The Anthropology of Authenticity: Everyman His Own Anthropologist

Abstract

Anthropology, the contributors to the recent volume Reinventing Anthropology tell us, is suffering from severe hardening of the intellectual arteries. In order for it to be revitalized, they say, the discipline must be de‐professionalized and de‐institutionalized, made more personal and existential. This involves a rejection of the pose of “objectivity” and “value‐free” inquiry and an open admission of the inherently ideological nature of the discipline. In a word, anthropology will have to become politically and morally partisan. This essay explores some of the implications of the recommendations made by the reinventors of anthropology. The stance taken in Reinventing Anthropology, this paper contends, would not only undermine anthropology as a systematic field of inquiry but would also negate whatever “relevance” the discipline might have to the contemporary world.