Anthropologists as Activists

In the articles for Tuesday, it seems like the authors' potential biases lurk much more prominently. Turner brings video cameras to villages and emphasizes the Kayapo-ness of the videos Tamok and others produce. "Representation, far from being an exclusively Western project foisted on the Kayapo through the influence of Western media, is as Kayapo as manioc meat pie" (84). But as an avowed videographer, who obviously already believes in the medium enough to bring cameras with him in the first place, can Turner really make such a determination with any sort of impartiality? As an anthropologist, doesn't he have to believe that he is not some sort of cultural imperialist, that he is not imposing problematic new methods of self-representation on the Kayapo? Similarly, Prins has a clear role in political activism and the use of video technology among the Mi'kmaqs. In both these cases, it seems like the anthropologists assume--indeed must assume--the virtues of video use by the indigenous groups with which they work. They take for granted that such technology coheres with the Kayapo and Mi'kmaqs needs and world view because they are its purveyors and supporters.

Trobriand Cricket

Watching Trobriand Cricket last week got me thinking about Appadurai and global cultural flows. In the film, British cricket has obviously been indigenized by the Trobrianders with new rules of play and colorful rituals, as Jerry Leach's commentary explicitly states.

But does this flow run in the other direction, specifically in the realm of sports? In North America, we have lacrosse, a Native-American game that has been adapted for general recreation. But lacrosse, though its supporters laud its rapid growth, still lacks the ubiquity of American sports like football, basketball, and baseball and, worldwide, the universal appeal of soccer. Its influence remains relatively limited. In the U.S., we also have professional sports teams with names and mascots loosely derived from indigenous peoples: the Cleveland Indians, the Atlanta Braves, the Washington Redskins, etc. But this seems completely different from Trobriand cricket or lacrosse. The potentially offensive nature of Cleveland's red-skinned caricature of a mascot aside, this brings us back to Harindranath's reminder about the problematic implications of the word "globalization": it masks the fundamentally unequal relations between developing countries and the West. Given these circumstances, the flow of media and culture does seem blatantly unequal. The indigenous influence on American sports comes in the form of commodified stereotypes: tomahawk chops and Redskins paraphernalia.

Mr. Warner

One summer afternoon three years ago, I heard a lecture by Michael Warner as a largely clueless high-school student. And I remember very little of the experience. I can visualize what the room looked like, a big lecture hall with theater-style seating (but that memory might have come from another lecture, since I heard several others in that same room). I remember Michael Warner basically reading from a paper, looking down and flipping through the pages, with an occasional symbolic raised glance to signify that he wished to engage the audience. Most vividly, I remember my teachers telling me in advance how part of his appeal was due to his resemblance to a young Michel Foucault.

Most strikingly, I do not remember a word of what Mr. Warner said. I have no idea even what his lecture was about, except that it related to critical theory (the subject of the lecture series). Yet according to "Publics and Counterpublics," I am nonetheless part of that lecture's public, it seems, by the simple fact of my attention, "the mere fact of active uptake" (61). My lack of recall (or admittedly, even comprehension at the time) is perhaps no different from the person watching television while vacuuming that Warner mentions. But this seems awfully inadequate to me, putting too much emphasis on the facts of discourse and too little on the character of the audience, though it does admittedly make more sense in the context of written works. Doesn't intelligibility matter, or is that assumed?

Cannibal Tours and the Anthropological Sneer

I've been thinking about our discussion of Cannibal Tours on Thursday, how it's easy for us as anthropologists to simply shudder or roll our eyes at the horrific remarks made by gauche European and American tourists. We have heard their narrative of pristine, prehistoric natives before and know we're supposed to react this way. But is there, as Rebecca asked, any room for sympathy?

I think there has to be. These people became enamored with the "primitive" and the "unspoiled" largely because of the exoticizing heritage of colonialism and the media's similar obsession. These tourists are our parents or grandparents and there, but for the grace of educational enlightenment, go we. Films like Apocalypto and the continuing popularity of the National Geographic-style gaze show that these tourists are not alone.

Anderson's Historical Narrative

First, I must say that I really enjoyed the few chapters we read from Imagined Communities. I appreciated Anderson's attempt to explore nationalism as a certain kind of cultural artifact, both in terms of a historical "how" and a perhaps an interdisciplinary "why" (4).

But I am struggling with one of Anderson's points vis-a-vis the development of the media. To a certain extent, I understand the importance of a sort of lingua franca print language in creating a territorially and linguistically bounded community of readers, "the embryo of the nationally imagined community" (44). But since these people are still not actually talking to each other, anyway, especially the ones living in more rural settings, why is this connection through print media so important? Why couldn't the primordial imaginary community be a connection through something else? Couldn't a French farmer feel himself a part of a community of other French farmers who do the same kind of work and live similar lives, though he will never meet them? Admittedly, thinking of himself as a "French farmer" might be a bit anachronistic, but I still don't see why language here is privileged over, say, residing within the same territorial boundaries. I feel like I'm missing something big here, but why is this community of readers so special, so different?

Media Imperialism

Both Tomlinson and Harindranath critique certain assumptions made by previous researchers studying the effects of Western media on members of other cultures. Tomlinson asserts that these people are not passive audiences, that they do not simply absorb wholesale the messages within particular media, but instead, individually and communally interpret and evaluate them. Harindranath also highlights the "contingent nature of the coercion and persuasion toward, collaboration with, and resistance to the implementation of neoliberal policies in various parts of the developing world" (165). He especially criticizes the assumed connection between ethnicity and interpretive behavior (160).

My question is this: how then do we try to pinpoint why individuals respond to media in certain shared ways? How can we determine if such shared interpretations are due to cultural sameness/similarity or something else entirely (e.g. two people from widely different backgrounds respond to Dallas in the same way because they both grew up down the street from bumbling rich people)?

Adorno and Another Brick in the Wall

We discussed in class last week how Adorno leaves very little room for existence outside the culture industry. "The only choice, " he says," is either to join in or to be left behind: those provincials who have recourse to eternal beauty and the amateur stage in preference to the cinema and radio are already--politically--at the point to which mass culture drives its supporters" (148). What such outsiders say, he continues, can be attacked as ideology. The only options then seem to be participation in the culture industry--whether tacit or active--and marginalization. And being an outsider is "the most mortal of sins" (150).

In "Another Brick in the Wall", however, Pink Floyd does leave open the possibility of becoming outsiders, of outright rebellion. The students can rise up, destroy the schoolhouse, and seize the evil schoolteacher. But even though this event seems couched somewhat as a student's daydream, I wonder what is supposed to happen after this dramatic break with the order of things. What do these students do next? Their subjection is surely not restricted to their school or this teacher; presumably, that treatment has trickled down from elsewhere. So, what happens next? Are they, as Adorno would say, tattooed with the death mark of "outsider"?

Adorno and the Present

In rethinking our discussion on Tuesday about Adorno, his cultural elitism, and our status a part of the much-maligned culture industry, I wonder how much certain innovations and trends complicate Adorno's picture of the behemoth.

He describes, for instance "blatant cash investment" as the "universal criterion of merit" (124). What does that mean for the recent moves toward "indie" films (and music, periodicals, etc.)? Money has certainly ceased to be the inarguable mark of quality. Perhaps Adorno would argue that that such cash investment has been rerouted to savvy market research, that so-called independent cultural products are simply the same old stuff in new packaging. Then again, the absence of big commercial funding certainly doesn't guarantee originality or merit. YouTube is chock full of people ripping each other off, even when the original video isn't particularly unique or interesting. Maybe the culture industry has over time already created such a closed system that like we said in class, an original thought or idea is impossible, making repetition unavoidable because it's all we have.

It also seems to me that the idea of quality has largely been replaced by that of personal taste, but that is another issue entirely.

This American Life - Chance and Second Chance

Ralph Fisher and Sandra Reddell in some ways seem like stand-ins for the so-called 'primitives' of anthropology's darker days; they are old and from Texas. They are simple people somehow unlike us, removed by their strange dealings with these bulls and their dogged faith in miraculous powers of science. The firm, barely smiling way Ms. Reddell tells Ira Glass he's wrong about Chance being less demonstrative than other animals marginalizes her as some sort of mild zealot, while Chance's (or another bull's) head is somewhat paradoxically mounted above her television.

These people have a relationship with this animal, the show implies, that we simply cannot understand, a relationship that runs the gamut from their letting Chance wander around their yard to taking pictures with his body and skinning it upon his death. The way Mr. Fisher describes alternately skinning Chance's body and crying is particularly arresting. Ralph Fisher and Sarah Reddell characterize Chance as being very much like the family's dog or cat, except for the size, but the way they act in his death is utterly unlike the typical family's response to a beloved pet's death. They skin their pet, and keep the hide in a box in their closet. When Ms. Reddell takes the hide out of the box, she explains, "This is Chance...He's all empty." It is clear they love this animal. Mr. Fisher has tears in his eyes when he describes the way they begged Texas A&M to clone chance. But within This American Life, these people and their affection for this bull, Chance are rendered absurd. As Ira Glass explains, this particular episode is about how "people get snapped back to reality." The Fishers, in other words, were previously outside of reality, in some place of faith and friendly bulls. Because they treated Chance as a pet and believed that science could bring him back, despite Second Chance's violence, they are Other. Whereas in the episode's prologue, we are all meant to emphasize with and imagine ourselves as the young "peezilla," our relationship with Sarah Reddell and Ralph Fisher is comparatively one of distance and head shaking.