Engaging Anthropology: The Case for a Public Presence

by Thomas Hylland Eriksen

Anthropology ought to have changed the world. What went wrong? Engaging Anthropology takes an unflinching look at why the discipline has not gained the popularity and respect it deserves in the twenty-first century. From identity to multicultural society, new technologies to work, globalization to marginalization, anthropology has a vital contribution to make.While showcasing the intellectual power of the discipline, Eriksen takes the anthropological community to task for its unwillingness to engage more proactively with the media in a wide range of current debates. If anthropology matters as a key tool with which to understand modern society beyond the ivory towers of academia, why are so few anthropologists willing to come forward in times of national or global crisis? Eriksen argues that anthropology needs to rediscover the art of narrative and abandon arid analysis and, more provocatively, anthropologists need to lose their fear of plunging into the vexed issues modern societies present. Engaging Anthropology makes an impassioned plea for positioning anthropology as the universal intellectual discipline. Eriksen has provided the wake-up call we were all awaiting.

Genres: Anthropology, Nonfiction

160 pages, Paperback

First published March 3, 2006

About the author

Geir Thomas Hylland Eriksen was a Norwegian anthropologist known for his scholarly and popular writing on globalization, identity, ethnicity, and nationalism. He was Professor of Social Anthropology in the Department of Social Anthropology at the University of Oslo. He has previously served as the President of the European Association of Social Anthropologists (2015–2016), as well as the Editor of Samtiden (1993–2001), Norsk antropologisk tidsskrift (1993–1997), the Journal of Peace Research, and Ethnos.
Hylland Eriksen was among the most prolific and highly cited anthropologists of his generation, and had been recognized for his remarkable success in bringing an anthropological perspective to a broader, non-academic audience. In Norway, Hylland Eriksen was a well-known public intellectual whose advocacy of diversity and cultural pluralism had earned both praise and scorn. Right-wing terrorist Anders Behring Breivik, perpetrator of the 2011 Norway attacks, cited Eriksen critically in his manifesto and during his 2012 trial.
In the academy and beyond, Hylland Eriksen had been highly decorated for his scholarship. He was the recipient of honorary degrees from Stockholm University (2011), the University of Copenhagen (2021), and Charles University in Prague (2021), as well as one of anthropology's most prestigious honors, the Swedish Society for Anthropology and Geography's Gold Medal (2022). He was a member of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters.

Reviews

[Rike · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book totally hits the nail on the head by asking why anthropology, in contrast to most other social sciences such as sociology, political science or history, is practically invisible in public discourse (and has even less influence on public opinion). In contrast to the many other anthropologists who ask the same question, Norwegian anthropologist Eriksen looks at the ways of anthropologist involvement themselves and not at some other unchangeable injustice that prevents the poor anthropologists from being heard. In self-critically analyzing why anthropologists are not paid attention to in the public (because they retreat into a dull academic style that interests only themselves) and how to change this (write more engagingly, with the audience in mind), the book offers a unique alternative to the otherwise monotonous and ever-puzzled "when will people start listening to us?!" mantra of most other members of the discipline.

I personally strongly concur with Eriksen on this and I wish more anthropologists would take the message of the book to heart: Don't wait till others start reading your academic treatises by themselves, but strive to make your work as accessible and engaging as possible in order to make yourself worth reading or listening to. (Hell, if other disciplines manage to do so, why can't you?!)

Only downside (thus the 4 instead of 5 stars): As it addresses the academic retreatism of anthropology and the discipline's lack of a public presence, for my taste, the book itself could have been written in an even less academic tone. Although, in fairness, it is entirely readable, and it is after all addressed to academic anthropologists...