Dear colleagues,

Thank you very much for this discussion and all the thoughtful 
contributions! (but please try not to reply with the whole thread in 
each message, very cumbersome to read, thanks!)

I would like to add a more historizised approach to the problem of 
‘Western’/‘non-Western’ anthropology. And I think that 
white/male/western is not the root of the problem but just symptoms.

The German word ‘Anthropologie’ was used from the 17th-19th centuries as 
‘science of human beings’ in a sense very close to medicine. Just around 
the end of the 19th century, ‘Völkerkunde’, ‘ethnologie’ (french), and 
‘anthropology’ became ‘studies of the other’. Note also that much of 
19th century ‘anthro’ was based on historical interest: if we 
(Europeans) understand how “primitive peoples“, allegedly conserved 
since stone age, live today, we may gain understanding of our own past 
development to a “higher culture“.

Plus, as de l'Estoile (2008) noted, anthropology as the study of the 
‘other’ is not only embedded in, but a necessary part of the colonial 
project (whether British, Japanese, Russian, etc). It has ever been a 
tool of domination, and – like it or not – it still is. To decolonize 
anthropology, abolish it. Sounds a bit polemic, but the only way I can 
see for reconciliation, is that we (anthropologists of the world) find 
comfort in being part of the dominating. A psychotherapy for the 
discipline – you can't change it, get used to it, embrace it, and 
transform it to something positive.

I've been working a lot with indigenous people and some gave me often 
surprising and often brillant explanations about the world, people, and 
‘the West’. But however convincing, logical, and well embedded in 
indigenous epistemologies these explanations are, they are not 
‘anthropology’, because the power of discourse is at my side, and only 
when I write, tell, and translate these explanations, I am the one doing 
‘anthropology’.

If those who are dominated try to investigate the way of life of the 
dominating, then they are usually either caught as spies, assimilated, 
ignored, or employed by anthropologists. Only if they do the ‘training’, 
learn the discourse of domination, and become an anthropologist, then 
they ‘can do it’, ‘can be it’, then they're ‘one of us’ (see the 
Appadurai example and so many more).

So we can choose either to play the postcolonial game, to speak as 
Spivak did, ‘as if’ we spoke for the subaltern who cannot speak for 
themselves (at least not as anthropologists), and go on spiralling in 
academic elitism; or to withdraw: this makes me feel uncomfortable, I'm 
out. Or, as noted above, acknowledge our position of power in the 
colonial/capitalist ‘world system’ and make something out of it.

I can see some danger of ‘epistemological hypochondry’ (Sahlins, hey) 
when circling through discussions of decolonisation. The world is 
colonial, and though the ‘classical’ colonial military control of 
foreign regions and their people has mostly given way to a capitalist 
and digitalized ‘neocolonial’ control through companies (nevertheless 
usually at home in former ‘imperialist’ countries), I think we have to 
live with it.

So I don't think that an anthropology from beyond anthropology is 
possible (that would be real decolonization). Therefore, I suggest that 
although we probably can't decolonize anthropology, we can still make it 
better, more ethical, more useful, more equal. We can make it much, much 
better, still.

Best wishes from Austria,
Bernd

_____________________

Bernd Brabec de Mori
anthropologist & musicologist
mailto: [log in to unmask]
phoneto: +4368110238660

*************************************************************
*           Anthropology-Matters Mailing List
*  http://www.anthropologymatters.com            *
* A postgraduate project comprising online journal,    *
* online discussions, teaching and research resources  *
* and international contacts directory.               *
* To join this list or to look at the archived previous       *
* messages visit:                                             *
* https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/Anthropology-Matters   *
* If you have ALREADY subscribed: to send a message to all    *
* those currently subscribed to the list,just send mail to:   *
*        [log in to unmask]                  *
*                                                             *
*       Enjoyed the mailing list? Why not join the new        *
*       CONTACTS SECTION @ www.anthropologymatters.com        *
*    an international directory of anthropology researchers *

To unsubscribe please click here:
https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?SUBED1=ANTHROPOLOGY-MATTERS&A=1

***************************************************************