Thoughts on a Legacy

Ned Spicer was invited to participate in a symposium, organized by Thomas Weaver of the University of Arizona, entitled  "Anthropology in the 1990's: Conditions, Needs, and Prospects." The symposium was held in conjunction with the American Association for the Advancement of Science meetings in San Francisco in the winter of 1974. The subheading of the symposium was, "Suppose They Began the Twenty-First Century and Forgot to Invite Anthropology!!!"

Ned presented his paper entitled, "Anthropology in the society of the 1990s", on February 28, 1974.

Twenty years later, in 1994, the paper was republished in Human Organization with a forward by his widow, Rosamond Spicer, under the title, "Reassessing Edward Spicer's Views on Anthropology in the Society of the 1990s: How and Why This Paper by Edward H. Spicer Was Written" (Spicer, Rosamond 1994 Human Organization, Vol. 53. No. 4, pp. 388 - 395). From her forward, we can gain an insight into Ned's thinking and approach to the future.

Rosamond observed that

"In preparing this paper on the future of cultural anthropology, Ned apparently gave it a great deal of thought. As was his habit, he wrote down voluminous notes and lists of ideas. He also made a number of starts, each different from the last.”

“At one point he wrote, 'I react strongly against nineteenth century economic-determinism, that technology and physical environmental conditions are the essential factors to consider in forecasting. I rather look to the future in terms of the adaptation of social structures and cultural orientations to one another in the context of the influence of firm cultural products. I shall therefore take off from consideration of the probable alternative trends which we may expect in the form and functions of societal structures and cultural value orientations.'  “

“Such a point of view was always the basis of his thinking and writing." (p. 388)

In describing Ned, Rosamond observed that,

"His interests, reading, and studies ranged through drama, literature, economics, city planning, philosophy, history, poetry, the environment, and all the fields of anthropology. All of this vast array of information and understanding he brought to bear in some way or another on any project he undertook, on any subject on which he wrote.”

“Perhaps one of his outstanding characteristics was his ability to synthesize, as was so evident in his Cycles of Conquest. I have long thought that the practice of that art of synthesis was connected with another, the appreciation and writing of poetry. I mention all these aspects of Ned because they seem to be contained in the following paper." (p.388).

 It was his global interests and ability to synthesize vast amounts of material that I remember from my first graduate classes with Ned.  I was drawn to his Community Development Seminar where  he challenged us to look at the problem at hand from multiple points of view. He asked us, “What are the “felt needs” of the various parties in this change situation?” He encouraged us to seek a synthesis of these views as a way toward understanding the issues and their complexities. As community developers, he taught us that our job was to help the parties to synthesize their shared interests. Our job was to facilitate, not impose, problem resolution.

Ned was a humanist who understood and taught the connection between a people’s past, present and how these shaped their future. In his paper on the February day in 1974, he outlined five trends in the social and cultural environment that he felt would shape the next 20 years for anthropology.

The five trends that Ned chose to characterize the society he envisioned for the 1990s were the following:

(1) increasing intercommunication among the peoples of the world;

(2) increasing occupational specialization with accompanying organic differentiation within societies;

(3) increasing failure of technological solutions for the resolution of human problems in acceptable ways;

(4) increasing assertion and self-expression of ethnic groups within nation-states; and

(5) increasing reaction against centralization in political and administrative structures.

He stated "In general, continuation of these trends will, I believe, result in a society more heterogeneous than it was in the 19th or any previous century, more aware of its heterogeneity, with stronger than ever tendencies to compartmentalization, with increased awareness of and interest in non-technological and non-economic factors affecting human life, and with a growing tendency to view the nation-state in a wholly new light, especially with reference to its ethnic components and its political and administrative units." (p. 389)

Now nearly 50 years later, it might be worth considering just how prescient Ned’s predictions were for the 1990s and now for the 21st Century. 

What are your thoughts about Applied Anthropology, or what has been your experience since 1974?   PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT IF YOU HAVE ONE.

Philosophy vs Cultural Anthropology

This is an answer to the question below that  I posted on Quara in 2018

What is the relationship between philosophy and cultural anthropology? How are they similar/different?

Barry Bainton, PhD Anthropology (1979)

Answered Jun 13, 2018 · Author has 235 answers and 85.5k answer views

Philosophy is a humanistic discipline that attempts to explain life in its many situations. It is divided into many different subfields or subjects such as morality, reality, language, logic, etc. It is term that can be applied in a general (universal) or specific (situational or cultural) sense. What the philosopher attempts to do is to understand nature and how we experience it. Methodologically, Philosophy is based on intuition, applied to personal experience at one extreme, and logical analysis based on mathematics at the other extreme.

Anthropology is a scientific and humanistic discipline that studies humanity as a physical biological organism and a social animal that is self aware. Anthropologists study how humans have and are able to consciously influence the environment by combining their physical (existential) uniqueness and their mental development that creates a unique “world view” (ideational) based on their individual/group experiences through time.

Anthropologists study humanity through direct observation and participation with their subjects. They document their findings in reports. By comparing the findings these reports document they seek to establish relationships via the comparative method. Such relationships range from unique features shared by the human animal; and, the identify differences between peoples based on how they explain life and natural world that they experience and have experienced. Anthropology is thus both scientific (a philosophical point of view that requires the validation and objective measurement of phenomena) and humanistic (a philosophical point of view that emphasizes the individual’s interpretation of experience).

Ahead of His Time

Ahead of His Time

By Barry R. Bainton, Ph.D. MIM

“Eliot D Chapple has been selected by the Forum of Presidents of the American Anthropological Association to present the Distinguished Lecture at the Association's upcoming annual meeting in Cincinnati. Titled 'The Unbounded Reaches of Anthropology as a Research Science and Some |Working Hypotheses,' the lecture will explore the central position anthropology occupies for pursuing research on human organization that integrates the biological, psychological, and cultural components of behavior. Chapple's long and noted career, is carved at the interface between basic and applied research demonstrates the wide range of theory and applications yielded by the generalist perspective, characteristic of anthropology.”[i]  (Anthropology News Letter, October 1979, Vol.20, No.8).

I walked in to the auditorium of the convention hotel in Cincinnati, OH to hear the Distinguished Lecture. It was with the awe of a new PhD and as a young applied anthropologist. I looked forward to Chapple’s speech, after all he was one of the founders of the Society for Applied Anthropology. Based on the title, I assumed he would address the linkages between basic (or academic) research and applied anthropology. I was aware of Chapple’s four-field approach to anthropology as a science, and his innovative methodologies. I hoped that he would be sharing his insights with us – especially to a younger generation facing a very difficult employment market as the 1980s began.

Later, after his Lecture, I felt both rewarded and disappointed. Rewarded by the width and depth of the net that Chapple cast around the field, and by his unorthodox incorporation of concepts and perspectives he addressed beyond traditional anthropology to push for an applied science of man. Chapple was far ahead of his time in the way he perceived the problems that an applied anthropology must address. The four fields meant just that – four fields to be treated as aspects of a singular whole that makes up human behavior.

But I was also disappointed. I was disappointed by the man who was presenting the lecture and his delivery.[ii] Not to be too pedantic, the speech, while informative, was too long, over an hour. It seemed to begin where the author, not the audience, was. Years later, after I had enrolled in Toastmasters, I learned the principles of public speaking. As I reread his paper, and reflected upon those days, I understood why I had been disappointed. It was not Chapple, per se, but the method he chose. The delivery quality of the reading an academic paper is designed for reading and not to be delivered orally. Writing and speaking are two very different media. One can expect that a reader will be drawn to the subject by self-selection. The oral presentation is more complex – it is “selling” an idea to an audience. Chapple was trying to sell his ideas to a very mixed audience.

What are those four fields Chapple was attempting to sell ?

For Chapple, Anthropology’s four fields represented “methods” for addressing the problem of humankind as both a biological animal and thinking social animal. To understand humans one must begin with the animal body – how it develops and how the emerging specialized organs and structures integrate with one another in a manner that produces a functioning biological organism. The story of human-kind is the story of nature and evolution. The processes of integration of the biological elements are, from Chapple’s perspective, also the processes of human organization as social animals.

Chapple s’ conclusion states:

              

“For us, however, recognition that the primary language of the CNS [Central Nervous System] enables us to build a science on the hierarchical systems of rhythms of interaction, ... , [It] also means that our inquiries over time and space are unbounded. We do not have to halt at a series of academic walls, each one of which wishes to exclude the free-trader in ideas from seeking his uniformities wherever the data suggest he should look.” (1980: 756) 

What struck me, re-reading the Lecture, is how anthropology today and its organization are building these walls taller and thicker. While we may plumb our subject deeper, we do so from an ever-narrower perspective. In response to the practical competitive demands of academic employment, we find that we must create a “unique” space for ourselves. In turn, the focus on specialization and their encapsulation in separate professional associations has surrendered the control of their science and discipline to special interest groups at the expense of the unifying Science of Mankind [Humanity].

Chapple continued,

“If you read widely in all those fields in which perceptive individuals, over centuries, have tried to formulate their views of the human condition - ... – you will find across culture and across history an encouraging yield of insights about uniformities the writers had become aware of. They may appear buried in writers within them. Yes, it requires little effort to translate them into the language of biological rhythms of human being.” (1980:766)

Chapple’s Anthropology as a Science:

Chapple’s work goes back to the 1930s. The scientific management, based on Fredrick Taylor’s time and motion studies, strongly influenced his approach to anthropology. Later, in the 1940’s, together with John Provinse and others, Chapple became a major force in the creation and growth of the Society of Applied Anthropology (SfAA). Despite an emphasis on anthropology, the SfAA shared Chapple’s openness to the application social science as a whole. The early SfAA and its journal, Applied Anthropology, reflected this sense of holism that Chapple felt the anthropological paradigm implied.

Chapple wrote only two books during a career that began in 1933 and ended in 2000. Most famous of these is Principles of anthropology (1942), which he wrote with the physical anthropologist, Carleton Coon. It was here in the Principles book that he initially presented his concept of a behavioral anthropology.

In his second book in 1970, The Biological Foundations of Individuality and Culture (1980/1970), (re-titled from Culture and Biological Man (1970)), Chapple presented the results of his “behavioral anthropology” research which is reflected in his subtitled, “Explorations in Behavioral Anthropology“.  Here he outlined “a framework within which anthropology can be understood as providing a systematic and general science of the human condition,” rooted in biogenetic givens of human nature (Chapple 1970:v).[iii]

Chapple’s approach deviated from mainstream anthropology by being “cultureless.”  Where American anthropology under Kroeber and White tended to view “culture” as a super-organic concept to which the individual and society surrendered, Chapple saw human biological and social behavior as the source and mediator of what we term “culture.”

As I re-read his Distinguished Lecture, I came to understood why Chapple’s views fail to catch on. As Kehoe and Weil observed, “The year 1970 should have been a high point in Eliot Chapple’s career.”[iv] But instead, “By 1970 Chapple was willing to conform to disciplinary standards and used the [culture] term; he may have realized that his earlier, relentlessly scientific, cultureless chronograph method threw out the baby with the bathwater.” By surrendering the behaviorist approach, Chapple was effectively turning his back on nearly 40 years of work. In 1979, I feel that Chapple felt he had a chance to make a new pitch for his behaviorist perspective. After all, biology, genetics, and neuroscience had made considerable progress since the 1940’s.

Why I found the Lecture exciting:

Today as I re-read the Lecture, I also contemplated what excited me. It was the way Chapple’ concept of “behavioral anthropology” integration the physical and social and provided a holistic theory of anthropology. As an applied anthropologist, trained in a four-field approach, I was looking for such a model of reality. A holistic theory would enable me, as a professional, to look at a situation in terms of its physical, material, social and cultural dimension, and these how these affected an individual and corporate organism’s performance.  These four fields, from the Chapple perspective, define the situation. Or, from the applied perspective, “the problem.”

A problem or situation has physical, biological and collective psychological interactive functions. Problem also has antecedent and resulting conditions or a history. These frame the human interactions that take place. In human terms, a “situation” is to be understood in terms of a dramatic arch (e.g. a story) or a cycle (e.g. a life). To understand human situations, one must understand the underlying biological and psychological forces that create human behavior. To understand the nature of the situation and its component parts is to have a basis for understanding and balancing the forces that promote situational change or stability in the situational conditions.

By the 1970’s the “culture” concept that had dominated American anthropology for a century was under attack from many sides. The question within academic anthropology focused on the question, ”What is culture”?

Meanwhile, the employment situation, along with the reorganization of American Anthropological Association, pointed toward a very personality and competitive dominated situation.  Later, as Phil Salzeman points out[v],

Insights about historical progression, or opinions parading as insights, sometimes come upon us not purposely, the fruits of directed and informed research, but serendipitously, as revelation burst forth from accumulated experience. It is about the recent development of academic anthropological theory, from the mid-1960s to the present, and its relation to academic life in university departments, that I have had unexpected and ungratifying revelations.  … We anthropologists seem to change allegiances and our views almost as quickly and repeatedly as Little Richard switches between gay rock star and Baptist preacher.”

So what is Chappel’s Problem:

Eric Wolf is often cited as saying, “Anthropology is the most humanistic of the sciences and the most scientific of the humanities.”  Chapple spent his career attempting to unify the social sciences and humanities. But to do so, he went to an extreme by arguing against the concept of “culture.” As a veteran of Toastmasters and veteran applied anthropologist, I looked at the lecture in a different light. I saw it as a major speech designed by its author as a last chance to “sell” a point of view, and as a summation of almost 50 years of work. If we examine the lecture, there are several points that stand out.

First, the speech was over an hour. It was too long. In its written form, it is 17 pages long, almost 11,000 words. This is a long time to keep the public’s attention speech on any subject and especially one as complex as this one.

Second, the subject is extremely complex for a mixed audience made up of a cross section of specialists. If ever there were a general rule for the applied anthropologist, I would look to Charles Erasmus, and the idea of “felt need.” The presenter’s position, i.e. Chapple’s, assumed that the individuals in the audience would or could understand how his perspective and their specialty connected.

Third, Chapple began the Lecture as if he were writing a research paper. He begins with a few basic biological assumptions and builds these up to an ending that links the neurobiology he began with to the emergence of the “cultural” nature of music and dance as the biological expression of group solidarity. A more effective strategy would have been to reverse the order of his presentation.

Here I have to admit that after a deep reading of the paper, and remembering how I felt 40 years ago, I can see that Chapple’s unique approach articulated thoughts that I have had but could not express verbally. Chapple is explaining that patterned behavior is the result how a personal experiences a situation. Behavioral patterns arise in a situational context resulting from the emotional response to the elements in the situation. This response becomes the “situational language” which we call, “culture.” A “situational language” is shared and taught just as a spoken language is.

 A “situational language” is not rational; it is emotional. When an individual attaches a meaning and value to their emotional experience, the experience becomes rational. Culture is an emergent phenomena based on situational language. What Chapple was suggesting here is that culture is a result of the individual’s rationalized behavior in a situational context, not the other way around.  

Unlike, Spencer, Kroeber, and Leslie White who conceptualize “culture” as a force independent of biology, i.e. as Super-organic, Chapple’s argument is that what we find as “cultural” is merely the extension of a neurobiological evolution of a biological organism.  Chapple’s lecture was one last attempt to explain and justify his position.

Chapple failed, I feel, because of egotism and by not knowing or understanding his audience. If one were to reverse the argument as it is presented, Chapple would have started with the audience on his side and he could lead them to his conclusion. This is what a good teacher does. Chapple suffered from the fact he was TOO much the researcher and to some respects a non-conforming humanist.

Where Chapple represents one branch that evolved as applied anthropology evolved in the Twentieth Century, there others.

---

[i] Anthropology News Letter, October 1979, Vol.20, No.8)

[ii] One can read the speech on Anthrosource (American Anthropologist, v82 n4 (198012): 741-758).

[iii]  Kehoe, Alice Beck, et al. Expanding American Anthropology, 1945-1980: A Generation Reflects. 1 ed. The University of Alabama Press, 2012. Project MUSE muse.jhu.edu/book/13809.

[iv] Chapter 11 Eliot Chapple’s Long and Lonely Road  ,   Alice Beck Kehoe and Jim Weil

[v]  Salzeman, Philip  “Fads and Fashions”, Anthropology Newsletter May 1988  pp. 1,32

ENDURING PEOPLES -- an anthropological concept

In 1980, Edward H. Spicer published The Yaquis: A Cultural History. It demonstrated his scholarship of four centuries of Yaquis Indians society and culture history; and his theoretical perspective of the broader implication and importance of the anthropological perspective in understanding socio-cultural dynamics.  In his last chapter he attempted to define the Yaquis as an '"enduring people" similar to many other "enduring peoples" one finds in the world today.

An "enduring people", in Spicer's sense, is a human social type consisting of an ethnic minority who retain their separate identities in the face of overwhelming and long term political and cultural domination by an "outsider" ("the Other","the Deep State", etc.) majorities.

The following article about Niki Haley's remarks is about the Confederate Stars and Bars. It conveys a story that illustrates how the concept might be employed to understand the divisions that exist within our own sociocultural system. Regarding the Stars and Bars, we could accept that the black community might have a different interpretation of the symbol than the white community. We usually think of the Confederate flag as symbolizing a unifying meme in southern white American communities. But, this article stands out because it focuses on the differential responses to a common shared symbol.

The article presents a case that illustrates how the Confederate flag has multiple and significant meanings for those who claimed it as the symbol of their community. It shows how these differences produce different attitudes among the members. These attitudes in turn lead to different actions by the members. Yet, from the outside, this a composite of enduring sub-cultural systems associated with a common symbol, would appear to be a homogeneous socio-cultural system.

Dylann Roof and Nikki Haley would appear to hold similar meanings for the display of the Confederate Bars and Stars Yet Roof used the symbol to motivate and justify his anger toward outsiders. Haley's response to Roof's a sacreligious use the symbol of local pride and heritage, justified her ordering the flag removal from State buildings. These different responses to the symbol's use in a shared context, point to the existence of  two very different cultural meanings to the Stars and Bars.   ·

If Spicer's concept of "enduring peoples" is applied in the broad global context, the differences, outlined above, can also to be found in the many religions, ethnic and political sects found throughout human society.

The difference in meaning that a people apply to shared symbols often produce the most intense psychological reactions. The reactions are found in the differences that individuals find in the cultural priorities, meanings and expressions of what are assumed to be shared or common set of symbols. This "assumption" often is the source for partisan conflicts and divisions.

Why Academic Anthro turned me off!

What are the odds that you can "win" a job by responding to this type of an ad, and recover the time and expense that is required to apply in the first 5 years while still uncertain about that there might be a tenure offer at the end. Is this a good investment given today the many options that are open in the applied or entrepreneurial fields for a trained anthropologist?

This is similar to applying for admissions. And another hurdle on top of the Student Loans and deferred income from pursing an MA or PhD.


An example of the effort that is required to apply for an academic job in anthropology. 

Candidates should create a profile in XXXXXXXXX's online application portal at https://xxxxxxx.referrals.selectminds.com/ and submit the following:

1. Application form (https://xxxx.xxxxxxxx.edu/sites/xxxx.xxxxxx.edu/files/FacApp.pdf)  
2. Cover letter explaining and describing interest in the position and why the applicant is a suitable candidate
3a. Statement on Mission outlining how the candidate will contribute to the University's (https://xxxxxxxxxxxxx.edu/about/mission),
3b. the department's (http://www.xxxxxxxxx.edu/ccas/culturalandsocialstudies/), and 
3c. the cultural anthropology program's mission (http://www.xxxxxxxxx.edu/ccas/culturalandsocialstudies/programs/culturalanthropology/)

4. Curriculum Vitae
5. Academic Transcripts from all institutions of higher education attended (photocopies of transcripts are acceptable during the initial application process)
6. Teaching Dossier that includes: a) a statement on the candidate's philosophy of teaching and learning, and b) evidence of teaching effectiveness (course evaluations, syllabi, etc.)

7. Additionally, three Letters of Recommendation, at least two of which speak of the candidate's teaching ability, should be sent directly to Dr. Yyyyyyyyyyy  at  000000000000.

Review of completed applications will begin immediately.

zzzzzzzzzz University, a zzzzzzzzzz institution, offers a comprehensive education directed to the intellectual, social, spiritual, physical, and other aspects of students' lives and to the promotion of justice. zzzzzzzzzz encourages applications from qualified individuals of all backgrounds and faith traditions who believe they can contribute to its distinctive educational traditions. zzzzzzzzz is an EO/AA employer; M/F/Disabled/Vet and seeks a wide range of applicants for this position so that one of our core values-gender, ethnic, cultural, and other diversity-may be realized.

The Great Unifier in Anthropology

Anthropology, especially American, has been in intellectual crisis for more than a half century. Like the Cold War was during the latter half of the 20th Century, it is the "new" normal. Intellectual crisis is not necessarily bad, it can be healthy to challenge old ideas and stimulating new ones. It becomes "bad", however, when the pursuit of one's ego gratification over takes one's pursuit of "truth." And, over the past half century we have had our share of egoists and gurus.

We have seen a wave upon wave of fads and fashions sweep over the discipline as we have unconsciously attempted to adjust and adapt to the changes that have been taking place all around us. The demographic curve, the decolonizing and nation building of the third world, the cold war and its sudden end, the raise of global capitalism, the campaign for human rights, crime and terrorism on a global scale, environmental concerns including global warming, among others have set in motion forces that have threatened and challenge anthropology, its institutions and practitioners.

We have seen much soul searching and navel picking within the discipline and its many traditional and emerging specialties. This is especially true as new constituencies have emerged and the Other has become one of US. Anthropology today is not the white, male, Anglo-American or Eurocentric discipline that emerged in the 19th century to study the "illiterate" natives found in the imperial colonies. It is no longer the testing ground for the western idea of progress. It can no longer be justified on the basis of Judeo-Christian theological principles of creation and western superiority.

Anthropology is the apex of humanity’s study and understanding of what it means to  be human and what this tells us of our destiny. It is the study of the Good, Bad and Ugly of the human animal and our institutions.

If there is any overarching principle that anthropology offers humanity, it is the discovery that we are BOTH the observers and the participants of “our” actions. We are both the agents of socio-cultural change and as well as the victims of that change. For the Human animal, “Progress” is an illusion. It is a drug that confounds our cultural beliefs and values by confounding our social institutions. Culture worships the benefits of Progress and ignores the costs of our addiction to the Individual and Society. Society is the human organization which seeks to insure the survival and replication (continuity) of our species and our planet.

Nature has found a way to progress in face of the reality of change. It does so by the evolutionary principle of adaptation on the social level. It has done so for ions through the simple principles of mathematics – that is probability. An organizational model, a form of live, emerges and is subjected to the reality of environment from which it emerged. It survives or fails that’s it. That is the test. It is neither Good or Bad, it just "IS".
 

What is this “IS”? “IS” is survival. Survival is a life long enough to replicate fast enough, and in a quantity large enough, to insure the survival of the original model. Life survives by establishing a connection with its environment, taking from the environment what it needs and returning to it what others need. The values of life are determined by ecological balance that a species and a community develop and are capable of maintaining the balance. The belief in Progress arises when the observer assumes that they are not a “participant” in the process but its beneficiary. Not only is the observer the beneficiary, but also has the exclusive “right” to benefit from the “progress” that accrues to her/his own professional advancement.

For too long, anthropology and anthropologists have accepted this perspective. I remember as an undergraduate in the 1960’s asking the questions – “Do you have to pay your informants when you are interviewing them?” It was a simple, practical question. Would I need to budget funding to pay informants for the information I would be collecting to do my dissertation?

The answers I received surprised me. As I reflect on it, the answers seem to have been generational. They ranged from “Of course not, you observe and collect data based on your observations.” “ You pay for your food and lodging but you don’t want to “influence” the informant’s answers by paying them for the answers.(this might bias their answers).” “You don’t pay the informant, but you “pay” the community by providing a service such a medical assistance, or help out in some way that community benefits, such as “cross-cultural” interpreter.” Or, even “Of course you pay them for their time and expertise by working out a “fair” hourly rate.”

 I was left feeling very confused. The moral seemed to be that I was entitled to the information. This was “rapport.” Become a “friend” and collect the secrets and share them with your own community when you get home. Or, become an employer and buy the rights to your observations and informant’s information that you could then sell when you get home.

It has only been in recent years that the idea of an auto-ethnography has entered the professional vocabulary. The auto-ethnography is an attempt to adapt to the fact that the field researcher is, as Boas so insight-fully noted, both observer and participant in the field situation. It is in the participant role that the field anthropologist introduces an automatic and random disruption in the “subject’s” environment. This is where the “science” of anthropology becomes the “humanity” of anthropology.

As I progressed in my chosen discipline, anthropology, I have pondered this question. My personal answer is to pursue a career as an applied anthropologist. This does not negate the importance of a science of anthropology, whether it be as an archaeologist, a linguist, a physical or biological anthropologist, or in my case as socio-cultural anthropologist. What it means is that there is no pure form of anthropology. The collection of data is not an end in itself. This is not natural. It is not evolutionary. Humans are not gods and that humanity is not GOD. We are part of a complex system. We are an experiment just like every other species is and has been.

Our knowledge, as anthropologist, is worthless to the species and the planet if it is not used to manage the planet and insure its survival. Our science enables our observation, but it is our humanity is measured by our participation. I have been studying the live and career of my mentor and teacher, Edward H. Spicer over the past decade. I found that in a quiet way he found a way to be both the participant and observer of our discipline. Even more important he was successful in replicating that role by training a number of us to be practitioners and/or to train students to take up careers outside of academic department. Replication is the other side of survival. Replication does not mean the mechanical cookie cutter copying. Life does not thrive on cookies; it survives and flourishes within a framework that offers both a basic structure and the variety that functions necessitates.

 

Rather than fighting over personalities and parochial theoretical purities, anthropologist and anthropology should, in my opinion, be serving the challenge posed by our position within the ecological system that we have inherited from Nature’s experiment. We should focus our individual and collective efforts on the salvage of the planet. For the vast majority of us and those species we have assumed responsibility for, this is the only place WE have evolved to survive in. It will be a sad day when the only record of life on this planet will be the evidence that some future extraterrestrial archaeologist discovers. Our discipline is or could be the Great Unifier of humanity and the planet. Ours is the only discipline that bridges the reality (or science) of human relations with the values of humanism.   

  

ART OF THE DEAL : Redux

I've been re-reading the Art of the Deal and find that Donald Trump has not really changed since Tony Schwarz wrote about him. The important lesson that comes from the book is that Trump is a loner when it comes to decision making. The test is always, "What is best for Trump?”  If cooperation is required, he makes a deal. If the deal is made, but he sees a better one, he will break the deal using all possible means.

To quote Trump, "I'm the first to admit that I am very competitive and that I will do ANYTHING within legal BOUNDS to win." (emphasis add: Art of the Deal (1987) p. 108). ANYTHING means any action to achieve the personal goal, ethically or unethically. BOUNDS means if I can't win I will sue you and we'll see what the legal bounds are. Oh! by the way I have more money than you and  law suits are expensive and time consuming -- so try me! Or, if I can't win, I'll walk away and claim victory.

These are good rational arguments for a business and a businessman responsible only for himself - take the risk and reap the rewards or pay the price. But, they are not the qualities one looks for in a leader of a Democracy who is elected to protect and balance the interests of the Nation and its people.

 There are times when you can't threaten to just walk away if you personal feelings are hurt. You have relationships that are long standing deals and practices that been made by your predecessors and that you are obligated to fulfill.

In Art of the Deal, one sees a young Donald Trump whose primary interest is money over tradition and who is pragmatic when it comes to his interests. See his attitude toward the customers for space in Trump Tower (p. 184 -185) and his attitude toward the New York establishment.

On p. 186 -7, he shows his personal need to glorify himself after seeing the apartment of a Saudi billionaire in a rival apartment building.

Loyalty is important to Trump, but it is a one way street. "You be loyal to me, if not "YOUR FIRED!"  How many has he fired? Can he change and be as loyal to America and the American people as he demands they be loyal to him?

 We have seen in the three years that the character in the book has found no redemption. Let us pray that The Art of the Leader is not the 2020 sequel. That is, it never is written.