On the Call for a Militant Anthropology

8/14/2019 On the Call for a Militant Anthropology

1/7

On the Call for a Militant Anthropology: The Complexity of "Doing the Right Thing"Author(s): Steven Robins and Nancy Scheper-HughesSource: Current Anthropology, Vol. 37, No. 2 (Apr., 1996), pp. 341-346Published by: The University of Chicago Presson behalf of Wenner-Gren Foundation for AnthropologicalResearch

Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2744354.

Accessed: 12/04/2013 11:47

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at.http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of

content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms

of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

The University of Chicago Pressand Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Researchare collaborating

with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Current Anthropology.

http://www.jstor.org


2/7

Volume37,Number2, April 996 | 34Ilanguage. dited y EllenB. Basso,pp.9-22. Tucson:Univer-sity fArizona ress.BOOMERT, ARIE. I986. The Cayo complex f St. Vincent: th-nohistoricalndarchaeologicalspects f he slandCaribprob-lem. Antropol6gica6:3-68.FERGUSON, R. BRIAN. I995. Yanomami warfare:A political his-tory. antaFe: SchoolofAmerican esearch ress.GILIJ, FELIPE SALVADOR. I987 (I782). Ensayo de historiaAmericana. vols.Caracas:Biblioteca e la AcademiaNacio-nal de la Historia.

KEYMIS, LAWRENCE. I968 (i596). A relation of the second voy-age toGuiana,perfourmednd writtenn theyeare 596 (fac-simile).New York:Da Capo Press.LAVANDERO, JULIO, AND H. DIETER HEINEN. I986. Canci-ones ybailes delritual e la Nouara.Montalban 7:I99-243.OJER, PABLO. I966. Formaci6n el OrienteVenezolano.Vol. I.Creaci6nde las gobernaciones. aracas:UCAB.RALEIGH, SIR WALTER. I968 (i596). The discoverie of thelarge, ich nd bewtifvl mpyrefGviana facsimile). ewYork:Da Capo Press.RAMOS, DEMETRIO. I988 (I593). El mito de El Dorado. Ma-drid: diciones stmo.RIVIERE, P. G. I984. Individual and society n Guiana: A com-

parative tudy fAmerindianocial organization. ambridge:Cambridge niversityress.VON HUMBOLDT, ALEXANDER. I970 (i8i9). Relation histor-ique du voyage us regions quinoxiales u NouveauxConti-nent facsimile). ol. 2. Stuttgart:rockhaus.WHITEHEAD, NEIL L. I988. Lords fthetiger pirit:A historyofthe Caribs n colonialVenezuela ndGuyana, 498-I820.Dordrecht:orisPublications.. i995. Thehistoricalnthropologyftext:The interpreta-tionofRalegh'sDiscoverie fGuiana.CURRENTANTHROPOL-OGY36:53:74.

On the Call for MilitantAnthropology: he Complexityof Doing theRightThingSTEVEN ROBINSDepartmentof Anthropology, niversity ftheWesternCape, Private BagXI7, Bellville,Cape Town,SouthAfrica. 2 IX 95Scheper-HughesCA 36:409-20) calls on anthropologiststo replacethecultural ndmoralrelativism fthe 990owith militant nthropologyhat s politically ndmor-ally committed ndengaged. he drawson herfieldworkexperiencesof poverty nd violence in Brazilian andSouthAfrican hantytowns o arguefor n activistan-thropology.fanthropologistsre witnessesto violenceand injustice,Scheper-Hughes rgues, heyneed to in-tervene nd take sides. While completely ympatheticto her call for politicallyengaged nthropology,be-lieve thatherindictment fSouthAfrican nthropolo-gists fornot having sufficientlyntervened o opposeapartheiddoes not begin to addressa rangeof ethicalquestionsrelating othe politicsof applied and activ-ist anthropologyn South Africaand elsewhere.Shesuggests hatsince (all?) SouthAfrican nthropologistsfailed to challengeapartheid, in thenecessary ettling

of accounts now takingplace in thenew South Africa,a radical self-critiques a necessaryprecondition or e-casting nthropologys a tool forhuman iberation p.4I5). While such self-critiquemay well be necessaryboth in SouthAfrica nd elsewhere,Scheper-Hughes'sarticle s not veryhelpful n identifying hat lessonscan be learntfrom uch exercises.The major problemwiththe article s that tassumesthat there was a clearly defined and unambiguousagendafor he militant or activistSouth African n-thropologist. atherthan investigatewhat SouthAfri-can anthropologistsid,either n the field,n theirpub-lication,or in lecturehalls, she simplydismisses theirworkas politically rrelevanto theantiapartheidtrug-gle-as not directly hallenging hepowerofthe state.As a South African nthropologist ho was trained ntheDepartmentof Social Anthropologyt theUniver-sity of Cape Town (UCT) in the early I98os, I feelobligedto respondto her claims. I recognizethat shehas doneserious and importantwork nBraziland else-whereand that she also made a valuable contributionin her teachingwhile shewas in SouthAfrica.However,herSouthAfricanwork s extremely roblematic orvariety freasons, speciallyher failure eriously o en-gagewiththeworkofSouthAfricannthropologistsndto reflect pon the dilemmas of takingsides in theSouthAfrican ontext.Scheper-Hughesdoes not seem aware that manySouthAfrican nthropologistsid takesidesbut nwaysthatdefy he simplisticdichotomies fresistance/com-plianceand ntervention/inaction.oreover, s was thecase during he VietnamWar,when U.S. anthropologistscollaborated with the military n OperationCamelot,manySouthAfrican nthropologistsntervened ut onthe wrongside. In South Africa such interventionscontributed owards reaction against applied or in-terventionistnthropologys well as serious divisionsand antagonismswithinthe discipline.Scheper-Hughesshows no signsofhaving grappledwiththesecomplexissues. nstead, headopts narrow nd naive nterpreta-tion of what it means to take sides, one that impliesthatthe militant anthropologist as to work from hebarricades r be a collaborator.Her colleagues at theUniversity fCape Town maynot have thrownMolotov cocktails at the police, butthey ertainlywere not collaborators.n fact, heywereinvolved in pedagogical practices that directly chal-lengedapartheid deology byproviding powerful ri-tique of cultural essentialism. Yet she dismisses theirlecture-roomnterventionsndrepresents hem s gen-teel colonials complicitwith apartheid p. 415):

In theDepartment fAnthropologyt theUniver-sityofCape Town business proceeded susual. . .. Race, ethnicity, tribe, culture,and identity weredutifully econstructednd de-essentialised n Anthropologyoi, wheretheyweretaught s historicallynvented nd fictive oncepts(see Boonzaier and Sharp 988). Meanwhile, through-out theyearSouthAfricanXhosas and Zulus (manip-

This content downloaded from 130.192.155.203 on Fri, 12 Apr 2013 11:47:11 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions


3/7

342 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY

ulated by a government-orchestratedthird orce )daily slaughtered ach other n and aroundworkerhostels n the name of tribe, ethnicity, nd cul-ture. The relativizing, econstructionistxerciseseemed irrelevant o the materialhistory f op-pressed nd oppressor tribes n South Africa ndto the recovery f spoiled identities nd spoiledethnicities . . in thepoliticallynegotiated rocessof new-nation uilding.

She claims forherself hemoralhigh ground s custo-dian of a nonrelativizingmilitant nthropology ithoutany attempt o understand hehistorically ituatedpo-litical motivations hatproduced hese pedagogical ac-ticts and deconstructive xercises.Scheper-Hughes eems unaware that these decon-structive xercises closely convergedwith the ANC'sresponse to apartheidpropaganda laims of mmutableand primordial ultural difference hat were dissemi-nated in the schools, radio, television, nd (some) uni-versities.For a youngwhite student ntering he UCTanthropology epartmentn theearly 98os this consti-tuteda powerful ritiqueofapartheid. n otherwords,the political salience of deconstructing ssentialisttribal discourse nAnthropologyoi correspondedothe liberationmovement'sattempts o decenter part-heid ideas about immutable cultural and ethnic differ-ences. Ifanything,ne could saythatScheper-Hughes'sUCT colleagues were too activist in their teaching.However, the political imperativeforchallengingpri-mordialist deas about cultural dentityhas exerted apowerfulnfluencenthewake of heongoing loodshedinKwaZulu/Natalandright-wingombings rior o theApril 994 democratic lections.These pedagogicaltactics n the small spaces of ec-ture roomsprofoundlynfluenced tudents rriving tuniversityfter avingbeenexposedtoapartheid duca-tion and the fictions fprimordialist thnic dentities.For Scheper-Hughes,however, these anthropologistsweremerely drinking ea, talking bout trifles,with-drawingfrom he struggle. Commentingon Scheper-Hughes's article,Kuper CA 36:424-26) correctly ointsout that English-speaking nthropologists ere gener-ally ANC supporters nd sometimes reproachedforallowing political agendato steer heir cholarship p.425). Kuperconcludes that Scheper-Hughes resentscaricature fcolleagueswho were actively nvolved nresearchfocused on the social dislocation and violenceof apartheid.Referringo Gordonand Spiegel's (I993)overviewof SouthAfrican nthropology,e argues hatit is little shortof outrageous that Scheper-Hughesdoesnot cite a single study rom heUniversity fCapeTown departmentn thepast decade.Scheper-Hughes ntirely gnoresthe history f ap-plied or activist nthropologynSouthAfrica. hedoesnot refer o the extensive iterature n the politics ofknowledge hatemergedn the I96os, I970s, and I98osin responseto the role of British,Dutch, and Frenchanthropologistsncolonialismor ofNorthAmerican n-thropologistsn South-EastAsia andLatinAmerica Bas-

tide I973, Faris I973, Frank 979, Onoge I979, Grilloand Rew i985). Although elativelyittlehas been writ-ten about applied anthropologyn South Africa, t isneverthless surprising hat Scheper-Hughesdoes noteven mention that one of her colleagues at the Uni-versity f Cape Town, John harp,has written n theGerman-influencedVolkekunde anthropologistswhosupplied apartheid ideologues with their culturalexpertise n tribal ustoms. n fact, ne of the archi-tects ofapartheid,W. W. M. Eiselin, who happened tobe the late PrimeMinisterH. F. Verwoerd's ight-handman, became the head of the firstVolkekunde depart-ment at StellenboschUniversityn I928 and s regardedas the cofounder fAfrikanernthropologySharp 98I:29). Eiselin and the Volkekundiges rovided he ntellec-tual frameworkor segregationistdeology hat onsid-ered South Africa's nine ethnic groups timeless,bounded, mmutable, ndmutually ncompatible thnicnations-an ideologydrawnupon in an attempt y theapartheidstate to legitimate the Bantustan ( home-land ) system.Inperhaps n even moreextreme eaction han thatofthe NorthAmerican nthropologists ho rallied gainstcolleagues who collaboratedwith the U.S. military nVietnam Grillo and Rew i985), Scheper-Hughes's ol-leagues at the Universityof Cape Town-as well asanthropologists t Witwatersrand, hodes, and NatalUniversities-severed all ties with the Volkekunde n-thropologists. et, Scheper-Hughes eems unaware ofthe huge chasm and antagonismbetween these twocamps. The pedagogicaltactics ofUCT faculty n theI980s were aimed at challenging he ideas of Volke-kundeanthropology.hese small acts ofresistancemaynotcomparewithwielding nAK-47,buttheyneverthe-less challenged apartheidpropaganda hatmanywhitestudentswereexposedtoprior o comingtouniversity.In theirchallenges to essentialist and primordialistnotions of culture, race, and ethnicity, number ofSouthAfrican nthropologistst English-speakingni-versities in the I980s, ended up endorsing vulgarMarxism hatrenderedultural dentities s mere uper-structural piphenomaor false consciousness. Suchorthodoxmarxism onvinced tudents ike me thateth-nic identities would underminethe solidarityof theworking lass and the national iberationmovement ndbuttress he divisive and oppressiveBantustan ystem.So we dutifully rew on class analysis,deconstructedracial and ethnic dentities, nd reconfirmed ur com-mitment o a nonracial,unified outh Africa.This fearof the dangers nd divisivenessofcultural,racial, andethnic difference reventedus fromrecognizingtheemancipatory potential of cultural identities andstruggles.The SouthAfrica f the 99Os, however, ascreatedthepolitical space for ll kinds ofpreviously nthink-ableprojects, ncluding nes that akeseriously he mul-tiplicity f cultural dentities nd struggles.While theANC remainscommitted o nationbuilding, unitarystate,and an ideologyofnonracialism, ince the i99OSit has been less concernedwithcontaining nd repress-



4/7

Volume 37,Number2, April 996 | 343ing expressions of cultural and ethnic difference.These daysculturaldifferences even celebrated ytheANC, as was evident n the official heme ofPresidentMandela's inauguration n I994: One Nation, ManyCultures. Clearly, cultural differences no longerfeared s an apartheid trategyf divide and rule.Scheper-Hughes ails to recognizethe political andhistorical context within which the deconstructivemoves of South African nthropologists ere located.She dismisses thispedagogicalproject s politically r-relevant itherbecause it is not sufficientlymilitantforher or because she assumes thatthiswas all thatwashappening n South African nthropology.n fact, hegivesno indication that she knows what research nyUniversity fCape Town anthropologistsnd their tu-dents were doing n the I98os. In i982 I was partof agroupoffourpost-graduatetudentswho went to ruralareas in SouthAfrica o investigate he social impactofforced emovals n South Africa'sBantustans. he ratio-nale for this project was the need to documentruralpovertys partof nationalresearch roject oordinatedby the economist FrancisWilson.We believed that thiswork would one day be useful to a futuredemocratic(ANC) governmentommitted odeveloping he chroni-cally overcrowded nd impoverishedhuman dumpinggrounds f the Bantustan ystem.Scheper-Hughes alls fora militantanthropologywithoutanyunderstandingfthemotivation or end-ingpost-graduatetudents oTranskei,Ciskei,Qwaqwa,Lesotho. nstead ofattemptingo engagewith theworkof members ftheUCT Anthropologyepartment, heresorts o caricatures f thedepartmentalea-room s acolonialoutpost. he does notaddress heprofound eedfor ecolonizing hewhite-dominatediscipline, prob-lem that U.S. anthropologistsre equally aware of intheir wndepartments. avingrecently elocated o thepredominantly lack and coloured University f theWesternCape, I am even moreconvinced ftheurgencyofthis task. It involvesradicalpedagogical nnovationsin contextswhere the acquisition ofconventional ca-demic iteracies nd theethnographicanon(s)areexpe-rienced as alienating nd intimidating. ransformationofouruniversitiesmayrequirenot truth ommissionsto examine the complicity of academic disciplineswithapartheid uta radicalrethinkingfdominant ca-demicdiscourses nd practices.

The call foranthropologists o intervenewhen theyencounter iolenceand njustice s notnecessarily rob-lematic.However,depending n thecontext, he inter-ventionofthe greatwhite anthropologistan smackof paternalism and elitism and may aggravateratherthan alleviate the suffering f the beneficiaries seeGrillo and Rew i985). Whether r notto intervene ndwhich sideto take nthefield regenerally ot as unam-biguous and obvious as in Scheper-Hughes'snterven-tion n a Cape Town shantytown. ven fwe accept thatshe oughtto have intervened n this nstance, s manyof us no doubt would have, most field situations inSouth Africa n the ig80s would havebeenconsiderablyless straightforward.

Scheper-Hughes's all to sidewith theoppressed sproblematic ecause of hertendency o treat hisgroupas an undifferentiatedategory. venduring he darkestdays of apartheid, siding with the oppressed wasfraughtwith complexity nd ambiguity. or example,in the mid-ig8os ArchbishopDesmond Tutu and thethen-Reverend llan Boesakplacedtheir ives andpolit-ical credibilityn the inewhenthey ntervened o savethe lives of suspected impimpis (police informers)whom angrycrowds were determined o necklace.These courageous clerics could themselveshave beennecklaced forattempting o save the lives of the en-emy. Similarly, ressphotographers erecaughtup inethical dilemmas when police demanded theirphoto-graphs f uchevents n order o identify uspects.Withthe death of apartheid t is even moreproblematic oview the oppressed as a homogeneousgrouping,nddoingtheright hing morethaneverrequires sophis-ticated and nuancedunderstandingfthemicropoliticsof ocal situations.The notion thatthe militant nthro-pologistwill haveno problem dentifyingheoppressedand the oppressorgnores he immensedifficultiesnddilemmasthat arise in fieldwork ituationswhen localfactions ndpowerbrokers eploy outsiders e.g.,an-thropologists)ofurtherll types f unprogressive ndexploitative nds, often n the name of the oppressedmasses.Clearly an argument ould be made foranthropolo-gists to intervenemore directly n local struggles ndsituations n specificcontexts.However,this requiresa thorough nderstanding f the complexitiesof localunderstandingsndpowerrelations.We mayhope thatSouth African nthropologistswill continue to be in-volved in applied research and contributeto thegrowth f n anthropologyfdevelopment nterventionsrather hanretreatingnto the nsularworldofthe acad-emyand esoteric ntellectualism. cheper-Hughes's allfora militantanthropologys unlikelyto have muchimpact n SouthAfrica, utperhaps twill help to per-suade North American nthropologistso grapplemoreseriouslywith thedesperate overty nd racialviolenceexperienced ythose who live in theurbanghettos or-dering hepoliced universities fHyde Park,Berkeley,and MorningsideHeights.While North Americanan-thropologists uch as Allen Feldman are doing mpor-tantworkonAIDs, substanceabuse,andhomelessness,theyremainoutside an academythat ooks upon ap-plied anthropology ith some disdain.Myown fieldworkncounters onvinceme thatdoingthe right hing s far more complicated than Scheper-Hughescares to acknowledge.Moreover,fthe reflexivemove in anthropology as taughtus anything,t hasmade us moreacutelyaware of theasymmetrical owerrelations hatshape mostfieldworkncounters.Unlessthere s criticalreflection n these questions, the callfor militant nthropologyouldbegin oresonatewithimagesofU.S. peace-keeping nterventionsn the Per-sianGulf,Haiti, Grenada,Panama, Vietnam, nd Korea.Do we want to be associated with a new paternalism-aPax Anthropologica ?



5/7


ReplyNANCY SCHEPER-HUGHESDepartmentof Anthropology, niversity f California,Berkeley,alif. 4720, U.S.A. 3 xI 95The Primacy f theEthical arguesfor dual visionofanthropologys a disciplinary ield-a fieldof study-and as a forcefield-a site of struggle nd resistance.The essay is not aboutSouthAfrican nthropology,utit does make referencen a fewcontentious aragraphsto social anthropologyn Cape Town. The statementsreferredo the final yearof the democratic ransition,I993-94, which constituted he ethnographic resentofmyresearch nd teachingyear n South Africa. sug-gested hat nthropologynCape Town at that imewasexperiencing ome theoretical onfusion nd paralysis.The latterwas capturedna poignantmoment-the tab-leau of severalmembers of the Departmentof SocialAnthropologyt Cape Town sitting orlornlyn the de-partmental earoom thighnoon onApril 7 during hefirst-ever emocraticelections in South Africa. Theywerequietlydiscussing, ver thenervous link-clink fteacups, heday'stask: dismantling field esearch tor-age room crowdedwith ongunused and unwieldy an-vas tents,rustedmess-kits,half-usedbottlesof insectrepellent, nd tornmosquito nets. And so, just as theclatterof the ubiquitous tea-cart umblesthrough hesatiricalnovels of the ateBarbara ym someof these-see,for xample,Pym I9871-dealing withBritish nti-quarians and anthropologists),he tearoom emerged nmycommentary s a generativemetaphor f postcolo-

nial British nthropologyn SouthAfrica.Whitewriting.Anthropology,ike all academic disci-plines in SouthAfrica, uffered rom he mposed sola-tionofthe academicboycott.One reactionwas a bunkermentalitymanifestedn an obsessiveself-preoccupationthatnonetheless fell shortof a radicallyself-reflexivepostcolonialcritique. t had been politicallyexpedientforBritish-speaking outh Africananthropologists odemonize -not thatthis was entirely nappropriate-Afrikaner nthropology orhaving servedas a willingandcomplicit ooloftheapartheid tate see Sharp 98I,Gordon 988) whiledefendingheAnglophone raditionof social anthropology s an intellectualforce n theantiapartheid truggle see Boonzaier and Sharp I988).Buttherewere some lapses and lacunae in thishistory.Despite pocketsofactivist resistance mongsocial an-thropologistsnd theirstudents s earlyas the I970S,forthe most part social anthropology oexisted withapartheidand survivedat the English-language outhAfrican niversitiesCape Town,Witwatersrand,atal,andRhodes) bysidesteppingctivepoliticalengagementor critique.As W. D. Hammond-Tooke (I970:80) ofRhodes University nalyzed the situationforEnglish-speakingSouthAfrican nthropologistst that time:

Much moreserious s thecompletedependence fthe [anthropological]esearcher n thegoodwill andco-operation f theDepartment f BantuAdministra-

tion and Colored Affairs. ermits renecessary orentrance nto non-White reas and can be summarilywithdrawnwith no reasonsgiven.... The general f-fectofthisuncertaintys to force he researchworker o play it safe . . . by selecting s politi-callyneutral topicas possible . . [avoidinganything hat] riticizesgovernment olicyeitherm-plicitly r explicitly.There were exceptions, of course. Among 2oth-century outhAfricannthropologists ere saac Schap-eraand Monica Wilson, ndividuals f nternational tat-ure and greatmoral integrity.n his daySchaperawentagainst the grainofconventionalBritish ocial anthro-pology by callingfor the studyof contemporary rob-lems, what he called the the here and now of SouthAfricans, ncluding the study of the large Cape Col-oured populationofthe WesternCape, whose specialsocial and political realityhad been largely verlooked

by social anthropologistsnterestedonly in tribalSouthAfricans.As early s themid-I930s,Schapera n-sisted that the colonial administratornd the mission-arywereas much a partof the tribal ocial system asthe chief nd themagician Schapera935:3I7) andthat theyshould be studiedtogether. ut through ll,Schapera neveropenly ookupa political tance nany-thing ewrote Gluckman975:27). Hepreferredrit-ing detailed and comprehensive ethnographies illedwith facts o concerning imselfwith superficiallyx-citing [political] analyses, inadequately groundedinfacts.Monica Wilson, for her part,was sorelydistressedwhen her friend nd UCT colleague thehistorianJackSimmons was detained and then banned forhis ex-plicitly antiapartheid olitics, but she did not resignfromherprestigious ost as seniorprofessorn protestof this action. The business ofanthropologyroceededas usual. Wilsonwas criticalofthe state,although l-ways n herquietandunassumingway see,for xample,Wilson 975). It was said in herdefense hat Cookie,her African ervant,was allowed to wear the bannedANC colorswhen she served able n the Wilson house-hold in Cape Town. And one could read betweenthelines thatWilson was oftenarguing n her writingsagainst the structure fmigrant abour.Although heinvitedthe former outh African resident, an muts,the so-called civilizedwhite supremacist, o write theprologueforone of herbooks,herson,FrancisWilson,commentedat a seminar n Cape Town honoringhismother nMay I994 thatshe probablywouldnothavedone so as her own political awareness grewin laterdecades.Perhaps hemostegregious apse camefrom hemostunlikely place. Max Gluckman,who took his first e-gree in anthropology t the University f Witwaters-rand beforeemigrating o GreatBritain,publishedanessay in I975 on Anthropology nd Apartheid inwhich he chastised these youngeranthropologistswho alleged that the colonial systemdominated heresearch ndwritings fsocial anthropologists orking



6/7

Volume37,Number2, April 996 | 345in the dependent territories f Africa. Gluckmannoted that some South African nthropologists weredeeply nfluenced ositively y thepolicy of egregationwhich,after he election ofthenationalist, ominantlyAfrikaner, overnment n I948 . . . became hardenedinto what s called apartheidseparateness). Gluckmancertainly ell nto the stickyweb of apartheid deologywhen he noted that perhaps therewas some good,after ll, in the apartheidnotion that indigenouscul-ture s excellent n its ownright.. andsomething heyshould clingto andfight or, ust asAfrikanersought ortheir anguageand culture gainst themightofEnglishculture Gluckman 975 :2I-22). I consider t un-wise, he continued, to neglectthe ideologicalbasiswhich sees African ulturenot only as appropriatendvaluable forAfricans, utZulu culture s good for ulu,Xhosa cultureas goodforXhosa,Pedi cultureforPedi,etc. . . . There have also been 'liberal' segregationistswho, nmy udgement, ended o emphasize thebeautyand harmony, nd even the appropriate niqueness, ofeach African ulture p. 22). This sentence lone in therecent annals of South African nthropologymeritsaformal pologyfrom heprofession.Ifthe choice forAnglophonewhiteSouthAfrican n-thropologistswas not exactly adapt or die, it was acase of accommodate or pursue anthropology lse-where. This was, in fact,what a great many whiteSouthAfrican nthropologists id, thereby reatly n-richingour profession n the United States and theUnitedKingdom.Not all SouthAfricannthropologists,ofcourse,had equal opportunityo do so,and somepre-ferred o remain and to struggle-a choicefraught ithdifficultynd danger.Taking an explicit political posi-tion cost the life of one SouthAfrican nthropologicalactivist,David Webster,n i989. Otherburdens ccom-paniedthe choice to remain n SouthAfrica. an Glenn(I994), a professorfEnglish tUCT, notedthat poli-tics ofsuspicion hangsover the work of all contempo-rarywhite South African ntellectuals and academics.Their life'swork is oftenread through he mandatoryand politically correct prismof political relevancy:Wheredoes thisfit nto thestruggle?Still, continueto questionthe failure fAnglophoneSouthAfricannthropology,articularlytUCT, topro-duce even a small cohort fblack South African nthro-pologists n the second halfof the 20th centurywhenotherdisciplines ndprofessionstUCT (law,medicine,religious studies) have foundways of circumventingstate-imposed bstacles to do so. Of course,Dr. Mam-pheleRamphele,nowpoisedto become nJanuary996the first lack SouthAfrican ice-chancellor ftheUni-versity f Cape Town, is the dramaticexception. Butwhat ifeven a small numberofotherblack South Afri-cans had been givena similaropportunitynd encour-agement ostudy nthropology? hat process s ustnowbeginningn earnest;Ramphele i995:5) chides her uni-versityfor continuingto churn out good little En-glishmen and calls for a decolonization processwhich would make a clean break with colonial En-gland seeCape Times,October , 995).

Whospeaks forwhom?Despite his provocative om-ments stated bove),Gluckmanand mostofhis whiteSouthAfrican olleaguesdid notparticipaten the cul-turaluniqueness discourse that was favoredfor bvi-ous reasons) bythe apartheidgovernment.fanything,they ended ogoto theopposite xtreme, avoringuni-versalist discourses nd avoidingreferences o distinctcultural traditions.Many white South African nthro-pologists, ncludingGluckman,were ntellectualmarx-ists who used political economicparadigms o explainsocial differences.hey emphasizedthebiologicalsimi-larities nd the sharedhuman ntellectual nd social ca-pacitiesof all peoples.The anthropology acultyofUCT in I993-94 wereand are,as Robinsnotes,well-known rogressiveswhotook ssue with the former tate's racist deology,whichexplainedsocial and economic differencesn terms ofbiologicalrace anda biologizednotionof culture bet-ter ead,perhaps, s kultur). eginningn the 980s, theypursued large eaching ndtheoretical esearch rojectaimed at deconstructing race, ethnicity, tribe,gender, nd culture seeBoonzaier ndSharp 988).Any emphasison culturaldifference, niqueness, nddistinctiveness as seen as playingnto thehands oftheapartheid overnment. utsince this SouthAfrican ey-wordsprojectwas notaccompaniedbya relentless, elf-reflexive ritique, t reproduced therparadoxes.For one, the projectto obliterate he idea ofuniquecultures nd traditionsnowto be understood s socialfictions nd historical nventions)discredited he com-plicatedattempts f somemarginalized roups n SouthAfrica, uch as the resettled Bushmen ofKagga-Kamaand the coloured populationoftheCape Flats,to re-claim a social, cultural, nd political space, albeit onethat flies in the face of ANC priorities nd politics.Moreover,the Keywordsprojectwas taught n a top-down, obligatorymanner tiflingttempts o explore l-ternativemeanings, eferences,nd uses ofculture, th-nicity, nd tribe.When,near the end of thisperiod,HarrietNugubane,a British-trainedouthAfrican nthropologist, as ap-pointed professort UCT-the first lack SouthAfri-can to fillsuch a position n theDepartment fSocialAnthropology-she met a chilly reception fromherwhite male colleagues. She departed rom heirobliga-tory econstructionismoargue, nstead, or hedistinc-tive cultural dentity f hernative SouthAfrican ulucommunity seeNugubane 988).The ironywas not oston Nugubane that she, a black South Africanwoman,was simultaneously viewed as a colonialist andtreatedas an outsider. She noted the arroganceofthose who criticizedherclasses,modified erexamina-tionquestions,andmade her feelsuperfluous.Ifwe have learnedone thingfrom he postcolonial,multicultural rguments hat have emerged ince thepublicationof Said's Orientalism n I979 it is respectfor the rightof individualsand groupsto claim theirownsocial self-identity.tdid notescape Nugubaneandotherblack intellectuals at UCT that the no race-notribe-no culture rhetoric fwhite South African n-



7/7


thropologists est served theirpersonal, ocial, and po-litical interests. n the postapartheid, emocratic, ndAfricanmajoritarian tate,whiteSouth Africanswouldhave the most to gainfrom adicallydeconstructed o-tions ofethnicity, ace, and culture.References CitedBASTIDE, R. I973. Applied nthropology.ondon:CroomHelm.BOONZAIER, E., AND J. SHARP. Editors.988. SouthAfricankeywords. ape Town: DavidPhilip.FARIS, J. C. I973. Pax Britannicand theSudan: S. F. Nadel,inAnthropologynd thecolonialencounter. dited yT.Asad.London: thacaPress.FRANK, A. G. I979. Anthropology ideology, pplied nthro-pology= politics, n Thepolitics f nthropology.dited yG. Huizer nd B.Mannheim. heHague: Mouton.GLENN, IAN. I994. NadineGordimer, .M. Coetzee, nd thepol-itics of nterpretation.outhAtlanticQuarterly3(I).GLUCKMAN, MAX. I975. Anthropologyndapartheid: hework f SouthAfricannthropologists,n StudiesnAfrican

social anthropology.dited yMeyer ortes ndSheilaPat-terson, p.2I-39. London ndNew York:Academic ress.GO R D O N, RBER T. I 988. Apartheid'snthropologists:hegene-alogy fAfrikanernthropology.merican thnologist5:535-53.GORDON, R. J., AND A. D. SPIEGEL. I993. Southern frica e-visited.Annual Review fAnthropology2:83-I05.GRILLO, R., AND A. REW. I985. Social anthropologynd devel-opment olicy. ASAMonograph3.) London ndNew York:Tavistock.HAMMOND-TOOKE, W. D. I970. AnthropologytEnglish-language outhAfricanniversities,nSouthern fricantud-ies. EditedbyM. R. Kettle nd R. P. Moss,pp.78-8I. Lon-don: African tudiesAssociation ftheUnitedKingdom.KUPER, ADAM. I995. Comment n: Moralmodels n anthropol-ogy, y RoyD'Andrade,nd Theprimacyftheethical, yNancy Scheper-Hughes.URRENT ANTHROPOLOGY 36:424-26.NUGUBANE, HARRIET. I988. Reshapingocialanthropology.a-perpresentedt theDepartmentfSocialAnthropology,ni-versityfDurban-Westville,outhAfrica.ON 0 GE, 0. F. I979. The counter-revolutionaryraditionnAfri-can studies:The case of pplied nthropology,n Thepoliticsof anthropology.dited yG. Huizer nd B.Mannheim. heHague:Mouton.PYM, BARBARA. I987. Less than ngels.New York:Harper ndRow.RAMPHELE, MAMPHELE. I995. Myvision fUCT beyond 000.CapeTown:UniversityfCape Town.SAID, EDWARD. I979. Orientalism. ew York:RandomHouse.SCHAPERA, ISAAC. I935. Fieldmethodsn thestudy fmodernculture ontact. frica :3I5-28.SCHEPER-HUGHES, NANCY. I995. Theprimacyftheethical:Propositionsor militantnthropology.URRENT ANTHROPOL-OGY 36:409-20.SHARP, JOHN S. I98I. The roots fdevelopmentf Volkekundein SouthAfrica. ournalfSouthern fricantudies8(I):I6-36.WILSON, MONICA. I975.... So truth e inthe feld.Afred ndWinifred oernleMemorial ecture, niversityfCape Town,SouthAfrica.

On ArchaeologicalTheory:Who's Who in Settingthe Agenda?L. S. KLEJNZheleznovodskaya 27, #27, Sanct-Petersburg I99 I55,Russia. 5 VII 95I am surprised y Murray'sCA 36:290-92) stormy eac-tionto myreview CA 34:508-II) of the collection nwhich he participatedYoffee nd Sherratt993). Whatstrikesme most about it is its error n perceiving hegeneralcharacteristics hat I (justlyor unjustly) ttri-bute to a whole approach s applying oeveryndividualadvocateof that approach.Forexample,withreferenceto whole ThirdWorld, remarked n thepoor,hungry,and downtrodden, nd Murray mmediatelyfeels of-fended orAustralia.LetKlejn keephis sympathy orhisfellowRussians,he suggests.Well, shall. The Russiansarechanging heir ocial systemnow, experiencingari-ous collisionsand ndeed sometimesfindinghemselvesunable to cope with theirdifficulties. urther, sug-gestedthat n generalcontemporaryrchaeological ndanthropologicalelativism esulted rom subconsciousweariness n the advanced nations with the troubles fpeoplesuntilrecently olonial- a weariness timulatedby feelings fguilt.But this does not mean that sup-pose every elativist o be wearyand guilt-ridden.Klejnhas misreadme, Murraydeclares, nd does notunderstand ur context.Of course, could well be con-fusedabout that distantcontext,could be incorrectlyreading tatements n a foreign anguage abounding nidioms andscholarly lang,but et us turn o theparticu-lar realizationof these accusations:

i. Klejntars ll the contributors iththesame broadrelativist rush p. 29i). Not all of them. tried o dif-ferentiatehearticlespresentedn thecollection, o seewhich ones were stronger nd which weaker,whichnearerto processualismand which to postprocessual-ism,which relativist nd which not. n particular,Mur-ray tipulates hathe does notalwaysfollowrelativism,but nrealityhe expoundsnearly verythingn the rela-tivist pirit.2. Klejn considers all ofthe manyvarieties frelativ-ism to imply kind of antiobjectivism ' p.29o). Whatvarietiesof relativism are meant here?Objectivismcan be understood s the absolutization f theobjectiveperception freality. erhapsMurray alls rejecting b-solutization mildervariety f relativism? o me bothrelativism nd absolutization f heobjectiveperceptionofreality I hesitate to call it objectivism) reextremes,and bothare bad.3. Klejn does not see that relativismhas contributedsomething sefulto ourdiscipline nd does not under-standthatthere s a middleground etweenobjectivismand relativismn archaeological pistemology p. 292).However, indicated the positivecontributions f the


Documents

On the Call for a Militant Anthropology