Inclusion, Collaboration & Engagement
The theme for the 2008 AAA Annual Meeting in San Francisco is “Inclusion, Collaboration and Engagement.” This theme provides us the opportunity to critically examine anthropology’s relationships: across subfields, with other disciplines, with our many publics, and with contemporary social problems. The Executive Program Committee envisions healthy debate as we confront methodological, ethical, and epistemological concerns that unite and divide us; as well as discuss the challenges, risks, and opportunities for growth enabled by this dialog.
Inclusion, Collaboration, and Engagement are ideas that have been central to anthropology throughout the discipline’s history and they are particularly important today. Anthropologists, scholars in other disciplines, and the general public have begun to recognize that anthropology has a great deal to contribute in this era of globalization. Still, our discipline remains a mystery to many and we are often not approached when social science information is needed. Moreover, anthropologists are conflicted about whether and how to participate in important public debates. Although there are the myriad attempts to develop a public interest anthropology, we are also wary of activism and public engagement, particularly as we recall government influence on anthropology during times of war.
This theme deserves our scholarly exploration. Analysis of the processes that promote inclusion, collaboration and engagement for positive human outcomes is a common area of interest for both academic and applied/practicing anthropologists, as is clear communication of anthropological perspectives to the wider public.
Inclusion
Anthropology’s historic mission to study humanity through the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities by definition requires the inclusion of multiple disciplines. For example, paleoanthropology and archaeology depend on chemistry, zoology, botany, geology and other disciplines to date sites and interpret data. Similarly, linguistic and sociocultural anthropology regularly include perspectives from other disciplines, including history, philosophy, psychology, and political science. Moreover, there is much merit in an enhanced inclusive dialogue between the branches of anthropology. Cultural and biological anthropology, for example, have opportunities to work together in examining themes such as race, disease, and the environment. Many applied and practicing anthropologists have joint roots in anthropology and other professions such as public health, urban planning, education, business, international development or social work. Their work relies on and contributes to these other disciplines as well as anthropology.
Inclusive anthropology implies more than a holistic or interdisciplinary approach. It suggests research problems and relationships that explicitly address the knowledges and concerns of those who have been relegated to peripheral zones of analysis and theory because of preconceptions about the seemingly static division of intellectual labor. Bringing diverse voices and epistemic perspectives onto the discipline’s center stage—and enlarging that space according to a less hierarchical logic—is consistent with anthropology’s historic principle of inclusion.
Collaboration
Working together toward a common goal is a central characteristic of anthropology, where collaboration may describe work done by teams of anthropologists from diverse subfields or research done by a single anthropologist working together with a subject. For example, heterogeneous research teams in physical anthropology and archeology assemble to address complex intellectual problems. Additionally, the relationship between anthropologists and many Native American tribes might now be best described as collaborative. Native American tribes often require that all anthropological work conducted on reservations directly and actively involve tribal members in the design, implementation, and dissemination of research that addresses problems with contemporary relevance to their tribes. This reconceptualization of the researcher-subject relationship both suggests new challenges and reveals exciting opportunities to improve research and ensure it engages community needs.
Anthropologists who use participatory action methods engage in a knowledge production process that converts “informants” into research consultants and collaborators. These methods can empower local people to have a voice in government and corporate decision-making. Beyond invoking notions of partnership and the sharing of ethnographic authority rhetorically, many anthropologists work to build concrete collaborative relationships in community settings. The benefits, challenges, and contradictory outcomes of collaboration are worthy of examination and constructive self-criticism.
Engagement
Engaged anthropology has many dimensions. Engagement is becoming a key value in college and university settings where anthropologists recognize that relationships with local publics and community organizations are essential to higher education. From both within and outside of academia, engaged anthropologists have examined public policy issues related to welfare reform, immigration, and protection of indigenous knowledge and rights, and have joined with local participants to instigate and sustain government and community change.
In this area anthropology has much to offer, but the discipline has not yet decisively stepped forward. This year’s theme provides an opportunity for academic and applied/practicing anthropologists to engage in dialogue to set a new agenda for making anthropology increasingly relevant to key issues in the twenty-first century, including social identity, economic growth, cultural preservation, peace-making, and environmental and social justice.
Posted by Jovan 
Posted by Jovan 
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