Philosophy of Anthropology

« Anthropology, philosophy of Anthropology, like philosophy, is multifaceted.

It studies humans' physical, social, cultural and linguistic development, as well as their material culture, from prehistoric times up to the present, in all parts of the world.

Some anthropological sub-fields have strong ties with the physical and biological sciences; others identify more closely with the social sciences or humanities.

Within cultural and social anthropology differing theoretical approaches disagree about whether anthropology can be a science.

The question of how it is possible to understand cultures different from one's own, and to transmit that knowledge to others is central to anthropology because its answer determines the nature of the discipline.

Philosophy of anthropology examines the definitions of basic anthropological concepts, the objectivity of anthropological claims and the nature of anthropological confirmation and explanation.

It also examines the problems in value theory that arise when anthropologists confront cultures that do not share their own society's standards.

1 Epistemological problems Despite a shared commitment to fieldwork and to the role of anthropologists as participant-observers, different theoretical schools of anthropology disagree sharply about how it all works, and in particular about whether anthropology is or can be a science.

According to one prominent school - cognitive anthropology culture consists of a set of rules in the minds of its members (Frake 1969).

To understand another culture, anthropologists must internalize those rules well enough to respond to new situations in a culturally appropriate way.

In its approach to cultural behaviour as rule-governed, and in its broad interpretation of rules, cognitive anthropology accords with Winch's (1958) Wittgensteinian account of the nature of human social life (see Social norms).

Winch, however, does not share cognitive anthropology's view that anthropology is a science.

Linguistic rules - primary examples of cultural rules - offer an entry into the rest of the culture.

To begin to learn a new set of cultural rules, cognitive anthropologists question informants about how they would classify various observable phenomena.

The point is not merely to discover the names that others give to the objects and categories familiar to the anthropologist, but to grasp the other culture's own, possibly different, way of structuring the stream of experience into categories.

To this end, cognitive anthropologists - who are also called ‘ethnoscientists' - elicit indigenous classifications of features of the natural world (for example, colours, birds, fish, plants).

They test their grasp of the rules by observing whether their own efforts at extending classifications gain the approval of their informants.

When the anthropologists have mastered the new system, they compare and contrast it with their own (Western, scientific) system.

The results of such investigations are usually put forth as evidence against radical forms of cognitive relativism (see Social relativism §3; Relativism).

Cognitive anthropology offers a clear answer to the first part of the central question raised above: one comes to understand another culture by becoming proficient in its rules through interaction with members of the culture.

How that knowledge is transmitted to those not initiated into the culture remains problematic, however, for it is not clear that one system of rules can be translated into another.

Although cognitive anthropologists view themselves as engaging in scientific studies of culture, and are concerned with the objectivity and predictive success of their claims, their account of the nature of cultural knowledge and how it is acquired works against its dispersal in the usual scientific channels, such as journal articles.

An opposing approach, symbolic anthropology, maintains that anthropology is ethnography.

The business of anthropology is to write accounts of human culture that can be read, analysed, discussed and challenged by students and peers, now and in the future. Doing anthropology does not require one to internalize some set of rules, as cognitive anthropologists suppose, but instead to figure out what people are up to when they say and do certain things.

Culture is not a set of rules located in anyone's mind, it is symbolic behaviour.

Culture is thus a ‘public document' that anthropologists are trained to ‘read', just as literary critics read (interpret) poems and novels.

Comparing anthropology with literary interpretation highlights the issue of objectivity.

Do standards exist for ‘correct' interpretations of cultures or do anthropologists have the same latitude as literary critics to offer alternative, and perhaps incompatible, accounts? Geertz ( 1975), borrowing Ryle's terminology, notes that ethnography at its most basic level involves ‘thick descriptions' rather than the reporting of ‘raw' data.

That is to say, any description of human behaviour (as opposed to mere bodily movement) imputes an intention to it, and thus, at least partially, explains the behaviour.

Collingwood in The Idea of History (1946) had already stressed the same point, using it to argue for a fundamental difference between interpretive explanations of human behaviour and causal explanations of ‘mere' physical events (see Collingwood, R.G.).

Nevertheless, he insisted that hypotheses about intentional descriptions could be subjected to rigorous examination, and accepted or rejected objectively, on the basis of evidence.

Latter-day interpretivists, however, regard the impossibility of peeling away all layers of interpretation to get at ‘the fact of the matter' as support for relativism (see Social science, contemporary philosophy of §3).

One interpretation may be preferred to another because it is more coherent, richer, more subtle or relevant to contemporary concerns, but not because one is true and the other false.

The latter terms are not applicable, at least in their usual sense, to interpretations.

Because symbolic anthropologists emphasize the importance of interpretation over causal explanation and prediction, they see a significant gap between anthropology and science.

While cognitive anthropology and symbolic anthropology are dominant theoretical approaches and loom large in philosophical discussions, many anthropologists, particularly those whose training was completed when earlier schools (for example, functionalism, historical particularism) flourished would not identify themselves with either school.

2 Ethical problems Respect for the beliefs, practices and values of other cultures, no matter how different from one's own, is a hallmark of anthropological wisdom.

Franz Boas (1940), whose name is inevitably linked with cultural relativism, rejected invidious comparisons between the ‘high culture' of northern Europeans and the art forms, languages, myths and religious practices of indigenous Americans, just as he rejected ‘progressive' evolutionary accounts, offered by physical anthropologists early in the twentieth century, that put the former at a more advanced stage of physical development than the latter.

He insisted that the culture of each group should be studied in terms of its own historical development and appreciated in that context rather than judged by the standards of another culture.

Since moral beliefs and practices, like other beliefs and practices, depend on the cultural context, many anthropologists regard ethical relativism as an easy consequence of cultural relativism.

Some moral philosophers have challenged this slide into relativism by claiming that while societies differ in their derivative moral judgments (for example, the propriety of cross-cousin marriage), they agree in their more fundamental moral judgments (for example, the immorality of incest).

Whether universal agreement exists on any basic moral judgment is at least in part an empirical question - one to which Turnbull's studies of the Ik (1972) suggest a negative answer.

A different attack on relativism maintains that establishing genuine relativism requires showing that people's basic ethical judgments would conflict even if they shared all the same factual beliefs and were fully enlightened as to the consequences of their views.

On this view, the mere absence of universally accepted principles is not sufficient to prove relativism.

By the same token, finding universally accepted moral principles would not disprove their dependence on particular cultures.

The agreement could be accidental.

Despite such philosophical attacks on ethical relativism, most practising anthropologists continue to embrace it, for they equate ethical relativism with tolerance for the moral codes of others.

Teachers of anthropology present relativism as the received view, usually also admonishing students to distinguish objective factual claims from subjective and relative value judgments.

The student's ability to reserve judgment on the moral codes and practices of others is regarded as a prerequisite for anthropological fieldwork and for acceptance into the discipline.

Anthropologists' alleged commitment to relativism, however, is undermined by their own professional code of behaviour, as stated, for example, in the guidelines of the Society for Applied Anthropology (Bernard 1988).

The dominant theme of these guidelines is Kantian: treat the people whom you study as ends not as means.

Respect their right to self-determination, to arrange their lives as they see fit according to their standards.

Anthropologists who are accused of violating this code must defend themselves satisfactorily or face professional sanctions.

Most field anthropologists believe that relativism permits or even requires them to defend ‘their people' against interference from governments, missionaries, or other agents of so-called advanced civilizations.

The common justification for such defences, however, is the society's right of self-determination.

Anthropologists also take up the cause of oppressed minorities within the societies that they study.

For example, feminist anthropologists work to improve the status of women in many cultures.

Thus even when denying absolute moral values, anthropologists embrace moral guidelines that are supposed to hold across cultures.

They unilaterally condemn behaviour that infringes on the rights of others.. »