PRESENTED AT AAA SYMPOSIUM, DEFINING A PUBLIC INTEREST
ANTHROPOLOGY, 97TH ANNUAL MEETINGS OF THE AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION,
Dec. 3, l998. Philadelphia
OPENING STATEMENT: DEFINING PUBLIC INTEREST ANTHROPOLOGY
PEGGY REEVES SANDAY
email:psanday@sas.upenn.edu
As citizens, many anthropologists from Boas to the present have had
a significant impact on American culture and society. Yet, as James Peacock
observes in his l995 Presidential Address to the American Anthropological
Association, anthropology as a discipline remains virtually invisible in
"the wider culture's plan" ( l997:10.) Perhaps this is because
the field does not reward those who turn their attention to that plan with
the view of changing it. Anthropology is remarkably good at description
and theory, but remarkably suspicious of relevance and change. While we
chronicle examples of anthropologists engaging in public debate in our
Newsletter, our research is rarely motivated by attention to "the
central problems of society" (Harkavy, Johnston, and Puckett l996:16.)
However, there is good reason to argue that this is changing because anthropologists
across the sub-disciplines are increasingly turning to the challenges posed
by local, national, and global social problems. We have come to the point
where it is time to distill and synthesize some widely shared principles
of practice which can reinvigorate if not reinvent anthropology. The following
statement outlines a paradigm for practice, but does not suggest either
that the approach which is outlined should substitute for others or that
it is particularly new.*
Because of its focus on public issues in which specific publics with
definable interests can be discerned, this paradigm is labelled Public
Interest Anthropology. Generally speaking, two trends can be noted
under the rubric of this paradigm: 1.)Merging problem solving with theory
and analysis in the interest of change motivated by a commitment to social
justice, racial harmony, equality, and human rights; and 2.)Engaging in
public debate on human issues to make the results of anthropological analysis
accessible to a broad audience. The commitment to social justice, human
rights, and democratic ideals reflected in the goals of Public Interest
Anthropology is one that many anthropologists hold but do not explicitly
admit on the grounds that it biases objective analysis. The following discussion
suggests that given anthropology's commitment to participant observation
this is a misplaced fear.
Public Interest Anthropology promotes change and advances knowledge
through attention to the 'dilemmas' and 'perplexities' of our time as these
are articulated in civil society, the arena where social issues circulate
and people come together in pursuit of common goals. Civil society can
be broadly defined as the social loci falling between the state and the
private sphere but overlapping with both. It is at these loci where publics
form and from which social issues emerge as interests are articulated and
circulated. In a democratic society, such as our own, civil society is
based on macro-social guarantees of freedom of association, self-government,
and the "rule of right based on equality." Within this context
the sphere defined by public interests is not just "a medium of democratic
politics" but a force which may check the political process (see discussion
in Taylor l995:208;287.)
There are important parallels between the concept of democracy and
the practice of Public Interest Anthropology. One of the major ideological
processes defining democratic civil society is citizen participation. One
of the distinctive methodological processes characterizing anthropology
historically is participation/observation and seeing things from "the
people's point of view." The importance of the bifocal approach---preserving
the experience-near by grasping specific occurrences and gestures empathetically
while situating local meanings in wider contexts---makes anthropology one
of the more grounded of the social sciences (Geertz l983:55-72; Clifford
1988:34). The public-interest implications of this grounded-ness is reflected
in the concept of culture as conceptualized by Frans Boas early in the
20th century. Boas's attention to particularities, his privileging
of human creativity, and his emphasis on the conditioning of cultural tradition
replaced race and evolution as the privileged explanation for the puzzle
of human social diversity. In the process, Boas not only changed anthropology
he changed the anthropologist's world (see discussion in Stocking l968:233;
and more recently Handler l998:458.) Boas's passion for change came from
his reaction to discrimination as a German Jew in l9th century Germany.
Thus, he acted from his own commitment to democracy.
A similar commitment and concern with human rights motivates Public
Interest Anthropology. Throughout the 20th century anthropology codified
ethnography, the quintessential methodological tool for a grounded approach.
Paradigms for ethnographic analysis, ranging from structural-functionalism
to semiotics and that mixed bag called post-modernism, guided the tacking
between the 'inside' and 'outside' of events (Clifford's l988:34 metaphor
for bifocality.) More recently, power and history were added to the analytic
project (see Wolf l998 for the most recent discussion on culture and power.)
From the perspective of a public-interest paradigm, understanding how interests
shape specific public[s] represents one step; researching the historical
and social trajectory of public[s] and interest[s] in relations of power
is another.
In the United States, publics emerge and problems are articulated at
all levels of society from the local community to the nation. The issues
may develop from the bottom up as people bond around common interests or
they may be articulated from the top down by scholars, public interest
professionals working for the state, or by journalists. Whether bottom-up
or top-down, world-changing public interest issues clash in the discursive
arena of public debate. For example, the feminist and civil rights movements
arose from grass roots citizen action but evolved as part of a national
debate which included movement leaders, academics, professionals and journalists.
The debate inspired a social climate which made people responsive to discrimination,
deprivation, and inequality along lines of race, class, gender, or sexual
orientation. The contemporary discourse of racism, sexism, classism, heterosexism,
homophobia emanates from the public interest sphere of national debate
that grew out of this climate. The discursive arena where these and other
social issues are debated and circulated constitutes a public-interest
sphere which takes on a life of its own independently of the public[s]
affected by the movements. Thus public interests associated with specific
groups may evolve into nested spheres of action, conflict, and debate.
In a democratic, multicultural society public interest action may be
temporary and peaceful or long term and revolutionary as different groups
contest their share in common resources or engage in activities seeking
systemic social change in the delivery of rights and resources. Understanding
how conflicting interests are played out in any society requires a study
of the trajectory of particular interests historically through the social
hierarchy and an appreciation of the contemporary power dynamics in the
political economy. Part of the project is understanding how things change,
how change affects the overall mix of interests, and what action[s] facilitate
change. The social realization of change in the interest of expanding democracy
is the central focus and the ultimate goal of PIA.
PRINCIPLES OF PIA AS PARADIGM
Public Interest Anthropology is more than a focus for research; it
is a paradigm for learning, teaching, research, action, and practice within
the field of anthropology. This paradigm spans the four fields and is motivated
by a number of foundational commitments and assumptions each of which has
implications for academic learning and teaching on the one hand; and research,
application, and practice on the other. To summarize some of its basic
principles, Public Interest anthropology is committed to:
1."democratization of knowledge" in research, practice, and
teaching;
2.a problem orientation, so that research links theory to practice
[including action] through the articulation of a specifically defined problem;
3.attention to problems affecting health, well being, social welfare,
and quality of life in multi-cultural societies with histories of inequality;
4.advancing knowledge through attention to the 'dilemmas' and
'perplexities'
of our time as defined by groups of people or whole societies; (see Dewey
cited by Harkavy, Johnston, and Puckett l996:19);
5.focusing on the mechanisms by which knowledge is communicated,
deflected,
subverted, mythologized [which means examining a variety of communication
fields such as language, ritual, force, cultural symbols, media, museums,
transnational global processes, etc.];
6.change that expands the scope of democracy;
7.participatory/action research so that the population, community,
or group whose interests are at stake in a PIA project play an active role
in the project;
8.emphasizing individual agency, the aesthetics of daily life, and
the uniqueness of local cultural forms in line with the Boasian emphasis
on "human creativity" and cultural uniqueness;
9.looking to power and history as the screen against which the specific
is projected in order to comprehend the possibilities and strategies for
change.
Each of these principles has specific meaning when considering the
pedagogy and practice of PIA. Pedagogy refers to PIA in the classroom;
practice refers to conducting PIA outside of the classroom. Each should
be considered separately, but both overlap in the emphasis on participatory-action
in learning and research.
A WORD ON PRACTICE
Practice refers to research, methods, applications, ethics, and action.
In some senses there is nothing new in the practice of PIA; yet, the emphasis
on multiplicity, bifocality, and collapsing traditional distinctions such
as between research, theory, action, and application makes it post-modern.
This does not mean that PIA is innovative or particularly new; rather,
it is a paradigm that synthesizes elements of past practice and current
theoretical debate in a focus on social change in contemporary national
and global contexts. The advance in knowledge that comes from this focus
may result from questioning grand narratives and proposing more context-specific
frameworks for workable social change. Challenging grand narratives is
often integral to social change, a lesson we learn from Boas's excision
of race and his substitution of culture to explain human diversity. Challenging
the specifics of anthropological theory is also key. For example, the cyclical
re-emergence of racial determinism in American thought, the success of
socio-biology as an explanation for a wide-range of social problems ranging
from race to rape, and the rooted-ness of beliefs supporting asymmetries
of power---all of which undergird racial and sexual inequality at the end
of the twentieth century---suggest that the public-interest arm of anthropology
has not been entirely successful in changing the way Americans think.
The blurring of the line between action and theory in Public Interest
Anthropology places a limit on both. While change may focus on particular
publics, change is conceived with an eye to its effects on the larger social
and historical context, which brings theory into the picture. However,
contrary to our usual tendency to turn to theory for generalization, Public
Interest Anthropology uses theory as a diagnostic device for concrete social
problems. Theory is brought to earth to illuminate not generalize an issue.
For example, gender and racial inequality all too often become the ground
for leaping to a discussion of universal asymmetries of power. While asymmetry
may be universal, the lines that divide people into unequal classes are
not. Most interesting for social change is an analysis of how particular
asymmetries arise in specific historical contexts and social arenas. The
public-interest arm of such research involves making this knowledge easily
accessible first to interested publics and secondly to the discursive arena
of public-interest debate.
With respect to specific strategies for change, the point must be made
that change is never pursued in a vacuum. Gain for one group must be considered
in the context of costs to others. Part of the research task is to assess
whether change abridges or expands the scope of democracy. This approach
balances anthropology's foundational commitment to "holism" with
seeing things from "the native's point of view." Participant
observation means becoming friends with people as well as finding out about
their way of life; appreciating them as individuals not as manifestations
of an anthropological category. The emphasis on participant observation
or participatory/action research means that cultural and individual uniqueness
are not sacrificed in the interest of theoretical labels. The opposition
of part to whole neither masks nor mutes individual voices. All else being
equal, Public Interest Anthropology is the anthropological version of the
democratic commitment to "We the People." Intelligent pursuit
of this commitment makes anthropology not just the intellectual watchdog
for democracy but the discipline best equipped to assess its limits and
possibilities in particular economic, cultural, political, and religious
frameworks.
*Note: This statement has benefitted significantly from many sources
beginning with Hymes' l969 edited book, REINVENTING ANTHROPOLOGY [particularly
the articles by Laura Nader, William Willis, and Eric Wolf]; the authors
who contributed to my l976 edited book ANTHROPOLOGY AND THE PUBLIC INTEREST;
the authors who contributed to Goldschmidt's l979 edited book THE USES
OF ANTHROPOLOGY. Most recently, the book DIAGNOSING AMERICA edited by Shepard
Forman [l995] argued for public engagement also. My work on the subject
of Public Interest Anthropology has benefitted in the intervening period
since my edited book by discussions with Frank Johnston and Ira Harkavy
as well as from a faculty seminar funded by Penn's Center for Community
Partnership, which involved Frank Johnston, Paula Sabloff, Julia Paley,
and myself. This statement also owes a great deal to the students and guest
lecturers in my experimental course, Defining Public Interest Anthropology,
taught at Penn in the Fall of l998. Finally, I want to thank Robert Borofsky
and the participants in the AAA Symposium, each of whom presented their
vision for defining public interest anthropology: Elvin Hatch, James Peacock,
Laura Nader, Anna Roosevelt, William Labov, Frank Johnston, Ward Goodenough,
George Stocking, Clark Erickson, Paula Sabloff, Jennie M. Smith, Anna S.
Agbe-Davies, Amy Rosenberg, Abigail Corrigan Romaine, and Dell H. Hymes
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