnocentric’ gaze – which as an anthropology major is most likely your worst nightmare! At the end of the day we are all human, and humans who have been raised in particular cultural context (or several) and that has influenced the way we understand the world and other people. No matter how hard we try, can we ever really be ‘objective.’ I personally think not, but I do believe we all have a responsibility to be self-aware of what our biases might be, especially when it comes to journeys of ‘self-discovery.’
References:
Badone, E 2016, ‘Eat, Pray, Love and Tourism Imaginaries’, in L Beaman S Sikka (eds), Constructions Of Self And Other in Yoga, Travel, And Tourism: A Journey To Elsewhere, Springer International Publishing, pp. 37-43.
Benedetto, GD 2012, ‘The Punitive Theatre of the Western Gaze: Staging Orientalism in Eat Pray Love’, International Communication Association, pp. 1-38.
Carroll, C 2009, ‘My Mother’s Bestfriend’s Sister-in-Law is Coming With Us’, Asia on tour: exploring the rise of Asian tourism, Routledge, pp. 277-290.
Savage, E 2013, ‘Confessions of a Fat, Exploitative Tourist’, Eureka Street, vol. 23, no. 21, pp. 28-29.
Stasch, R 2016, ‘Dramas of Otherness: “First Contact” Tourism in New Guinea’, HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory, vol. 6, np. 3, pp. 7-27.
Feel like reading another rant on the perils of travel? See also:
Anthrozine 