journal article
Art, Behavior, and the Anthropologists [and Comments and Reply]Denis Dutton, Donald Brook, John K. Clegg, Seth D. Cudjoe, H. Alto Delaquis, Thomas A. Green, Elvin Hatch, Frederick C. Huxley, I. C. Jarvie, Tim E. H. Jones, Babatunde Lawal, Arthur C. Lehmann, Alan P. Merriam, S. G. Morab, Carlos Munizaga Aguirre, Zenon Pohorecky, Anthony Seeger and Jehanne Teilhet
Current Anthropology
Vol. 18, No. 3 (Sep., 1977)
, pp. 387-407 (21 pages)
Published By: The University of Chicago Press
//www.jstor.org/stable/2741396
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Abstract
Can Social activities be understood as having important and persistent social functions which are unintended by members of the society in which they are performed? In arguing that the answer is no, I draw methodological comparisons between aesthetic criticism is shown to make use of a broader sense of "intention" than many anthropologists have wished to employ in describing the functional significance of social activities. Yet the persistent functional values of such activities resemble in important respects the purposiveness characteristic of works of art. These values (the social unity brought about by the Hopi rain dances, for instance) cannot be regarded as merely inadvertent by-products of actions directed toward other goals (producing rain), but must be understood as strategies, as matters of intelligent human design, and hence as implicitly intentional. The inclination of so many anthropologists to treat intention virtually as an irrelevant component of functional analysis is shown to be part of the misguided impulse to treat human activity "scientifically," in the same way that a chemist or biologist regards a physical or organic process. Understanding a primitive society more resembles understanding a work of art than a physical process: in this respect, anthropology has much to learn from aesthetic criticism.
Journal Information
Current issues are now on the Chicago Journals website. Read the latest issue.Current Anthropology is a transnational journal devoted to research on humankind, encompassing the full range of anthropological scholarship on human cultures and on the human and other primate species. Communicating across the subfields, the journal features papers in a wide variety of areas, including social, cultural, and physical anthropology as well as ethnology and ethnohistory, archaeology and prehistory, folklore, and linguistics.
Publisher Information
Since its origins in 1890 as one of the three main divisions of the University of Chicago, The University of Chicago Press has embraced as its mission the obligation to disseminate scholarship of the highest standard and to publish serious works that promote education, foster public understanding, and enrich cultural life. Today, the Journals Division publishes more than 70 journals and hardcover serials, in a wide range of academic disciplines, including the social sciences, the humanities, education, the biological and medical sciences, and the physical sciences.
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Current
Anthropology © 1977 The University of Chicago Press
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journal article
Understanding in Anthropology: A Philosophical Reminder [and Comments and Replies]Maria-Barbara Watson-Franke, Lawrence C. Watson, Morris Freilich, F. Allen Hanson, David M. Hayano, H. Dieter Heinen, Harold Kagan, Dennison Nash, Richard J. Preston and Bob Scholte
Current Anthropology
Vol. 16, No. 2 (Jun., 1975)
, pp. 247-262 (16 pages)
Published By: The University of Chicago Press
//www.jstor.org/stable/2741124
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Abstract
The task of anthropology consists in describing and explaining cultures and ultimately reaching an understanding of them through interpretation. The practical difficulties of this are obvious to all those who have dealth with members of another culture. As Malinowski observed, the anthropologist's task is to be "the interpreter of the native." It is suggested that some of the principles elucidated in the philosophical discipline of hermeneutics, such as understanding in context as opposed to preunderstanding and the dialectical relationship between the interpreter and the object of interpretation, may be helpful in defining the essential problems that anthropologists may encounter in their attempts to interpret cultures.
Journal Information
Current issues are now on the Chicago Journals website. Read the latest issue.Current Anthropology is a transnational journal devoted to research on humankind, encompassing the full range of anthropological scholarship on human cultures and on the human and other primate species. Communicating across the subfields, the journal features papers in a wide variety of areas, including social, cultural, and physical anthropology as well as ethnology and ethnohistory, archaeology and prehistory, folklore, and linguistics.
Publisher Information
Since its origins in 1890 as one of the three main divisions of the University of Chicago, The University of Chicago Press has embraced as its mission the obligation to disseminate scholarship of the highest standard and to publish serious works that promote education, foster public understanding, and enrich cultural life. Today, the Journals Division publishes more than 70 journals and hardcover serials, in a wide range of academic disciplines, including the social sciences, the humanities, education, the biological and medical sciences, and the physical sciences.
Rights & Usage
This item is part of a JSTOR Collection.
For terms and use, please refer to our Terms and Conditions
Current Anthropology © 1975
The University of Chicago Press
Request Permissions