Engaged Anthropology

In this article, I explore the role of anthropology and anthropologists in unsettling orthodoxies and provoking disquiet with taken for granted ways of thinking and doing. Set against the backdrop of the debates about engaged anthropology, my interest is in exploring an approach to anthropology that takes anthropological practice seriously and with it the role of the anthropologist as activist and agent of change. I argue that the work of the anthropologist is not just to do fieldwork and produce texts, but that "engagement" has a more interactive dimension. By acting anthropologically, I suggest, anthropologists can be activists in ways and in settings that are distinct from the kinds of engagement envisaged in contemporary debates on "engaged", "activist" and "public" anthropology, as well as the modes of practice characteristic of "applied" anthropology. I draw on fragments of auto-ethnography to explore what the idea of acting anthropologically might offer within as well as outside the academy.

This paper explores the role of anthropological expertise in shaping the outcome of legal proceedings under conditions of cultural diversity. Taking the state-driven land-restitution process in post-apartheid South Africa as its point of reference, the text reflects upon the work of anthropological experts in a number of cases and shows how their theoretical and political stances shaped the trajectories of their legal engagements. Pointing towards frictions that emerge in acts of translation between the seemingly objectivist rhetoric evoked in court and more relativist and subjectivist stances within the academy, the paper revisits and problematises debates around strategic essentialism. Sketching instead the contours of a 'recursive anthropology' that expresses itself in terms of a post-positivist universalism, the paper turns on the author's use of his own expertise in support of a White land claim, probing-and critically reflecting upon-the practical potential of a form of expertise grounded in such a recursive anthropology.

Italy has been the European country first struck and most heavily affected by COVID-19. Exploring the outbreak’s impact on
the migration reception system in Bologna, Emilia-Romagna region, we show how anthropological tools have been applied to
mitigate public health misunderstandings and the effects of legislative measures among vulnerable mothers, asylum seekers,
and refugees. Following a description of the legal horizon and migrant reception systems, we explore the gaps in representations
of COVID-19 containment measures. By observing the underlying structures of social inequality and the relationship between
individual/social/political bodies, this essay offers an ethnographically grounded analysis. It investigates how the outbreak has
been experienced and represented by vulnerable migrants—diseased adult men, sex trafficked, and mothers migrants—living in
reception structures. Although their experiences differ with gender, age, and material conditions, they all show what is at stake:
the cultural diffraction of disease representations and symbolic meanings according to a visible/invisible conceptualization in
particular institutional forms. Monitoring the social pandemic and local response to COVID-19, we shed light on the reconfiguring
of sociocultural beliefs and people’s lived experience of containment measures, quarantine, and prescribed behaviors.

This paper explores the tensions and resonances between academic and non-academic approaches to scholarly knowledge through fieldwork conducted at an NGO that promotes the rights of lesbian, bisexual, and female-to-male transgender people in Eastern India. I analyse both productive and frustrated exchanges between activists and academics from the activists' point of view and make the following two arguments: Firstly, I argue that interpretations, developments, and uses of knowledge instigated by non-academics must be taken seriously by academics even when they are in tension with the dominant academic understanding of that knowledge. Secondly, and expanding upon this argument, I go on to suggest that academics should consciously seek to write in a style and tone that does not assume extensive shared specialist knowledge, in order to open up fertile scholarly ideas more fully for engagement with those outside academia or within different disciplines and sub-specialisms of scholarship.

Tal como ocurre con otros casos de “colonialismo de poblamiento”, las narrativas fundacionales uruguayas afirman que tras la masacre de Salsipuedes de 1831 no quedaron indígenas en su territorio. Sin embargo, desde fines de los años ochenta asistimos a un proceso creciente de reemergencia de personas y colectivos que se autoidentifican como charrúas. En este trabajo sostenemos que la lógica de eliminación, que trasciende el imaginario uruguayo y que se refleja en mecanismos de despojo y de desmembramiento de los pueblos indígenas, favoreció la formación de identidades subterráneas como un modo de resistencia. A partir de interacciones y de saberes generados durante nuestros recorridos en la campaña uruguaya, en los que fuimos recolectando historias de familias indígenas, exploraremos cómo las investigaciones colaborativas influyen en el proceso de reemergencia charrúa. Este tipo de metodología favorece la colectivización de las experiencias de núcleos indígenas subterráneos debido a que propicia vínculos e instancias de comunicación entre los participantes y, por lo tanto, abre posibilidades para el fortalecimiento de una identidad colectiva. De este modo, el nuevo contexto de reemergencia invalida la tesis de la extinción indígena ligada al imaginario (colono)nacional y permite no sólo la manifestación pública de narrativas contrahegemónicas sino también la reconstitución del pueblo charrúa.

Antropologia "teorica" e antropologia applicata costituiscono due mo-dalità differenti di avvalersi delle metodologie e conoscenze disciplinari il cui rapporto, soprattutto in Europa e in Italia, è stato controverso e conflittuale. Il volume, attraverso esempi etnografici frutto sia di ricerche sul campo sia di consulenze condotte in Brasile, Cile e Italia, si propone di offrire un contributo per tentare di superare le barriere che hanno ostacolato il dialogo fra questi due "mondi". Ciò non significa sottovalutare, bensì analizzare approfonditamente, le specificità che caratterizzano entrambi gli ambiti e in particolare le ardue sfi-de che i progetti di antropologia applicata mettono di fronte al ricercatore. Tuttavia proprio le evidenze etnografiche hanno permesso di comprendere quanti problemi di ordine politico, etico e deontologico interessino inaspet-tatamente allo stesso modo i due campi. In entrambi, infatti, emergono oggi con sempre maggior frequenza questioni relative al coinvolgimento del ricer-catore nel contesto di indagine. L'autore, anche grazie al contributo delle elaborazioni teorico-politiche fornite dalle scuole antropologiche latino-americane e, in primis, da quella brasiliana caratterizzata da uno stretto legame fra antropologia teorica e appli-cata, si propone un duplice obiettivo. Il primo è quello di offrire suggerimenti utili sulle strategie e il posizionamento da adottare di fronte a tali sfide. Mentre il secondo prevede di restituire la complessità di temi quali: l'indipendenza del ricercatore durante il lavoro sul campo, il suo ruolo nel dibattito e nella sfera pubblica, gli spazi di negoziazione con tutti gli attori coinvolti nei progetti, la libertà di utilizzare le metodologie caratterizzanti la disciplina e di proporre riflessioni critiche oltre che rielaborazioni teoriche approfondite.

The Katukina (Noke Koi) people have their territory within the state of Acre in Brazil. Their first contact with Western society was in the late 19th century, when migrants traveled through the Amazon basin in search of rubber trees. Since then they have been in permanent contact, first helping the rubber tappers and bosses as guides, hunters and in the production of rubber. The recent success of neighbouring peoples in obtaining resources from NGO projects has awakened in the leaders the interest of doing something similar and thus promoting through “culture” the entry of resources in their land. This article will discuss the spontaneous collaboration between anthropologist and the Noke Koi to founding an association. From the ethnographic encounter we will be able to analyse the complexity of the relations between indigenous people and the surrounding society as well as what our interlocutors really seek when engaging in these emerging activities.

Tailored for general audience at 2017 Chiang Mai Design Week (CMDW2017).

เวิร์กช็อปประกอบด้วย 3 ส่วน คือ แนวคิดกระบวนการคิกเชิงออกแบบ กรณีศึกษาการคิดเชิงออกแบบ กระบวนการ และนวัตกรรม และเวิร์กช็อป โดยเปิดให้ทุกคนที่สนใจในหัวข้อนี้โดยไม่จำกัดอายุ ประสบการณ์ และอาชีพ

ผู้เข้าร่วมจะได้เรียนรู้หลักการสำคัญในกระบวนการคิดเชิงออกแบบและกฎการระดมความคิดพื้นฐานจากการอธิบายผ่านตัวอย่างต่างๆ รวมทั้งได้ทดลองการระดมความคิดและทดลองทำต้นแบบอย่างรวดเร็ว เรียนรู้วิธีการเล่าเรื่องและทดลองปฏิบัติจริง ผู้เข้าร่วมจะได้เรียนรู้การใช้กระบวนการความคิดเชิงออกแบบในการประยุกต์ใช้ชีวิตประจำวัน อาชีพการงาน และทัศนคติต่อไป

ดร.นน อัครประเสริฐกุล เป็นอาจารย์อาวุโสประจำมหาวิทยาลัยซิดนีย์ เขากำลังพัฒนาแนวทางการสอนแบบใหม่และกระบวนการวิจัยที่ใช้ความร่วมมือระหว่างการวิจัยทางมานุษยวิทยาและกระบวนการคิดเชิงออกแบบออกแบบ และทำงานวิจัยในลักษณะสหวิทยาการระหว่างการออกแบบกับสังคมศาสตร์ ดร.นน จบการศึกษาจากหลายสถาบันดังนี้ PhD & MA (Harvard University); MPhil (The University of Oxford); SMArchS and Urban Design Certificate (Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Resumen: Nina S. de Friedemann (1930-1998) fue una antropóloga pública. Ella ejerció la investigación comprometida, con miras a la justicia social para los grupos de base con quienes colaboró y estudió. Fue una investigadora que se anticipó en cinco décadas a la antropología pública de las académicas noratlánticas. Nina S. de Friedemann también es pionera en los estudios afrocolombianos y en la antropología visual. Su énfasis profesional radicó en documentar y defender las contribuciones culturales de las poblaciones negras a la identidad de una Colombia étnicamente diversa. La obra de esta pionera fue fundamental. Inspiró a líderes de las comunidades negras en sus reivindicaciones que culminaron en la Ley 70 de 1993, también conocida como la ley de negritudes. Sus materiales de investigación se encuentran en la Biblioteca Luis Ángel Arango con el nombre Fondo Nina S. de Friedemann, un repositorio ahora catalogado y disponible para su estudio. En el contexto del lanzamiento del fondo, Greta Friedemann-Sánchez reflexionó sobre el legado de Nina S. de Friedmann, su madre, como académica comprometida públicamente. Revisó materiales inéditos, correspondencia, publicaciones y fotografías de Nina S. de Friedemann. Este artículo revisa tres pilares del legado ético de Friedemann. El primero es el registro y documentación de los datos de investigación e incidencia pública. El segundo es el registro histórico y público de la aplicación de la investigación al beneficio directo de las necesidades de las personas. El tercero es la repatriación de los resultados de investigación en una variedad de registros para difundirlos a un amplio conjunto de audiencias con el objetivo de cambiar las normas culturales y promover políticas públicas para la justicia social. Estos pilares se revisan dentro del marco normativo contemporáneo de protección de los sujetos humanos y el contexto histórico durante el cual ejerció esta antropóloga.

Palabras clave: antropología colombiana, antropología comprometida, antropología pública, archivos históricos, ética.

Public and Engaged Anthropology: The Legacy of Nina S. de Friedemann

Abstract: Nina S. de Friedemann (1930-1998) was a public anthropologist. She practiced engaged research, with a view to promoting social justice for the communities with whom she collaborated and studied, and she anticipated the public anthropology of the North Atlantic academia by five decades. Nina S. de Friedemann was a pioneer in Afro-Colombian studies and in visual anthropology. Her professional emphasis was on documenting and defending the cultural contributions of black populations to the identity of an ethnically diverse Colombia. The work of this pioneer was fundamental and inspired leaders of the black communities in their demands that culminated in Law 70 of 1993, also known as the ley de negritudes. Her research materials are housed at the Luis Ángel Arango Library under the name Fondo Nina S. de Friedemann, a repository now cataloged and available for study. In the context of the fund’s launch, Greta Friedemann-Sánchez reflected on her mother’s legacy as a publicly engaged scholar. She reviewed unpublished materials, correspondence, publications, and photographs by Nina S. de Friedemann. This article reviews three pillars of Friedemann’s ethical legacy: the recording and documentation of research and public advocacy data, the historical and public record of the application of research to the direct benefit of people’s needs, and the repatriation of research results in a variety of registers to disseminate results to a broad range of audiences in an attempt to change cultural norms and promote public policies for social justice. These pillars are reviewed within the contemporary normative framework for the protection of human subjects and the historical context during which she worked as an anthropologist.

Keywords: Colombian anthropology, engaged anthropology, ethics, historical archives, public anthropology.

Antropologia pública e comprometida: o legado de Nina S. de Friedemann

Resumo: Nina S. de Friedemann (1930-1998) foi uma antropóloga pública que exerceu a pesquisa comprometida, com vistas à justiça social para os grupos de base com os quais colaborou e estudou. Foi uma pesquisadora que antecipou em cinco décadas à antropologia pública das acadêmicas do Atlântico Norte. Nina S. de Friedemann também é pioneira nos estudos afro-colombianos e na antropologia visual. Sua ênfase profissional se encontra em documentar e defender as contribuições culturais das populações negras para a identidade de uma Colômbia etnicamente diversa. Sua obra foi fundamental, pois inspirou líderes das comunidades em suas reinvindicações que culminaram na Lei 70 de 1993, conhecida como “ley de negritudes”. Seus materiais de pesquisa se encontram na Biblioteca Luis Ángel Arango, Colômbia, com o nome “Fondo Nina S. de Friedemann”, um repositório agora catalogado e disponível para estudo. No contexto do lançamento do fundo, Greta Friedemann-Sánchez refletiu sobre o legado de Nina S. de Friedmann, sua mãe, como acadêmica comprometida publicamente. Revisou materiais inéditos, correspondência, publicações e fotografias de Nina S. de Friedemann. Neste artigo, são revisados três pilares do legado ético de Friedemann. O primeiro é o registro e a documentação dos dados de pesquisa e incidência pública. O segundo é o registro histórico e público da aplicação da pesquisa ao benefício direto das necessidades das pessoas. O terceiro é a repatriação dos resultados de pesquisa numa variedade de registros para difundi-los a um amplo conjunto de audiências com o objetivo de mudar as normas culturais e promover políticas públicas para a justiça social. Esses pilares são revisados no âmbito legal contemporâneo de proteção dos sujeitos humanos e do contexto histórico em que trabalhou como antropóloga.

Palavras-chave: antropologia colombiana, antropologia comprometida, antropologia pública, arquivos históricos, ética.

In times of the COVID-19 pandemic, in which the ethnographic exercise becomes, at times, prohibitive, other ways of acting are presented to anthropologists, whose job presupposes their insertion in networks of native relations. The transit through these networks, undertaken ethnographically, becomes useful to address problems presented by research interlocutors in situation of vulnerability. In this brief report, I present my experience of engaged anthropology with immigrants and refugees in the city of São Paulo. It highlights the experience with migrants living in the municipality of Guaianases, and my performance in the Health Care Network for Immigrants and Refugees. Finally, I argue that ethnography is a politically implicated activity, and that addressing problems presented by our research interlocutors are not filigree of the anthropologist's work, and locate him in this network of relationships in which he is inserted, evidencing their agencing by research subjects. keywords COVID-19. Immigrants. Refugees. Health.

In the early 20th century, a colonial, and nowadays unpopular, vision of anthropology promoted the documentation of local knowledge for academic audiences. In the early 21st century, engaged anthropology is challenging this unidirectional flow of knowledge, encouraging a reverse process of translation from academic language into local (or indigenous) meaningful terms. Making academic knowledge available to indigenous respondents-cum-interlocutors often requires such an act of translation: a commitment undertaken by the anthropologist to share or ‘communicate back’ (in an easily comprehensible form) academic interpretations of ethnography about local/indigenous histories or cultural practices, which may have been, in some cases, partially forgotten, or fallen out of use.

This paper attempts the historiographical analysis of the caste as it reflects in Sindhi progressive literature and rural politics. In an attempt to reframe the harmonious image of Sindhi society, the Progressives popularised certain slogans, phrases and historical events as the metaphors of the nationalist and class struggle. Tracing from the early Partition phase (the 1940s), this paper interrogates the progressive’s orientalist literary trajectory that reframes caste metaphors and constructs the Sindhi nationalist narrative. It is contended that the reframing of some key historical events of Dalits and peasants seem uncritical and apologetic of caste friction, create an illusion of neutrality and at times even sanction casteism as a functional aspect of Sindhi society. The ‘progressive’ literature condones caste hierarchies and flattens the question of caste adding to the pre-existing hegemonic relations between the historically dominant and the subordinated
caste groups. This diminishes the possibility of deploying the framework of caste-as-class for understanding caste, organising Dalits reckoning their agency as it may shape their immanent narratives and subverting caste hierarchies.

A public policy report that addresses a major element of the Trump administration's border and immigration plans.

https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/why-caution-needed-hiring-additional-border-patrol-agents-and-ice-officers

The last time the Border Patrol received a large infusion of money to hire thousands of new agents, cases of corruption and misconduct spiked in the agency. New hires were not sufficiently vetted, novice agents were not adequately supervised, and agents who abused their authority acted with impunity. Now the Trump administration wants to repeat history by hiring thousands of additional Border Patrol agents, as well as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers, without introducing the reforms and safeguards needed to avoid the abuses and scandals of the past. Corruption is likely to ensue from such a rapid acceleration in hiring, problems which could easily be averted with rigorous hiring practices.

The administration’s plans are encapsulated in two memos issued on February 20, 2017, by Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly. The memos implement President Trump’s executive orders on border security and immigration enforcement and call for hiring 5,000 additional Border Patrol agents  within Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and 10,000 additional ICE officers—ostensibly as a means of enhancing public safety and national security.  But these two branches of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) are poorly prepared to recruit, train, and supervise new personnel. While the Border Patrol experienced some improvements in the aftermath of its last expansion, most recommendations for reform remain unimplemented.

Given this history, there are serious concerns that rapid expansion will bring about a resurgence of problems in the Border Patrol and also cause similar problems in ICE. The proposed surge is also stunningly expensive. Yet there is little justification for this expense at a time when undocumented immigration has fallen to historic lows. If the goal is to enhance border security, this money would be better used in many other ways.

What is the place and the purpose of anthropology today? Are anthropologists able to react aptly to the current issues and problems in ever-changing societies and approach them in an accurate and scientifically rigorous way? In the last decades, ethnology and social anthropology have faced many challenges. These resulted in uncertainties about their position in post-colonialist and-in this part of the world-post-socialist societies.

The work explores and discusses a key argument of the ‘ontological turn’ in anthropology: the call to go beyond cultural relativism, ‘taking seriously’ the ontological assumptions of the collectives under study. While this idea has been fruitful in problematizing modern dualisms that are one of the foundations of contemporary social theory, it has derived -in many of its developments- into an intellectualism of philosophical imprint and certain conservatism centered (still) on the written monograph. This inhibits, or at least reduces the radicalization of the apertures proposed by the ‘ontological turn’. Through the lessons arising in a research experience with young rappers in a Mapuche community in the coastal area of Valdivia (Region de los Rios, Chile) between 2017 and 2019, we see the relevance of literally becoming engaged in the practices of the inhabitants of the territories where the ethnography takes place. The focus is centered on following the course of actions involved ...

A collection of essays solicited and curated by Neni Panourgia on the conceptualization, fieldwork, and writing of engaged anthropology. Το access the collection follow the link https://www.americananthropologist.org/online-content/insights-forms-of-engagement:

* Ain’t I a Rational Being? by Katerina Sergidou. To access the essay follow the link: https://www.americananthropologist.org/insights/sergidou

* Ethnographic Writing and Anthropological Theory by Richard Handler. To access the essay follow the link:
https://www.americananthropologist.org/insights/handler

*Notes on Attending a Riot: Northern Ireland in 2015 and 2021 by Laura Brady. To access the essay follow the link:  https://www.americananthropologist.org/insights/brady

* Reflections on Conflict and Peace in Northern Ireland by Laura McAtackney and John Baucher. To access the essay follow the link: https://www.americananthropologist.org/insights/mcatackneybaucher

*Yes! And! by Sally Campbell Silverman. To access the essay follow the link:
https://www.americananthropologist.org/insights/silverman

Los Katukina (Noke Koi) tienen su territorio dentro del estado de Acre, en Brasil. Sus primeros contactos con la sociedad occidental se produjeron a finales del siglo XIX, cuando los migrantes viajaron por la cuenca del Amazonas en busca de árboles de caucho. Desde entonces han estado en contacto permanente, primero ayudando a los patrones y recolectores de caucho como guías, cazadores y en la producción de caucho. El reciente éxito de los pueblos vecinos en la obtención de recursos de proyectos de ONGs ha despertado en los líderes el interés de hacer algo similar y, por lo tanto, promover a través de la “cultura” la entrada de recursos en sus tierras. Este artículo describe la colaboración entre el antropólogo y los Noke Koi en la fundación de una asociación y sus desarrollos en el contexto del fortalecimiento de los pueblos indígenas y sus asociaciones en la Amazonia. A partir del encuentro etnográfico podremos analizar la complejidad de las relaciones entre los Katukina y la sociedad circundante, así como lo que nuestros interlocutores realmente buscan cuando participan en estas actividades.

This is a critical conclusion to the book After the Crisis: Anthropological Thought, Neoliberalism, and the Aftermath, edited by James G. Carrier.  It not only reviews the book and its various chapters, but also puts forth ways that anthropology can move past the crisis in the future (the crisis diagnosed by Carrier being the increasingly tenuous political economy of academic anthropology, the intellectual exhaustion of anthropology since the 1980s, and the financial and social crises of recent decades).  The book makes the important and counterintuitive point that anthropological thought in recent decades has converged with neoliberal thought in abandoning the sort of systematic analysis that had been important in anthropology and economics from the 1940s to the 1970s.  This convergence is counterintuitive because contemporary anthropology almost uniformly portrays neoliberalism in a bad light.  I demonstrate in the Conclusion the hold that this critique actually has, precisely in moments when it seems most counterintuitive.  At the same time I seek to rescue what has been gained intellectually and politically in recent decades, and move from crisis and self-criticism toward a revised and renewed systemic anthropology.

My core point is that just as economics has abandoned systematic perspectives through a reduction to decision-making individuals, anthropology has done so through a reduction to individual and small-group subjectivity.  Such voices often, though not always, negatively view current economies.  Recognizing these parallel moves makes comprehensible the strange coexistence of anthropology’s vigorous criticism of and intellectual convergence with neoliberalism, as seen in unexpected instances such as the radical ethnography of suffering. I connect this to the culture of anthropology itself, particularly romantic populism in interaction with academic production. Building on this, I explore ways of bringing a concern with system, particularly power and inequality, back into the discipline’s representation of voices, the complexity of intersectionality, and the plurality of relations and actors. The task that I set myself here is both analytical and political, so I close by calling for an explicit dialogue around our political-ethical stances, rather than the present tendency to hide them within our ethnography and theory.

The new liberal policies in Europe into a globalizing market vision, perceive water as a new sphere of winning benefit. Economic crisis into Balkan countries make them vulnerable to loose the control of their natural resources. Into this perceptive the Greek government took the decision on July 2013, for the deviation of Aoos (Vjosa Albanian name) river for collecting the 70% of the waters into the lake of Ioannina. Aoos starts from Vovousa (Epirus) and after 70 Km into the greek territory and 170 Km into the Albanian territory arrives to Vlore, Adriatic Sea.  Our group went to Permet in Albania having two aims. To search for the perceptions and the memories of the locals about the river and to see how the existence of the river affects the local life, economy, community. The second aim was to bring the news to Albanian people about the decision of the deviation of the river. We worked on the field for five days by collecting the narratives of the locals and visual material of the everyday life connection of the community with the river. In the end of every interview of the people-subjects of the research we inform them about the deviation. In the same time we ‘ve informed the mayor and we have organized a meeting in between the mayors of Permet and Konitsa for creating a local transborder alliance against the deviation with a journalist from the popular albanian TV channel, the Top Channel. Despite that the journalist told us that this reportage would have been played in Albania next day, it didn’t. So we thought to find another indirect way to accomplish our second aim of informing the people. And art gave us the occasion to realize this. Through our ethnographic data on the field, we ‘ve created an artistic video under the title “I am the river” for bringing the news to people through the troian horse of art. Two exhibitions of our artist member Ilir Kaso, one in Athens Greece, during last autumn and one in Tirana brought the journalists from the traditional medias (TV, newspapers etc) and the people are learning about the deviation in a national level. From that time, until today a Balkan transnational network of citizens and environmental organizations is fighting and trying to resist into this globalizing policy that transforms water from a basic need for living to a commercial product.